A huge thank-you to our sponsors for An Appalachian Christmas Carol, 2013! Buy locally this Holiday Season!

(P.S. It’s not too late to get tickets for the last week of shows: click here)

RUTH’S CHRISTMAS TREES
BY BOYD RUTH

It’s not too late to get tickets for the last week of shows: click here!

An Appalachian Christmas Carol (2013) at Stuart’s Opera House, featuring David Haugen as Scrooge (pictured below).

Remaining shows:

Thursday, Dec. 19, at 7pm
Friday, Dec. 20, at 8pm
Saturday, Dec. 21, at 8pm
Sunday, Dec. 22, at 2pm

Tickets available at www.stuartsoperahouse.org:
$18 adult, $15 student and seniors, $12 children.

Brick Monkey Theater Ensemble, Southeast Ohio’s professional theater company, is proud to present An Appalachian Christmas Carol.

Tickets available at www.stuartsoperahouse.org:
$18 adult, $15 student and seniors, $12 children.

2013 Performance dates are:

Friday, Dec. 13, at 8pm
Saturday, Dec. 14, at 2pm & 8pm
Sunday, Dec. 15, at 2pm
Thursday, Dec. 19, at 7pm
Friday, Dec. 20, at 8pm
Saturday, Dec. 21, at 8pm
Sunday, Dec. 22, at 2pm

(Click the poster at left to enlarge.)

About the Show:

You think you know the classic Dickens A Christmas Carol. But what if the story was set in Southeast Ohio in 1907 and old Eb Scrooge owned the local coal mine? What if Bob Cratchit helped organize the mine workers, and Fezziwig’s holiday party took place at Stuart’s Opera House with local musicians playing live onstage?

Spinning the traditional ghost story and tale of redemption, An Appalachian Christmas Carol honors Southeast Ohio’s rich coal mining and labor union heritage, while simultaneously celebrating the spirit of the season. This is a joyful story of redemption, rooted in rural storytelling and intertwined with regional traditional music. So be sure to make An Appalachian Christmas Carol part of your new holiday family tradition on the Historic Public Square in Nelsonville, Ohio.

For an in-depth look at the development of An Appalachian Christmas Carol, check out WOUB’s preview:
http://woub.org/2013/11/27/appalachian-theater-group-gives-dickens-classic-regional-twist

And a HUGE Thank You! to all those who chipped in, large and small, to help make this show a reality. Our recent fund-drive was a great success earning beyond the $5000 goal we set. It takes a true community to make art happen, and our community (so many of you locally, AND so many of you nationwide!) is clearly a strong one that cares about supporting professional theater in Appalachian Ohio.

Total Donations so far: $5130 of our $5000 goal!
(updated 12/7/13 at 11:45 am)

It’s NOT too late to donate! Though we made our goal — THANKS TO ALL OF YOU! — we can still use every penny we can get to make this another successful year with the show.

Please help Tiny Tim dance his way to a happy ending! After last year’s inaugural success of An Appalachian Christmas Carol, we’re going even bigger this year and we need your help:

• 700 school kids saw a free matinee last year. We’re doubling that number this year. Your $20 donation will cover the cost of bringing one child to a show (ticket and bus). CLICK HERE TO DONATE
• Help the props department build the Cratchit Family turkey. Your $50 donation will help us create the scenic elements to bring our 1880’s Company Town to life. CLICK HERE TO DONATE
• Adopt a musician! Your $100 donation will pay a musician for one rehearsal and one performance. CLICK HERE TO DONATE
• Fiddle strings break and the dancing stops. Your $5 donation will keep our musicians playing! CLICK HERE TO DONATE

As always, your donation is tax deductible as we are a non-profit organization. Our donation processor, Network For Good, provides you with all the tax documents you might need and is among the most trusted in the arts! You can donate a little or a lot, or even set up a monthly pledge like many of us do to keep our NPR radio stations on the air.

READ ALL ABOUT IT!

The history of how An Appalachian Christmas Carol came together, reported by WOUB: http://woub.org/2013/11/27/appalachian-theater-group-gives-dickens-classic-regional-twist

About the show:

You think you know the classic Dickens “A Christmas Carol.” But what if the story was set in Southeast Ohio in 1907 and old Eb Scrooge owned the local coalmine? What if Bob Cratchit helped organize the mine workers, and Fezziwig’s holiday party took place at Stuart’s Opera House with local musicians playing live onstage?

An Appalachian Christmas Carol
December 13-22, 2013
Stuart’s Opera House, Nelsonville, OH
www.stuartsoperahouse.org

Brick Monkey is proud to once again participate in Humble Play: New Play Festival of Appalachian Ohio!

This year’s Humble Play Festival features a free reading of Her Summer Fling by Merri Biechler, BMTE’s Managing Director and author of the much anticipated return this winter of An Appalachian Christmas Carol. (See More about Merri and her impressive writing resume here.)

