FUN GRIP INVENTIUM heading to the 2024 Omaha Fringe Festival

Audacity Theatre Lab in collaboration with Fun Grip Improv presents
Jeff Swearingen and Brad McEntire in... THE FUN GRIP INVENTIUM

Started in early 2006, FUN GRIP is a comedy duo consisting of Jeff Swearingen and Brad McEntire. This Texas-based long-form improv partnership presents The Inventium, a single set where Brad and Jeff create a one-time-only, completely improvised play on stage.

Playing this summer at the 2024 Omaha Fringe Festival

Details:
Blackstone Theatre,
3624 Farnam St, Omaha, NE 68131   [map]

Friday August 9 at 8:00 pm,
Saturday August 10 at 6:30 pm,
Sunday August 11 at 3:30 pm
​
ickets for this festival are $10. For more info about the festival (tix, shows, etc.) visit the Omaha Fringe website... HERE

For more on Fun Grip Improv visit... HERE

#   #   #

Perhaps you would be interested in adding more excitement and romance, adventure and intrigue to your life. If that's the case, I don't know what to tell you. But I would suggest you subscribe to my newsletter. I mean, who knows? Life is full of surprises. I only send stuff out occasionally, but it is good stuff. Hit the button below...

Leave a comment. If you are a robot or a blatant marketer trolling Blogger, then you will be gleefully deleted. Humans only, please.

Spanish language version of I BROUGHT HOME A CHUPACABRA now available

The Spanish version of my monologue play I Brought Home a Chupacabra is now out as a Kindle ebook on Amazon. Big grateful shout-out to fellow solo performer and all-around fantastic human Frida Espinosa Muller of Cara Mia Theatre for the translation assist.

Here's a link to the play on Amazon:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D71RC7YY

The English-version is, of course, still available on Amazon. Thanks to Lauren Moore for originating the piece back in 2014 (that's who is here on the cover) and Ruth Engel-McEntire for directing.

Here's the blurb for my Spanish-speaking friends:

Una mujer trae casa el legendario Chupacabras de antaño

En este extraño e hilarante monólogo, una joven encuentra una bestia semimítica durante una caminata y la lleva casa. Durante los próximos días se verá obligada descubrir por qué conecta mejor con los animales que con las personas.

Esta es la versión en españ encantador monólogo de Brad McEntire.

#   #   #

Perhaps you would be interested in adding more excitement and romance, adventure and intrigue to your life. If that's the case, I don't know what to tell you. But I would suggest you subscribe to my newsletter. I mean, who knows? Life is full of surprises. I only send stuff out occasionally, but it is good stuff. Hit the button below...

Leave a comment. If you are a robot or a blatant marketer trolling Blogger, then you will be gleefully deleted. Humans only, please.

ENTERPRISE at Theatre Southeast

Student actors DaShaun Ellis, Lily Clouse, Isara Al-Hilo and Ethan Melendez

credit: TCC-SE

I recently directed Brian Parks' comedy Enterprise at Tarrant County College's Southeast Campus. I had a great student cast and crew. My faculty colleagues also added to the quality of this fast-paced biting corporate satire.

Enterprise was the winner of the Fringe First Award at the 2017 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Four businesspeople arrive in the morning at their skyscraper office and soon learn that their company is on the brink of collapse. What follows is an antic all-day, all-night effort, as the four race to save their jobs by the next morning.

Enterprise is fast-paced, edgy, semi-surreal comedy about business, ambition, skyscrapers… and office bathrooms.

It played April 17–19 at 7:30 p.m., with a matinee on April 19 at 1:30 pm at at the Roberson Theatre on the TCC Southeast Campus, 2100 Southeast Pkwy., Arlington, TX 76018. Tickets were Pay-What-You-Can.

The audience seemed to dig it and the actors slowly grew into their roles, both tightening up delivery and relaxing into characters over the run of the play.

#   #   #

Perhaps you would be interested in adding more excitement and romance, adventure and intrigue to your life. If that's the case, I don't know what to tell you. But I would suggest you subscribe to my newsletter. I mean, who knows? Life is full of surprises. I only send stuff out occasionally, but it is good stuff. Hit the button below...

Leave a comment. If you are a robot or a blatant marketer trolling Blogger, then you will be gleefully deleted. Humans only, please.

At the South West Theatre Conference 2024

Swearingen performing The Beast of Hyperborea at SWTC 2024

After presenting The Beast of Hyperborea at TEXFest 2024 back in February, the production by Audacity Theatre Lab was chosen to advance to the South West Theatre Conference (SWTC) in Little Rock, Arkansas in April.

The SWTC is a theatre service organization working to enhance the theatre experience for theatres in Arkansas, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas. Theatres from those states gathered to present plays that were adjudicated by theatre professionals. It was held April 4-6 at The Studio Theatre in Little Rock (320 W 7th St, Little Rock, AR 72201).

Swearingen and I loaded up The Beast of Hyperborea stuff and headed out to attend. The "conference" was really just a very small gathering of about five theatres with their cast and crews as well as three adjudicators. Despite the bad luck to be the first show to present for the weekend and a couple of technical glitches by the board ops, both lights and sound (again, went first, so we were the show that was used to work out the bugs), The Beast of Hyperborea made a decent showing.

Swearingen was slightly better rehearsed this time around and we took some notes from Victoria (new costume and repainted set pieces), but the show was not quite as dynamic as the performance had been back in February. 

Although we did not "win" in Little Rock as we did in Victoria back in February, Swearingen still garnered an "Outstanding Actor" Award and we received some overwhelmingly positive feedback from the adjudicators. Again, the observations were subjective, but again, there were a few nuggets of wisdom.

