New Colony Announces The Warriors 3/17-4/17

The New Colony is proud to announce the world premiere of The Warriors written by Company Member Evan Linder, conceived by Company Member Mary Hollis Inboden. Directed by Benno Nelson, The Warriors runs March 17 - April 17 at the Second Stage Theatre, 3408 N. Sheffield Ave. Opening/Press night is Sunday, March 20 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $25 and are now on sale. The production runs Thursdays - Sundays at 7:30 p.m. Tickets may be purchased at 773.413.0TNC (0862) or thenewcolony.org.

When Chicago actress and New Colony Company Member Mary Hollis Inboden (Best Female Performer, Sketchbook X, The New Colony's Five Lesbians Eat A Quiche) was 12 years old, she was living in Jonesboro, Arkansas. Westside Middle School in Jonesboro was a typical middle school and, at that time, the most famous student was former Miss America 1990, Debbye Turner. However, on March 24, 1998, Westside Middle School would become known for a new reason.

Just after lunch at Westside Middle School; two classmates dressed in camouflage opened fire from the woods behind the school on a group of students and teachers waiting on the playground after a fire drill. The students would later learn that the school was evacuated because one of their future assailants pulled the fire alarm. When the firing ceased, five people were dead and another ten were injured. Inboden had lost one of her best friends in the assault and had become a survivor of the Westside Middle School Massacre, one of the many school shootings in 1998 that led up to the most well known school shooting at Columbine High School in 1999.

More than a decade later, Inboden looks back at the event and who her fellow Westside Middle School Warriors are today. Based on numerous interviews with the survivors, The Warriors tells the stories of their daily battles and triumphs living in the shadow of this event and Inboden's own struggle to come to terms with her feelings towards her hometown, former classmates and the consequences of April 1998.

The Warriors, is an honest and irreverent homecoming that mixes fact, fiction, identity and history. Inboden and Linder conducted numerous interviews to create the people who represent Jonesboro. Inboden says, "The New Colony process has been more than valuable to The Warriors because I had no desire to create a play about the tragic event itself, a work of complete and total non-fiction, or a one-woman show. I didn't want to be the voice for all of these characters who are based, no matter how loosely, on real people. I didn't to have to be a hero or a villain as I feared would be inevitable if I were the sole creator of the play. With all of the actors and creative team playing the active role they do in a New Colony production I have been able to both raise my own ideas and prejudices and see them complicated, enriched and interpreted in the telling of this very personal story." These composite characters created give voice to the children who witnessed one of the most horrific events of the 1990's and how that shapes them as an adults. Focusing not on the event that unites them but on how they have grown up as survivors.

Written by Evan Linder, The Warriors is directed by Benno Nelson with Assistant Director Christopher Shea. The script supervisor is Megan Johns, with original music composed by Julie B. Nichols. The cast members are Sarah Gitenstein, Mary Hollis Inboden, Whit Nelson, Nicole Pellegrino, Michael Peters and Wes Needham.

The Warrior's staff also includes Alice Magelssen, stage manager; Shaun Renfro, scenic designer; Jared Debacker, production manager; Kent Cubbage, lighting designer; Andrew Wheatley, sound designer and Mieka van der Ploeg, costume designer.
THE NEW COLONY MISSION
The New Colony, named one of Chicago's "Essentials" by Time Out Chicago, is currently concluding their second season. Following their successful Chicago extended run, The New Colony's "Hearts Full of Blood" was awarded "Best Playwright" at the New York International Fringe Festival and was one of 200 productions invited back for their encore series. In addition, NewCity named The New Colony Artistic Director Andrew Hobgood one of "The Fifty People Who Really Perform for Chicago." The New Colony strives contributes original material to the American artistic canon and develop a new kind theater going audience. Through collaboration with emerging artists of all disciplines, The New Colony continually develops new work and fresh perspectives. With the goal of exploring enticing subject matter and The Common language of experience, The New Colony will help cultivate the next generation of arts supporters.

The Warriors begins March 17 and continues through April 17 at the Second Stage Theatre, 3408 N. Sheffield Ave. The Warriors runs March 17 - April 17 at the Second Stage Theatre, 3408 N. Sheffield Ave. Opening/Press night is Sunday. March 20 at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $25 and are now on sale. The production runs Thursdays - Sundays at 7:30 p.m. Tickets may be purchased at 773.413.0TNC (0862) or thenewcolony.org.

 

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