Trademark Theater's Third Season Includes THE HOLLOW, COLLEGE LIFE, and More!

Trademark Theater announces its 2019 season today. The company's third season features a community driven piece developed with local college students, a new character-driven solo performance created by Tyler Michaels King, as well as Trademark's third World Premiere production. Each of our Season Three projects is pushing the boundaries of traditional theater making, says Trademark's Artistic Director, Tyler Michaels King. As always, we strive to keep the experience fresh for our audiences never the same thing twice. Each presentation is totally unique and serves as a great example of our mission to develop and produce bold new theater.

Kicking off the season in early May is a workshop reading of playwright Tyler Mills' new piece, College Life. College Life, is a new play developed through interviews with college undergraduates. The play will give voice to the daily concerns of students and challenge the perspective that they are too young or inexperienced to engage with large ideas. Staged with college-aged performers, College Life will explore the power of young people getting to speak for themselves. Tyler Mills' community driven work continues to excite me, says Michaels King. After the success of last year's Understood, I am excited to watch him go even deeper with an even more specific group of our local community Mills has already interviewed over 50 college students from local colleges including St. Thomas and the University of Minnesota. This workshop reading will be the first presentation of the new work in development and will be shown at the A Mill Artist Lofts Performance Studio May 6th and 7th, 2019. Local actor, director, writer and arts educator Jay Owen Eisenberg (currently starring in Theater Latt Da's Hedwig and the Angry Inch) will direct the reading.

In the fall of 2019, Trademark will bring to life its third World Premiere Production. The Hollow is a concept album/contemporary performance hybrid. The multidisciplinary production explores the mysticism of the outdoors and the dualities of human nature through music, movement, and stunning visuals. The Hollow is about confronting our demons, whether in the woods, underground, or in our own bodies and minds. This piece has been in development for three years at Trademark, our longest timeline yet, says Michaels King. It is the most challenging piece we will have staged thus far: an unconventional presentation that uses only music and movement to tell a story about two people searching for meaning. Simple and timeless themes weave through the piece, folding in and out of the musical experience. In terms of style, it is the most contemporary we've gone as a company.

The Hollow was created by local musicians Jenna Wyse and Joey Ford (Coy & Daring, Tree Party), Emily Michaels King (E/D, Children's Theatre Company's The Lorax, Moving Company's Love's Labour's Lost), and Artistic Director Tyler Michaels King. The Hollow will be presented at the Tek Box in the Cowles Center, October 2nd through October 20th, 2019.

Lastly, Trademark's Third Season features a workshop presentation of Immortal, a new solo performance conceived by Tyler Michaels King. This character-driven, cabaret-style, one-man performance explores aging, the end of life, and mortality through the eyes of a fading entertainer standing before his final curtain. With his unique transformative and musical style, Tyler will bring to life this brand-new alter-ego in collaboration with local composer/lyricist Keith Hovis (Jefferson Township Sparkling Junior Talent Pageant; Pioneer Suite, The Striker) and director and Joe Krienke (Soma Studios; Dell'Arte International School of Physical Theatre). This idea has been germinating for the past few years, but I could never find the right way to bring it to light, Says Michaels King. After meeting with both Keith and Joe, and knowing the talents they bring in the musical world and physical theater/clowning world respectively, I knew they were the perfect team to make this show a reality.

Immortal's workshop presentation will be shown at Cabaret @ Camp Bar in St. Paul on Dec 9th, 2019, a one-night-only event.

This season is the culmination of the work we began over three years ago when we first started the company, Michaels King shares. The Hollow is the last of those first three projects we began with in 2017. It's the finish line for Trademark's first phase. As we look ahead to future seasons, our board and staff are developing new paths for our company to forge. More artists, more voices, more projects and programs. Growing from a company into an institution. That has always been our mission. We are excited to start to make some of that a reality as we continue to make high-quality art for the Twin Cities and Minnesota.

Trademark Theater challenges the boundaries of traditional theater-making, and expands the breadth of original theatrical works produced in Minnesota by creating, developing and producing dynamic stage productions. Trademark seeks to bring new focus to new works while provide space and resources for artists, both local and national, to create bold, provocative, risk-taking new theater in the heart of the Midwest.

Ticket packages for Trademark's third season are on sale now for $45. To purchase tickets and to find more information, head to www.trademarktheater.org.

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