Chicago’s premier solo performance festival returns!
Lifeline Theatre and Live Bait Theater are thrilled to present a joint revival of the FILLET OF SOLO FESTIVAL, running for four weeks at multiple Chicago venues.
This year’s fest features unforgettable performances by solo artists Caroline Andres, Julie Ganey, Cindy Hanson, Nicole Hollander, Deb R. Lewis, Tekki Lomnicki, Rett Lowell, Matt Miller, Dorothy Milne, Kim Morris, Clare Nolan, Caitlin Parrish, Martie Sanders, Pamela Webster, John Wilson, Doug Whippo, and James Anthony Zoccoli.
| 7:00pm | 2nd Story |
Performances are only $10! The complete festival schedule is listed below. For tickets to any performance, click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
| WEEK ONE: July 29-August 1 |
Thursday (7/29), Friday (7/30) & Saturday (7/31)
At Lifeline Theatre (6912 N. Glenwood Avenue, Chicago)
And on Saturday, August 21, join us for a celebration of the life and work of Tekki Lomnicki!
Kim Morris, Doug Whippo and John Wilson explore the arc of human experience. All are company members of 2nd Story, a wildly popular, Chicago-based storytelling troupe that performs regularly at Webster’s Wine Bar in Lincoln Park and the Morseland in Rogers Park.
Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
| 8:30pm | The Sweat Girls are A-Gaga! |
Members of the 17-year old storytelling troupe (Caroline Andres, Cindy Hanson, Clare Nolan, Martie Sanders and Pamela Webster), tell tales of becoming a mama in your 40’s… and losing the mama moniker when your baby goes to college… and figuring out if you’re going to need to be a mama to both your grandmamma and mother. It’s all just the stuff of life, as the Sweat Girls “illuminate the extraordinary within the usual and the profundity in the everyday.” (Windy City Times)
Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
Sunday (8/1)
At Lifeline Theatre (6912 N. Glenwood Avenue, Chicago)
| 3:00pm | The Sweat Girls are A-Gaga! (Description above) |
| Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477. |
WEEK TWO: August 5-8
Thursday (8/5)
At Lifeline Theatre (6912 N. Glenwood Avenue, Chicago)
| 7:00pm | Grown Up |
| Dorothy Milne hadn’t noticed that time was passing and suddenly her generation is in charge. Worse yet, she’s in charge! With her older relatives passed on, Dorothy is definitely a grown up now — and making it up as she goes along. She sure wishes she’d paid more attention when the oldsters were still around to tell her things. Dorothy has been Artistic Director of Lifeline Theatre for 11 years and has been reporting on her life from the stage in group shows with the Sweat Girls for the past 17 years. This is her first solo excursion. Directed by Sharon Evans. |
Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
Friday (8/6)
At Lifeline Theatre (6912 N. Glenwood Avenue, Chicago)
| 7:00pm | Grown Up (Description above) |
Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
Saturday (8/7)
At Lifeline Theatre (6912 N. Glenwood Avenue, Chicago)
| 7:00pm | Grown Up (Description above) |
Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
| 8:30pm | Solo Sampler 1: Julie Ganey and Caitlin Parrish |
The Half-Life of Magic by Julie Ganey: A half-believer navigates the space between story and truth. Ganey examines the stories we tell ourselves as she wrestles with fairies, Michelangelo, a priest, and Harry Potter – not necessarily in that order. Directed by Amanda Delheimer.
Strapped by Caitlin Parrish; performed by Missi Davis: An industrious young woman delivers a treatise on economics, sex, and the American way.
Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
Sunday (8/8)
At Lifeline Theatre (6912 N. Glenwood Avenue, Chicago)
| 3:00pm | The Sylvia Chronicles: 30 years of Graphic Misbehavior from Reagan to Obama |
| A workshop reading of a work-in-progress by Nicole Hollander. Nicole has appeared as a solo performer all over the Chicagoland area and is a published writer of over 20 books. Her cartoon strip SYLVIA appears daily and weekly in 30 newspapers across the country. |
This is a FREE workshop event. Call 773-761-4477 for tickets.
| WEEK THREE: August 12-15 |
Thursday (8/12), Friday (8/13) & Saturday (8/14)
At The Artistic Home (3914 N. Clark Street, Chicago)
| 7:00pm | Solo Sampler 2: Julie Ganey and Matt Miller |
The Half-Life of Magic by Julie Ganey: A half-believer navigates the space between story and truth. Ganey examines the stories we tell ourselves as she wrestles with fairies, Michelangelo, a priest, and Harry Potter – not necessarily in that order. Directed by Amanda Delheimer.
Sea World by Matt Miller: In the summer of 1998, Miller worked as a birds-of-prey trainer in the “Wild Wings Bird Show!” at Sea World Cleveland. This is the story of that beautifully crazy summer.
Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
| 8:30pm | Solo Sampler 3: Rett Lowell, James Anthony Zoccoli, and Deb R. Lewis |
The Second Boat by Rett Lowell: Years after the loss of her father Tom, a daughter agonizes over the items he left behind – namely, his Vietnam era dogtags. While on a mental expedition to conquer a web of memory, she will come to understand whether the rhetoric left in his wake is born of artifact or of herself.
Wiggerlover [whiteboy+blackdad=greyareas] by James Anthony Zoccoli: Actor/writer Zoccoli (JAZ) gives a retrospective account of his life as little Jimmy: a half-Italian, half-Polish kid who wants to be all Black when his White mother gets remarried to an African-American man.
Darkness, then Light by Deb R. Lewis: A story of how Lewis and her partner rescued her granddaughter from a meth lab and became parents to a nine-month-old with virtually no warning when Lewis never saw herself as being a parent. A tale of coping with “dyke fatherhood,” so to speak, by a member of 2nd Story.
Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
Sunday (8/15)
At The Artistic Home (3914 N. Clark Street, Chicago)
| 3:00pm | Man Up |
A reading of a work-in-progress by Martie Sanders (writer-performer with the Sweat Girls) directed by Richard Corley, former artistic director of Madison Repertory Theater. Martie’s solo pieces include vivid and hilarious portrayals of eccentrics discovered in her life’s adventures, and in this tour de force, she portrays 12 (male) characters encountered while navigating her career as an actress. There will be a post-show discussion after the performance.
This is a FREE workshop event. Call 773-761-4477 for tickets.
| WEEK FOUR: August 20-21 |
Friday (8/20)
At The Artistic Home (3914 N. Clark Street, Chicago)
| 7:00pm | The Best of Tekki Lomnicki |
Performer, teacher, and political activist Tekki Lomnicki presents three pieces: Thanksgiving, Tekki’s classic first solo show about growing up Catholic and the journey with her mother to Lourdes; Clothing Optional, which gives the audience an intimate peek at what goes on at a clothing-optional commune in Northern California; and Mr. Sandman, where Tekki’s unconscious runs amuck, short-circuiting her sleep patterns, dreams and CPAP machine.
Tickets: $10. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.
Saturday (8/21)
At Theater Wit (1229 W. Belmont Avenue, Chicago)
| 7:00pm | Grigsby Award for Excellence in the Art of Solo Performancepresented to Tekki Lomnicki |
The 2010 Grigsby Award for Excellence in the Art of Solo Performance will be presented to Tekki Lomnicki on Saturday, August 21, in a special ceremony at Theater Wit, to honor her exceptional achievements and unique talent. Ms. Lomnicki will be celebrated with an industry roast with those who have worked with her and have loved her throughout her amazing career.
Tickets: $50 for VIP seats, $35 for regular admission. Click here to order, or call 773-761-4477.