About the Play:

Franny, 42, and her vintage clothing store, ReVamped, are short on cash until Tiffany, the soon-to-be trophy wife of Bruce Hudson, asks Franny to create her wedding dress. The timing is perfect…until Franny falls for Kyle, Bruce’s 22-year old son, and their resulting affair threatens to rip her world apart at the seams.

The reading features company members Merri Biechler, playwright; Emily Prince, director; and Dennis Delaney as Bruce Hudson. The cast includes Debra Spangler, Andy Haftkowycz, and Kayla Vogel.

WHAT: Best of Humble Play 2013 Festival
WHEN: Friday, October 18, 2013 at 7pm
WHERE: ARTS/West, 132 W. State Street, Athens, OH
HOW MUCH? Free!

Brick Monkey Theater Ensemble, Southeast Ohio’s professional theater company, is proud to present An Appalachian Christmas Carol. The show’s premiere was such a big success in 2012 we’re DOUBLING the number of performances this year!

Performance dates for the 2013 return of An Appalachian Christmas Carol are:

Friday, Dec. 13, at 8pm
Saturday, Dec. 14, at 2pm & 8pm
Sunday, Dec. 15, at 2pm
Thursday, Dec. 19, at 7pm
Friday, Dec. 20, at 8pm
Saturday, Dec. 21, at 8pm
Sunday, Dec. 22, at 2pm

(Click the poster at left to enlarge.)

About the Show:

You think you know the classic Dickens A Christmas Carol. But what if the story was set in Southeast Ohio in 1907 and old Eb Scrooge owned the local coal mine? What if Bob Cratchit helped organize the mine workers, and Fezziwig’s holiday party took place at Stuart’s Opera House with local musicians playing live onstage?

Spinning the traditional ghost story and tale of redemption, An Appalachian Christmas Carol honors Southeast Ohio’s rich coal mining and labor union heritage, while simultaneously celebrating the spirit of the season. This is a joyful story of redemption, rooted in rural storytelling and intertwined with regional traditional music. So be sure to make An Appalachian Christmas Carol part of your new holiday family tradition on the Historic Public Square in Nelsonville, Ohio.

Tickets available at http://www.stuartsoperahouse.org: $18 adult, $15 student and seniors, $12 children.

Click image to enlarge!

We are incredibly excited to present the next offering in our Free Play Reading Series: SLEEPING ROUGH, by Kara Manning. The play received its world premiere production three months ago and you will be the first audience to hear it outside of New York City!

As a theater company who devotes much of our energy to new play development, we do not take Ms. Manning’s gesture lightly! We are thrilled to share her play with our Southeast Ohio audience.

In SLEEPING ROUGH, an American woman, unable to forgive her country for a grave offense, ignores the entreaties of her daughter and ex-husband and flees to London to graffiti her anguish across the city of her youth. It’s December 2008, and as America broadcasts news of financial crisis and political change, a fractured family roams the London streets trying to understand what sparked a fatal decision.

The reading will be presented by the Brick Monkey Theatre Ensemble, southeast Ohio’s professional theater company. The reading is directed by Emily Prince and features Merri Biechler, and Brian Evans.

WHO: Brick Monkey Theater Ensemble
WHAT: A reading of Kara Manning’s play “Sleeping Rough”
WHERE: ARTS/West, 132 W. State Street, Athens, Ohio
WHEN: Thursday, July 18, 2013, at 7:00PM

Admission is free, and donations are kindly accepted.

***
Kara Manning: Kara’s plays have been performed or developed via the Royal Court Theatre, Out of Joint, Hampstead Theatre, the O’Neill Playwrights Conference, MTC, Atlantic Theater, MCC Theater, TheatreWorks Silicon Valley (2012 New Works Festival), Playwrights Horizons, Women’s Project, HighTide Festival Productions, London’s 2013 LoNyLaTimeWave Festival, etc. Her play Sleeping Rough was produced earlier this spring by New York’s Page 73 Productions (receiving a Drama Desk nomination for Best Featured Actress). Kara is the 2007 recipient of the Princess Grace Award in playwriting, a MacDowell Colony Fellow, a member of MCC Theater’s Playwrights Coalition, a recipient of an EST/Sloan Commission and a Princess Grace Foundation Special Projects Grant. Kara was shortlisted for the BBC Drama Production Writers Academy and is an alumnus of the Royal Court’s International Residency and the Women’s Project Playwrights Lab. She works for WFUV/The Alternate Side as a content editor/writer and host of the British music show UKNY and has written for Rolling Stone, NPR and MTV News. She is also literary manager of the Irish Repertory Theatre. Graduate of Columbia University’s MFA program in playwriting.

Brick Monkey Theater Ensemble and Ohio University’s School of Theater, in association with Ohio University’s LGBT Center, will present a staged reading of “8”, a new documentary play by Dustin Lance Black about the federal case for marriage equality. The reading is part of a nationwide movement to spur action, dialogue and understanding about same sex marriage. Following the performance, there will be a talk back with the cast of 21 professional, student and community actors and a panel including representatives from local LGBT organizations, campus and community leaders, and marriage equality advocates and authorities.

