By Daily Press staff
“Dads” will fittingly be the theme of the next monthly installment of the Ruskin Group Theatre’s popular “L.A. Café Plays” to be held on Father’s Day Sunday, June 18.
The Café Plays have been dubbed the “fastest theater in town,” because five short plays go from conception to execution in just 10.5 hours. Although several theaters throughout the country have staged 24-hour plays, Ruskin producers Mike Myers, Erin Kelly and Michael Laurie have upped the stakes and cut that time by more than half.
Past participants in the Café Plays, as director or actor, have included such luminaries as Dylan McDermott of “The Practice,” Olivia D’Abo from “The Wonder Years” and “The Odd Couple” on Broadway, and Dan Lauria from “The Wonder Years” and “Jag.”
At 9 a.m. the day of the performance, five writers gather at Back on Broadway, a café-restaurant in Santa Monica. Each writer picks at random two manila envelopes containing actors’ headshots. They are then given four hours to write a seven-to 10-page one-act play that takes place in a café. The directors then take over, meet their actors, and begin rehearsals.
“The 65-seat Ruskin Group Theatre is typically sold out for the two evening performances, as audiences revel in the 10.5 hour creation cycle of five one-act plays, bound by a common theme and locale — all must take place in a café — but otherwise as diverse as the minds from which they spring,” the Los Angeles Times said.
The Ruskin Group Theatre, founded in 2002, has not only produced several critically acclaimed shows, it has done extensive outreach, teaching and performing in correctional facilities, boys’ homes, nursing homes and more throughout Southern California. Ruskin is currently producing the critically acclaimed play That May Well Be True, whose run has been extended through June 24.
The Café Plays will be staged at 7:30 p.m. and 9 p.m. at Ruskin Group Theatre, located at 3000 Airport Dr. at Santa Monica Airport. Tickets are $10. Call (310) 397- 3244 or go to http://www.ruskingrouptheatre.com. Guitar auction to benefit New Orleans
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on June 16, 2006. Read the original PDF.