UIS THEATRE'S

2008-2009 Season

Fall 2008

CLOUD 9

BY

Caryl Churchill

Missy Thibodeaux-Thompson will direct an exciting play by  this notable British playwright.  This play was described by the NY Times as "Intelligent, inventive and funny."   The play begins in 1880 in British Colonial Africa, and the following is a description coming from the Samuel French publishing catalogue:  “Cloud 9 is a parody and spoof of the Victorian Empire and its rigid [and oppressive] attitudes especially towards sex. The cast includes Clive, a British functionary, his wife Betty played by a man, their daughter Victoria played by a rag doll, Clive's friend Harry an explorer, Mrs. Saunders who runs about dressed in a riding habit, Clive's son Edward who still plays with dolls and is played by a woman and Joshua a native servant who knows exactly what is really going on. What really is going on is … a non stop round robin of sexual liaisons.  … The second act shifts to London in 1980 except for the … characters it is only twenty five years later and all those repressed sexual longings have evaporated along with the Empire.” 

The production will run Nov. 7, 8, 9 and Nov. 13, 14, & 15 in The Studio Theatre.

Audition Dates look to be sometime in August/September 2008 and will be posted before long on this website.

Spring 2009

As You Like It

By

William Shakespeare

Eric Thibodeaux-Thompson will be directing one of Shakespeare's finest comedies--AS YOU LIKE IT.   Set in France, where Duke Senior is usurped and exiled by his brother, Duke Frederick, Duke Senior and his followers are hiding in the Forest of Arden.  Duke Senior’s daughter, Rosalind, is permitted to stay at court because she and Frederick’s daughter are close.  But, when Rosalind falls in love at first sight with young Orlando, and after Orlando is forced to flee persecution by his older brother, Rosalind and Celia flee to the Forest of Arden, and Rosalind disguises herself as a man, Ganymede.  Of course, as is common in many of Shakespeare’s plays, confusion and mistaken identity ensues, lovers pine for each other, Duke Senior and his followers (along w/ the melancholy Jacques) search for meaning while in hiding in the Forest of Arden, and in the end, Duke Frederick repents, the lovers are all united with the proper mates, and all works out in the end. 

The Production will run April 17, 18, 19 and 23, 24, 25 in The Studio Theatre.

   Audition Dates look to be sometime in early January 2009 and will be posted before long on this website.