Commedia Beauregard Stages MASTER WORKS: THE VAN GOGH PLAYS, Now thru 5/5

Commedia Beauregard continues its series of plays based on great works of art by featuring Vincent Van Gogh. Tonight, May 2nd the Raven Theatre will be opening a short play festival at the West Stage. Come see how some of Chicago's most exciting, award-winning, up-and-coming playwrights have translated the works of this mad genious into new works for the stage.

The Paintings: CommBeau selected 6 of Van Gogh's plaintings for treatment on this project: Undergrowth with Two Figures, Night Cafe, Skull with Burning Cigarette, The Man is at Sea, Doctor Gachet, and The Drinkers (which can be seen at the Art Institute of Chicago). Take a look at all of the paintings here.

There are a couple CommBeau veterans on the playwright roster, and CommBeau is equally excited to have four newcomers added to the ranks of art translators. Ellen Cribbs is back. Her play Disappointment was part of Master Works: The Museum of Bad Art Plays back in 2011 at Gorilla Tango. Christopher Kidder-Mostrom contributed his plays The Doctor's Lesson and Bottles of Red to The Rembrandt Plays and The Museum Louvre It Or Leave It Plays, respectively. It's great to have them back. Ellen's play Smoke If You Got 'Em is based on Van Gogh's Skeleton with Burning Cigarette. Chris's play this time is The Right Place, based on the painting Undergrowth with Two Figures. The other playwrights on the project are Sean Margaret Wagner, Rory Leahy, Alberto Mendoza, and Jason Linder.

Not unlike with the playwrights, CommBeau has brought back a couple of veterans to helm two of the plays in the line-up. Celia Forrest has worked with CommBeau as the assistant director of Corleone last year. She's going to be at the head of the 2013 production of A Klingon Christmas Carol, too! We also welcome Brittany Westfall back to the fold. She last directed Gena's Demons as part of Master Works: The Museum of Bad Art Plays in 2011. New directors include Toma Langston, Erik Parsons, Niki Dreistadt, and Richard Paro. Given their past directing successes elsewhere, the four newcomers are quite wonderful additions to Commedia Beauregard's roster.

There are a bunch of folks in this show, so CommBeau can't list all of their accomplishments, but if you know any of them, you're going to want to come see them in this for sure! So, who's in the cast? Well... Matt Beard, Celeste Burns, Kathryn Cesarz, Ariana Cohen, Cody Davis, Jennifer Kaesheimer, Andrew Kudla, Cyra K Polizzi, Arne Saupe, Ed Schultz, Abbey Smith, & Denise Smolarek. It's a fine group. You'll want to see their work.

Tickets are now available for Master Works: The Van Gogh Plays. Go to the online box office to purchase tickets through Brown Paper Tickets, or give them a call at 800-838-3006.

Show Dates & Times:

May 2 @ 8 p.m.
May 3 @ 8 p.m.
May 4 @ 8 p.m.
May 5 @ 3:30 p.m.

CommBeau's mission is to translate the universal human experience to the stage: to expand our horizons and share knowledge of all cultures, translating between languages and between arts to create theater that is beautiful in expression.

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