Winter cheer from the Chairs

Stolen Chair would like to wish you and yours our fully non-denominational winter cheer and the best wishes for the coming year!

August 30, 2007 marked Stolen Chair's 5th anniversary, and it's hard to believe how far we've come since we presented Portrait of Dora as a Young Man on a $50 budget in 2002. This year we presented three critically-acclaimed productions, were chosen as New York Press' "Best of Manhattan," and secured public funding from both the city and the state. And we could not have done any of this without your invaluable support!

2008 will bring even bigger projects for the company. This spring, we'll present the world premiere of the third installment of our CineTheatre Tetralogy: The Tragic Swashbuckler (working title), a 1930's swashbuckler as Sophocles might have written it. This comic mash-up of Greek Tragedy and Errol Flynn-era pirate films will feature rapier duels and rapier wit as it satirizes humanity's dependence on moral codes, however flimsy they might be.

There are just a few days left to earn deductions for this tax year, and we hope you'll help us get a head start on next year's fundraising goals by making a charitable contribution to Stolen Chair. Please visit http://donate.stolenchair.org to find our more or click the button below make an online donation.

Wishing you the very best,

The Chairs

Noir in the News...

Kudos to Brooks Reeves and State of Play Theatre for their recent write up in the Times on The City That Cried Wolf. We interviewed Brooks here on the blog almost a year ago in the lead up to our absurdist film noir for the stage, Kill Me Like You Mean It. You can read that interview here or you can find out about the third installment of our CineTheatre Tetralogy (4 years, 4 productions, 4 classic film styles adapted for the stage), a 1930s swashbuckler as Sophocles might have written it. We go into retreat to begin creating the work in...whoah, in 13 minutes! And while we're retreating, go see City..., it's quite a lot of fun, or at least was in FringeNYC two summers ago!

228 page reading packet!

Thanks to Emily the superturg (jf you don't know what one is, go ask your parents, provided, of course, that your parents have MFAs in theatre), we have quite the swanky reading packet (read the table of contents) for The Tragic Swashbuckler, weighing in at a hefty 6 or 7 pounds :).

It contains a bunch of historical, critical, and analytical material about swashbucklers and Greek tragedies, as well as some suggested movies and plays. Interestingly, unlike the last two CineTheatre pieces, it was nigh impossible to get juicy film theory on swashbucklers; most theorists seem to think it's meaningless fluff unworthy of serious scholarly attention.

They're wrong... ;P

Enjoy the packet! And it's not too late to sign up for our upcoming swashbuckling playdate (12/11 @ 7pm)...just email us at info@stolenchair.org.

NYtheatre.com: "Identifying the future leading lights of NYC theatre"

Martin plugs the Chairs in his latest blog post over at the I:

For example, we cited the Brick Theater back in 2004; now they’re one of Time Out-New York’s favorite venues. In 2005, Stolen Chair Theatre Company was on our list; this year, they’re on the New York Press’s “Best of Manhattan” list. Qui Nguyen and Robert Ross Parker of Vampire Cowboys were honorees for us in 2004; in 2006 they won the Caffe Cino Fellowship from the New York Innovative Theatre Awards. And Daniel Talbott of Rising Phoenix Theatre Company was a “Person of the Year” in 2006; and Rising Phoenix won the Caffe Cino Award in 2007.

Thanks, Martin!

The new news

December newsletter 1 of 2 has just been sent to our eblast subscribers (sign up here!) featuring the official announcement of The Tragic Swashbuckler, details about the upcoming playdate, links to the two November print features on Stolen Chair, and a plea for all our supporters to make their holiday purchases with Giveline.

Calling all would be swashbucklers & tragedians!

The Tragic Swashbuckler Playdate: Tuesday, Dec 11 (evening)

The Stolen Chair Theatre Company invites all interested male collaborators to join us for 2 hours of collective creation as we begin developing The Tragic Swashbuckler, the third installment of our critically-acclaimed CineTheatre Tetralogy, a 1930s swashbuckler by way of Aeschylus, exploring how susceptible morality can be to the conflicting pulls of loyalty to self, lover, family, fraternity, nation, and god. This comic mash-up will feature rapier duels and rapier wit as it satirizes humanity's dependence on moral codes, however flimsy they might be.

We're starting from scratch on this and we need your help. If you're a fan of classic 1930s Errol Flynn swashbucklers (or even the more contemporary Princess Bride and Pirates of the Carribean), have had some experience performing Greek tragedy, enjoy a good stage fight, or just want to wile away 2 hours playing pirates, we hope you'll join us. While the evening will by no means be structured like an "audition," participants will be the casting pool for the two all-expense-paid creative retreats (the weekends of Dec 15 & Jan 5), the staged reading (the weekend of Feb 2), and the production itself (running for 4 weeks beginning April 18).

Please contact info@stolenchair.org with a letter of interest if you'd like to attend and please note if you would be interested and available for either or both of the retreats, the reading, and the production.

About the CineTheatre Tetralogy: In 2005, Stolen Chair debuted The Man Who Laughs, a live silent film for the stage. The play was met with popular and critical acclaim and has since been published in Playing with Canons, inspiring Stolen Chair to launch an ambitious 3 year program to adapt 3 other classic film styles to the stage. The next installment of the series was 2006's Kill Me Like You Mean It, an absurdist film noir for the stage which was called an "intriguing" "clever" "high-styling" "must-see" "stroke of genius" by an assortment of critics. The company plans to run all four of the installments in repertory for its 8th season in 2010.

About Stolen Chair: The Stolen Chair Theatre Company is a critically-acclaimed award-winning collaborative theatre laboratory dedicated to the theft, recycling and re-examination of historical performance styles, and the creation of visually stunning and uniquely contemporary work where the earnest and ironic happily co-exist. Stolen Chair was featured in New York Press' Best of Manhattan 2007, is a recipient of NYtheatre.com's People of the Year award, and has been praised by TimeOut, Flavorpill, nytheatre.com, Backstage, and PBS' New Theatre Corps. The company's 6th season is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.