Sideshow Theatre Company Announces All-Digital 2021 Season

Sideshow Theatre Company has announced its 2021 Season, featuring an all-virtual line-up of entertainment.

The season kicks-off this month with a one-night-only benefit screening of Sideshow's 2018 hit You For Me For You, written by Mia Chung and directed by Ensemble Member Elly Green. This summer, Sideshow presents a reading of Preston's Choi's new play Drive-In at the End of the World, directed by Associate Artistic Director Justin J. Sacramone and created through "The Freshness Initiative," Sideshow's new play development program. Throughout the year audiences can also enjoy the Sideshow House Party Series, five virtual readings by some of the company's favorite playwrights - each followed by an interactive celebration.

Comments Sideshow Artistic Director Regina Victor, "The Sideshow Ensemble is excited to have cultivated a season full of curiosity and delight to gather the community in these tough times. Looking at the plays we've chosen to present, each one in their own way asks the question: Who am I, and who decides that, really? Power dynamics play out across race, class and gender in unconventional ways across our season, and there's even quite a bit of magic sprinkled in. I'm so grateful, in this moment of leadership transition and COVID-19, to be able to continue to build upon Sideshow's legacy of presenting and developing some of Chicago's most memorable and exciting plays. I really have the ensemble's artistic determination, and the dedication of my Executive Director and board to thank for that."

Sideshow Theatre Company's 2021 Season:

Sunday, February 28, 2021 at 7 pm CST

You For Me For You - A One Night Only Streaming Fundraiser

Written by Mia Chung

Directed by Ensemble Member Elly Green

An archival recording of Sideshow's 2018 hit production You For Me For You. Two North Korean sisters plan an elaborate escape from the "Best Nation in the World," only to be separated at the border. Now in two strange and separate worlds filled with outrageous characters, they must navigate barriers of language and bureaucracy, reckon with the ways that culture and country can shape us, and discover that survival requires sacrifice.

Tickets (general admission: pay-what-you-can; dinner package add-ons + meal donations: $40 - $150) go on sale soon at sideshowtheatre.org.

Tuesday, July 13, 2021

Drive-In at the End of the World, part of Sideshow's "The Freshness Initiative"

Written by Preston Choi

Directed by Associate Artistic Director Justin J. Sacramone

Dramaturgy by Yasmin Zacaria Mikhaiel

Life at a small town drive-in gets a lot more interesting when Mothman shows up and everything burns down to the ground. The rag tag crew, now amateur paranormal investigators, try to turn a profit as a cavalcade of cryptids crash through their crumbling community. Apocalyptic and irreverent, Drive In at the End of the World is on the hunt to find who will come out on top and who will become bait.

"The Freshness Initiative" is Sideshow's commissioning and new play development program, now in its sixth year. Previous commissions include works by Aurora Real de Asua, J. Nicole Brooks, Kristiana Rae Colón and Brynne Frauenhoffer.

March 19 - September 17, 2021

Sideshow House Party Series

Remember house parties after a show? It's like that, but digital! Scattered throughout the calendar year, Sideshow will broadcast five readings of plays we love, written by playwrights we love. Every party has to have a theme, darling, and we will not disappoint. A play is an event, and so each play will have a customized party experience to bring us together even when we're apart. The full line-up includes:

Friday, March 19, 2021 at 7 pm CST

Thin Mints

Written by Ellen Steves

Directed by Associate Artistic Director Justin J. Sacramone

Thin Mints follows a troop of Bonfire Girls during a five-day woodland jamboree as they prepare for an important election. At the end of the retreat, one scout will be chosen to take over the Troop. The girls use torture, terror, and trauma to claw their way to the top... but who is really pulling the strings? The play scores 100% on the Bechdel Test and offers a warped perspective on the consequences of a community governed by abuse and manipulation.

Friday, April 23, 2021 at 7 pm CST

A Heap See

Written by Dawn Renee Jones

Director TBA

Koua is a fast-moving whirlwind. By age 24, she had survived the "American War" in Laos and refugee camps in Thailand. This mother of six is determined to give her children a better life in St. Paul, Minnesota where she faces her greatest obstacles.

Friday, May 21, 2021 at 7 pm CST

Once in a Bleu Moon

Written by Mallory Raven-­Ellen Backstrom

Directed by Artistic Director Regina Victor

As her stars realign and a fateful blood moon approaches on the eve of her thirty-third birthday, Bleu casts a forbidden spell. To undo the damage Bleu must master her ancestral demons by accepting that, with a dash of magick, she can have it all...If not all at once. Once in a Bleu Moon is a witchy fable about womb magick, self-forgiveness and breaking generational curses.

Friday, August 20, 2021 at 7 pm CST

Fabuloso!

Written by Makasha Copeland

Director TBA

Armed with all purpose cleaner and the resilience of that cockroach from Wall-E, three maids and a middle-schooler are tasked with removing the stains from Oak Hill Resort. When their boss is found dead in the master suite, this cleaning crew must launch their own investigation. Who killed whomst, and who gives a sh*t?

Friday, September 17, 2021 at 7 pm CST

The Whisperer's Apprentice

Written by Ensemble Member Walt McGough

Director TBA

In a world where storytelling is magic, an ancient kingdom is collapsing. Two young siblings go searching for the one woman who could help stave off chaos, but she is hiding in the forest, haunted by regrets. Will the tale that shapes the world finally break, once and for all? The Whisperer's Apprentice is a magical, theatrical exploration of who wields power in the stories we tell, and what it costs them to maintain it.

As a companion event to this reading, playwright Walt McGough will lead a group of hale and hearty Sideshow artists through a weekly, live-streamed and completely ridiculous campaign of Dungeons & Dragons. Capturing a different (and dice-rolling) kind of magic, this campaign will immerse audiences in an exciting, serialized new form of collaborative storytelling, and highlight just how much is possible when some of the best artists in the city work together to save the world.

Ticket information, casts and additional directors will be announced soon on sideshowtheatre.org. Follow @SideshowTheatre.

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