Out of Box Theatre's 2015-16 Season to Focus on Moral Ambiguity

From Out of Box Theatre

Not everything is easily sorted into black and white, especially in difficult situations. Out of Box’s fourth season is ambitious, and it is filled with comedy, drama, and music that shine a light into the gray areas that people inevitably face in their lives.

“We don’t start out with a theme, but as we choose the plays a theme begins to make itself very clear,” says Out of Box Artistic Director, Carolyn Choe. “The plays that spoke to us this year clearly show that there is a large area in which it is hard to define and choose what is morally the correct thing to do.”

The season opener is Blackpool and Parrish by David Belke, a Canadian comedy that pits Agent for All Good against Agent for All Evil in the final Armageddon, which has been inconveniently scheduled for tomorrow at teatime. The season ends with Rapture, Blister, and Burn by Gina Gionfriddo, featuring three generations of women sharing their raucous and refreshing approaches to navigating work, love, and family. This new comedy takes a sharp look at how women – and men – find happiness and conquer disappointment.

In between Armageddon and the Rapture, Out of Box is proud to feature original works by local playwrights. Mama Bear by Sharron Harris Warrick revolves around Debra, a woman dealing with an out-of-control son, and an escalating series of events that ultimately drives this stressed-out woman to an act of desperation with a dramatic ripple effect. The Spins, by Sara Crawford, focuses on a young woman haunted by the death of her musician brother and features new original music.

Family relationships offer another arena in which the gray area is widespread. Out of Box presents the Atlanta premier of Other Desert Cities, written by ABC’s Brothers & Sisters creator Jon Robin Baitz, a Pulitzer Prize finalist and Tony Award nominee. A writer returns home after many years and announces that she is about to publish a memoir dredging up a pivotal and tragic event in the family’s history. It’s a wound they don’t want reopened, but the writer bravely draws a line in the sand and dares her family to cross it.

In addition, Neil LaBute’s In a Forest, Dark and Deep, is a dark journey into sibling rivalry that escalates into a psychological thriller bursting with savage conflict. By contrast, the outrageous comedyThe Kitchen Witches features two “mature” cable-access cooking show hostesses who’ve hated one another for thirty years because of a romantic rivalry. When circumstances throw them together on a TV show, the insults are flung harder than the food.

Love offers one of the greatest areas of ambiguity, and there is no better place to see it than in Stephen Sondheim’s musical Company. Habitually single Robert is forced to question his adamant retention of bachelorhood during a hilarious array of interactions. In David Lindsay-Abaire’s Good People, Margie risks all she as tries to find a fresh start by reaching out to an old flame from her youth, now a successful doctor.

Out of Box lunges headfirst into the moral ambiguity surrounding current events. The regional premier of The Library, which opened this year on Broadway, is a bold and chilling play about the aftermath of a school shooting, written by acclaimed writer Scott Z. Burns (Side Effects, Contagion, The Bourne Ultimatum). The Library asks us to examine our relationship to the truth and the lies that claim to heal us. Out of Box also offers Two Rooms by Lee Blessing; it was originally set in the 1980s but is sadly still relevant to our world today. As an American professor is held prisoner in a windowless room in Beirut, his wife strips the furniture of a room in their home so that she, at least symbolically, can share his ordeal. Ultimately, she is forced to make a choice: does she trust the efforts of the State Department, or does she utilize the media to put pressure on those who hold the fate of her husband in their hands?

And no season is complete without holiday productions. Comedy is king for Christmas with a show for the entire family, A Dickens Carol: A Traveling Travesty in Two Tumultuous Acts. The Styckes-Upon-Thump Repertory Company embarks on their fifteenth annual tour of the Dickens classic. When the company’s diva feigns illness, this merry troupe of over-the-hill and upstart actors carry on without her. Midway through the doomed performance, the diva rushes in to reclaim her role. Total mayhem ensues as the company scrambles to keep the show going while everything goes hilariously wrong. As always, the late-night adult comedy show Santa After Hours returns with Santa After Hours 2015: The Wreck-oning by the “Usual Gang of Idiots.”

Season Flex Passes are now available, as well as tickets for individual productions. Out of Box Theatre is located at the Artisan Resource Center, 585 Cobb Pkwy S. in Marietta. For tickets and more information visit them online at www.outofboxtheatre.com or call 678-653-4605.

Out of Box Theatre aims to captivate audiences with a dynamic approach to contemporary theatre, with a dedication to creating a one-of-a-kind, intimate experience that will continue to surprise and excite audiences for years to come. We call it the “Out of Box Experience.”