Two By Haven

Neil Haven has had a great deal of success on both local stages lately. The irreverent puppet show staging of his Who Killed Santa? Returned for a second staging last winter. This coming week, two more of his scripts make it to the stage.

At 7:30 pm on Monday, February 22^nd, the MGAC presents a staged reading of a new piece that they had commissioned him to write. The impressive cast of Angela Iannone, T. Stacy Hicks, Dan Katula Kurt Ollman and Dylan Zalewski will read Pink Champaign

 The story sound promising . . . a parental couple track down their out-of-the-closet seventeen year-old son. The parents, their son and his estranged gay grandfather have something of an impromptu family reunion. Sounds like it could be interesting. The reading is being presented for a suggested $10 donation.

For more info, visit the MGAC’s website.

For reservations, please call 414-383-3727.

And at 7:30 pm on Thursday, February 25^th, In Tandem Theatre  presents a brand new staging of what is by far Neil Haven’s best work to datethe appealing comedy Stuck. An earlier production of the play ran at In Tandem’s 10^th Street Theatre recently. The new production is being fully-produced by In Tandem and co-directed by In Tandem co-founder Chris Flieller. It’s about this elevator operator at a retro hotel . . . she’s agoraphobic and rarely makes it out of the elevator.

The In Tandem production features a cast almost exclusively consisting of some of my favorite local actors . . . let’s seeKaren Estrada and Doug Jarecki of sketch comedy group the Show are joined by Allison Mary Forbes (a talented comic actress who has done a whole bunch of great work,) Libby Amato (most recently seen in Invader? at the Alchemist) and Nicholas Harazin (whose done some really great work in local Shakespeare shows . . .) At the center of it all in the lead role is newcomer Leia Espericueta as the agoraphobic lead.

 In Tandem’s Stuck runs through March 14th at the 10th Street Theatre.