Reader’s Theater
Local writers, directors and actors from our community present staged readings of exciting new plays that we believe speak to our audiences
Overview
All Reader’s Theater events are on Saturdays at 7:00pm.
The readings take place in the Theater at Allens Lane Art Center and are available to in-person audiences. A short Talk Back with the playwright, director, and actors will follow each reading where the audience is invited to ask questions and to provide feedback on the work they just saw. These readings are available with a pay-what-you-wish reservation.
Marjorie Is Dead!
April 18, 2025 at 7:00pm
Step back in time to 1900s Britain in this infectiously funny farce, MARJORIE IS DEAD. Inspired by Fry & Laurie and the works of P.G. Wodehouse, this play follows the outbreak of a deadly “coroner’s virus” in the unsuspecting Tilbury family, whose lives are as convoluted as they are in peril. Watch as the doctor, the Colonel, the solicitor, and a roguish ne’er-do-well run circles around each other in a hilarious whirlwind of mixed-up identities, flaming passions, overheard conversations, and misunderstandings.
Eve in Paradise
Written by Megan Edelman
May 4, 2024, at 7:00pm
Eve in Paradise is an adaptation and a memoir. Eve is a biblical troublemaker, a seventeenth-century puritanical ideal, and a 21st-century intersectional feminist, who has lost her faith. The audience finds Eve embodying Milton’s epic poem Paradise Lost and cutting it with scenes from her own life. As she grapples with the original text, she shares her journey as a child of the catechism, a questioning teenager, and an adult who strives to find the beauty not in God, but in humanity.
Black Roses in the Garden
Written by Camille James
February 3, 2024, at 7:00pm
1970s – Harlem – during the second wave of Women’s Rights. This play gives the podium to the hidden voices of Black queer women who expressed their ideas, desires, and pleasures in a now dwindling lesbian bar culture. In a hidden, dank, dimly lit bar, we join four women on a journey of laughter, determination, and courage in love and sisterhood that feeds them at the root.
Black is the New Black
Written by Sharese Salters
December 9, 2023, at 7:00pm
Aria Winters is just about to enjoy a standard Netflix binge when five very random men (the sweetheart, the smart jock, the frat boy, the lover, and the classic man) show up at her front door. Aria finds herself the star of a surreal dating show and fends off her many supposed admirers. A wildly hilarious ride that also shows the many perils faced by Black women in the dating world.
Covid-19 Safety
As we monitor the status of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, Allens Lane Art Center Theater has decided on the following guidelines to best ensure the safety of our audience members and performers on stage while also expanding our seating capacity to better serve our community.
2022-2023 Season Guidelines
- No eating or drinking (other than water) will be permitted in the theater.
- Performers and staff will be fully vaccinated.
- Audience members are no longer required to show proof of vaccination, however, masks are required for all audience members while inside the theater.