Unfortunately, Circle Arts Theatre from New Braunfels, TX was unable to bring their production of Feeding the Moonfish, so Baytown Little Theatre was thrown in. They brought their production of The Guys as the other representative company from Texas. They ended up being named "Outstanding Production." It was nice to see actor Lyle Tate again, who again was awarded an acting award alongside Swearingen.

Little Rock had the vibe of an MC Escher artwork (very confusing with lots of road construction). The hotel, out by the airport, charged for their breakfast buffet (usually complimentary) and the building seemed to be designed by someone who had dropped out of architecture school. Plus, we were there the weekend before the eclipse. Lots of RVs and people setting up in the parking lot with telescopes. Little Rock was in the path of the upcoming eclipse. On top of that, and there was a kids pageant in the hotel, so anytime I got on the elevator, I was in it with either an elderly eclipse enthusiast or a little girl slathered with too much make-up being openly berated by her overbearing pageant mom. Between the barely-a-conference and the hotel stay it made for a very weird weekend.

On the plus side, Swearingen and I discovered a great place for beers, open late, that had a wonderful patio for cigars (cigarettes for Swearingen) called the Rail Yard. Great burgers, too.

#   #   #

Perhaps you would be interested in adding more excitement and romance, adventure and intrigue to your life. If that's the case, I don't know what to tell you. But I would suggest you subscribe to my newsletter. I mean, who knows? Life is full of surprises. I only send stuff out occasionally, but it is good stuff. Hit the button below...

Success at TEXFest 2024

Jeff Swearingen performing The Beast of Hyperborea at TEXFest 2024

Brought back a bunch of plaques

This was taken at the end of the weekend. My tired eyes tell the tale...

Audacity Theatre Lab returned from TEXFest with a collection of nifty awards. I presented my production of The Beast of Hyperborea as well as took adjudication training, took several workshops and even taught several workshops on my own. 

TEXFest is an biannual theatre conference produced by TNT (Theatre Network of Texas). This year it was held in Victoria, TX from February 21 - 25, 2024 at the Leo J. Welder Center for the Performing Arts in Victoria, TX. The conference featured performances from theatres around Texas, workshops and other events. Two productions from TEXFest 2024 were chosen to advance. The Beast of Hyperborea was one of those productions. It will move on to perform at the Southwest Theatre Conference (SWTC) in Little Rock, Arkansas in April.

Big congrats to the other advancing production Feeding The Moonfish from Circle Arts Theatre in New Braunfels, TX.

And, of course, congratulations to my friend and colleague Jeff Swearingen for bringing The Beast Of Hyperborea to life on stage. I did the directing and rest of the behind-the-scenes stuff and Jeff acted in the piece as he did last summer.

Jeff and I at TEXFest 2024. The Beast of Hyperborea was judged Best Production

Jeff ended up winning an Audience Acclaim Award in Acting, A well-deserved accolade that was voted on by the audiences. He tied for the award with Lyle Tate from the Baytown Little Theatre's production of The Guys. Sidenote: Lyle proved to be a real champ since he let us borrow his black clip-on costume necktie when we discovered - fifteen minutes before curtain - that Jeff had forgotten his own necktie. Much appreciation for Mr. Tate.

ATL also received recognition for being an official participating production in the conference at all. Big thanks to the adjudicators Annette Procunier, David Eck, and Michael Winters for some useful feedback. Truth be told, the feedback was mostly subjective opinions, but did have a gem of value here and there. Specifically, what they had to say about technical things.

Presenting my Crafting to Solo Show workshop, complete with Power Point.

On top of the production, I also taught a workshop on "Crafting a Solo Show" based on my recent book. I taught it twice. One session only had two folks, but the second session had half a dozen. Each morning (not to mention once a week via Zoom for several weeks prior to the conference) I attended extensive adjudication training at TEXFest! 

Swearingen and I had some trouble with the hotel in Victoria and that pulled my attention a bit. We also accidently stumbled into the most pro-Trump BBQ joint on the planet, talked shop and had a chance one evening to catch up with our mutual friend Wes Copeland over rum and cokes.  Needless to say, it was  a busy weekend !

#   #   #

Perhaps you would be interested in adding more excitement and romance, adventure and intrigue to your life. If that's the case, I don't know what to tell you. But I would suggest you subscribe to my newsletter. I mean, who knows? Life is full of surprises. I only send stuff out occasionally, but it is good stuff. Hit the button below...

The Beast of Hyperborea heads to TEXFest 2024

The Beast of Hyperborea

Featuring Jeff Swearingen
Written and Directed by Brad McEntire

The Beast of Hyperborea is an mystifying tale told in the tradition of Victorian adventure fiction. The tale concerns an eccentric group of explorers who set off for on a daring quest to a remote island in search of a legendary monster.

I am pleased that the show has been selected to play at TEXFest 2024

TEXFest is an biannual theatre conference produced by TNT (Theatre Network of Texas). 

TEXFest 2024 will be held in Victoria, TX from February 21 - 25, 2024 at the Leo J. Welder Center for the Performing Arts in Victoria, TX. The conference features performances from theatres around Texas, workshops and other events. 2 productions from TEXFest 2024 will move on to perform at Southwest Theatre Conference (SWTC).

Friday, February 23 at 4:30 pm

Leo J. Welder Center for the Performing Arts at Victoria College, located at 214 N Main St, Victoria, TX 77901

I will also be teaching a workshop at TEXFest. Details coming soon.

More info... HERE