Steppenwolf Kicks Off LATE NIGHT @ GARAGE REP Tonight

Steppenwolf Theatre Company has announced the line-up for Late Night @ Garage Rep, a series of cross-genre performances Thursday nights during Garage Rep 2014, starting tonight, March 6. The line-up includes a performance by Salonathon; the play with music, Duo: 1 Is 1, 2 Is Math; Kevin Coval and Young Chicago Authors; James Anthony Zoccoli's Wiggerlover [whiteboy+blackdad=greyareas]; Ian Belknap's one-man Bring Me The Head Of James Franco, That I May Prepare a Savory Goulash In The Narrow And Misshapen Pot Of His Skull; The Gift Theatre's improv group, Natural Gas; and Chicago Dance Crash's Follow The Reader.

Late Night @ Garage Rep performances are in the Garage Theater (1624 N Halsted St) at 11pm, following Thursday evening Garage Rep performances; full schedule below. Tickets ($5) go on sale Friday, January 10 at 11am through Audience Services (1650 N Halsted St), 312-335-1650 and steppenwolf.org.

Late Night @ Garage Rep Line-up:

(All performances, artists and dates are subject to change)

March 6

Salonathon @ Steppenwolf: SAY MY NAME

Hosted and curated by Jane Beachy

With DJ Swaguerrilla

Salonathon, created and curated by Jane Beachy, is a home for underground, emerging and genre-defying works. It seeks to cultivate and showcase boundary-pushing creative acts that have no natural landing place in a fun, inclusive, rigorous atmosphere. Salonathon has run as a weekly series on Monday nights at Beauty Bar in Chicago since July 2011. In addition, Salonathon presents, produces and curates in larger venues for one-off events and short-form series (ie: Metro, Steppenwolf Theatre, Logan Square Auditorium, Chicago Reader/Empty Bottle Presents events). Notable artists include Big Dipper, BAATHHAUS, Ike Holter, Manual Cinema, The Fly Honeys and hundreds of others. Guest hosts and curators include Kelly Kerwin, Joe Varisco and Will Von Vogt. Swaguerrilla is Salonathon's house DJ. facebook.com/salonathon

March 13

Duo: 1 Is 1, 2 Is Math. A Play With Music

Book & Lyrics by Bill C. Thomas

Music by Elizabeth Doyle

Directed by ensemble member Robert Breuler

Featuring Suzanne Petri as She and Roger Anderson as He

Duo: 1 Is 1, 2 Is Math is the I Do! I Do! for the new century. The story follows a couple (Petri and Anderson) from their first meeting through their marriage and the ups and downs of their relationship as they move through their life together, growing, moving, changing, through difficult times and life's lessons until they discover "Why We Stuck." They are funny and moving and human. This sophisticated yet approachable play by Bill C. Thomas and directed by Steppenwolf ensemble member Robert Breuler, is filled with new and affecting music composed by Elizabeth Doyle. Duo is a new work that appeals to everyone from the young couples starting out to couples that are in the middle years-the difficult time in a relationship that is everyday yet long lasting. The story comes alive with insight, intelligence and wit. duothemusical.com

March 20

Young Chicago Authors present The 'Go Live: A New School Variety Show hosted by Kevin Coval

Young Chicago Authors transforms the lives of young people by cultivating their voices through writing, publication, and performance education. YCA offers free weekly programming, workshops and in-school residencies throughout the city of Chicago and Chicagoland. Since 2001, YCA has been the home of Louder Than A Bomb, now the largest youth poetry festival in the world. YCA directly serves 4,500 teens a year through workshops, performance and publication programs, and reaches 10,000 young people and adults through readership of its publications and audiences at its events. youngchicagoauthors.org

March 27

Wiggerlover [whiteboy+blackdad=greyareas]