“8” by Dustin Lance Black: Tuesday February 12th at 7 p.m. at The Elizabeth Baker Theater in Kantner Hall on The Ohio University Campus.

The event is free and open to the public. General seating on a first come, first served basis. Donations accepted on behalf of Freedom to Marry Ohio.

Information: 8theplayathens@gmail.com

For tickets to the show, visit this link to Stuart’s Opera House today. And if you’re curious about Brick Monkey, watch the short video below to learn a little more about us!

A big thanks to all our sponsors! Please click on the logos below and think & buy local! The generous folks listed here are just a few who’ve been supporting our run-up to An Appalachian Christmas Carol:

For tickets to the show, visit Stuart’s Opera House web site today. To help with fundraising for the show, please visit our support page. We cannot do outreach to the community — including shows for hundreds of kids and adults who have never seen live theater — without your help!

Support Brick Monkey in winning the $10,000 Start It Up Grant! 

It is so EASY to help us win the $10,000 Start It Up Grant!

Simply copy this link:
http://youtu.be/tm30wHCEgQk

and paste it on your Facebook page! The more you LIKE, SHARE, & RETWEET the link on Facebook, Twitter & Pinterest, the better chance Brick Monkey may earn $10,000 toward our goal of producing An Appalachian Christmas Carol this year!

The more LIKES, SHARES, & RETWEETS, the greater our chances of being passed onto the final round. Contest ends November 10, 2012, so PLEASE share the link ASAP and often. For more information please visit: http://businessremixed.com/start-it-up/

Please share the video above widely on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest!

Please consider giving Southeast Ohio an early Christmas gift and donate to our campaign to mount An Appalachian Christmas Carol at Stuart’s Opera House this Christmas season. To learn more about the production, and to help us with gifts as small as $10 or as large as $1000, visit our fundraising page by clicking here. We only have until November 16th to meet our funding goals, so please don’t wait!

Why Your Donation Matters

The Brick Monkeys want to see the Nelsonville Public Square filled with visitors every Christmas. They’ll be coming to see the production of An Appalachian Christmas Carol, eating a Cratchit family Christmas dinner, buying gifts on the Square, staying in local hotels, ice skating at the North Pole Rink, riding the North Pole Express, connecting with groups like Little Cities of Black Diamonds, and telling their friends to visit Nelsonville for a family holiday event they can’t find anywhere else. But we need your help to make this vision a reality. Please join us on this sleigh ride!

Please join us for the Athens premiere of Brick Monkey member, Rebecca VerNooy’s, new one-person show, Across Time. Brian Evans, also a Brick Monkey, is directing the production.

After a limited premiere in Athens, the show heads to the United Solo Festival in New York City. 2012 United Solo, the world’s largest solo theatre festival, presents one hundred solo productions! All shows in NYC are staged at Theatre ROW: 410 West 42nd Street, New York City.

ACROSS TIME
Written and performed by Rebecca VerNooy Directed by Brian Evans

Performances in Athens on:

November 4 at 4 at 7 pm
November 5 at 8 pm

The Virginia Hahne Theater at Kantner Hall, Ohio University

$10 suggested donation to defray costs for mounting the production at United Solo festival in New York.

FOR RESERVATIONS: email Acrosstimeathens@gmail.com

Time and space collapse in this Movement Theatre piece as a transplanted New Yorker finds herself in Southeastern Ohio confronting her own mortality. Looking for that thing she is supposed to be doing, she keeps getting distracted by the many voices of her life. A funny look at the transcendent power of love.

The Vision

Brick Monkey Theater Ensemble wants to see the Nelsonville Public Square filled with visitors every Christmas. They’ll be coming to see the production of An Appalachian Christmas Carol, eating a Cratchit family Christmas dinner, buying gifts on the Square, staying in local hotels, ice skating at the North Pole Rink, riding the Santa Train, connecting with groups like Little Cities of Black Diamonds, and telling their friends to visit Nelsonville for a family holiday event they can’t find anywhere else.  But we need your help to make this vision a reality.

Who We Are

Brick Monkey is Southeast Ohio’s professional theater company.  You’ve seen our actors and directors in prominent regional theaters and on TV and in films; you’ve seen our designers’ work on Broadway; and our playwrights’ plays around the country.  We’ve made Athens County our home, and we want you to see our work.

The Project

You know the classic Charles Dickens story A Christmas Carol …. but what if old Eb Scrooge owned the mine?  Brick Monkey presents An Appalachian Christmas Carol, at Stuart’s Opera House, December 13–16, 2012. This new play celebrates Southeast Ohio’s rich coal mining and labor history, featuring local talent and live music by members of Rattletrap Stringband. Christmas Carol Photo, click!

Who Supports Us

The Ohio Arts Council

The Athens Foundation

Athens County Convention and Visitors Bureau

The O’Bleness Foundation