Featuring James Anthony Zoccoli

With DJ Gregor Mortis

The totally (too-good-to-be-true) true story of one boy's life in an interracial family in Chicago 1979. James Anthony Zoccoli [JAZ] gives a retrospective account of his life as Little Jimmy: a half-Italian, half-Polish kid who wants to be all Black when his White mother gets remarried to an African American man. What is a "Wigger," exactly? Where did the term "Caucasian" originate? What does it mean to "Feel White" or "Act Black"? People are all the same on the inside, right? All of these questions and more are explored in this very personal and very comical storytelling performance. facebook.com/wiggerlover

April 3

Bring Me The Head Of James Franco, That I May Prepare a Savory Goulash In The Narrow

And Misshapen Pot Of His Skull

Written and performed by Ian Belknap

Writer/performer Ian Belknap (founder/Overlord of WRITE CLUB; Wide Open Beaver Shot of My Heart: A Comedy With a Body Count) unleashes his blistering, laceratingly funny fury at vacant-eyed polymath Franco, and the vacuous star-fucker culture that permits him to exist. facebook.com/headlessfranco

April 10

Natural Gas

Formed in 2008 as the improv and sketch extension of The Gift, the members of Natural Gas originally studied together at the famed Second City in Chicago. Inviting new friends to play with them along the way, the Natural Gas ensemble performs every Wednesday night at the Gift. Natural Gas has performed in stages all over Chicago, from the historic Biograph Theater to the Annoyance, the Second City, and elementary schools and high schools alike. The members of the team are a collection of actors, writers, lawyers, and friends... The perfect combination for an improv team. thegifttheatre.org/natural-gas

April 17

Chicago Dance Crash presents Follow The Reader

Established in 2002, Chicago Dance Crash continues its reputation as "...a solidly established ensemble that draws on a slew of styles from breakdance and martial arts to ballet, modern, and jazz... impressively unifying them into a single aesthetic underpinned by strong technique" (Chicago Sun-Times). For Follow The Reader Chicago Dance Crash has 24 hours to transform the Chicago Reader into a living, dancing newspaper. Crash will get their hands on the paper Wednesday, and by Thursday they will take to the stage with a show filled with freshly choreographed pieces, dance battles, improv contests and show stopping antics. Crash serves up the weekend's pop culture with their classic athletic, entertaining style, each dancer striving to become your Reader's Choice. chicagodancecrash.com

The Steppenwolf Garage is dedicated to new plays, new artists and new audiences for the American theater. It offers artists the opportunity to present their work with the scale, space and resources it merits. For audiences, it provides opportunities to engage in multigenerational conversation about the new, provocative work emerging from Chicago's diverse and vibrant theatre scene.

Garage Rep 2014 marks the fifth annual series, featuring The New Colony's reWILDing Genius, Prologue Theatre Company's Saturday Night/Sunday Morning and Walkabout Theater Company's The Wild. For more information about Garage Rep 2014, visit steppenwolf.org/garagerep.

Steppenwolf Theatre Company is America's longest standing, most distinguished ensemble theater, producing nearly 700 performances and events annually in its three Chicago theater spaces-the 515-seat Downstairs Theatre, the 299-seat Upstairs Theatre and the 80-seat Garage Theatre. Formed in 1976 by a collective of actors, Steppenwolf has grown into an ensemble of 43 actors, writers and directors. Artistic programming at Steppenwolf includes a five-play Subscription Season, a two-play Steppenwolf for Young Adults season and two repertory series: First Look Repertory of New Work and Garage Rep. While firmly grounded in the Chicago community, nearly 40 original Steppenwolf productions have enjoyed success both nationally and internationally, including Off-Broadway, Broadway, London, Sydney and Dublin. Steppenwolf has the distinction of being the only theater to receive the National Medal of Arts, in addition to numerous other prestigious honors including an Illinois Arts Legend Award and 12 Tony Awards. Martha Lavey is the Artistic Director and David Hawkanson is the Executive Director. Nora Daley is Chair of Steppenwolf's Board of Trustees. For additional information, visit steppenwolf.org, facebook.com/steppenwolftheatre and twitter.com/steppenwolfthtr.

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