Younger generation stars at Out of the Loop
06:58 PM CST on Wednesday, March 1, 2006
By LAWSON TAITTE / The Dallas Morning News
ADDISON – This year's Out of the Loop Festival has a bold, youthful feel. WaterTower Theatre's
fifth annual spring celebration opens Thursday with This Is How It Goes by the brash playwright Neil
LaBute, and over the next 10 days, it offers performances by 21 groups and individuals.
About half of the groups are both new to the festival and recently formed, including a troupe of
Southern Methodist University students performing a Sam Shepard classic. Two works are by
Dallas playwrights in their 20s, and the headliner act, Burgerboy Chronicles by the New York
musical comedy group Minimum Wage, takes an amusing look at fast-food first jobs.
Part of this Generation Y emphasis is sheer last-minute spontaneity.
Finding a worthy East Coast group to bring into Addison was tough, says WaterTower artistic
associate James Lemons. "I was complaining about it in the office, and Stacy Oristano, who's now
working for us, said, 'There's this group I saw in New York several times last year ...' "
Another late development adding to the youth orientation: the absence of two established
companies that had applied for spots in the festival.
LAWSON TAITTE'S 5 MUST-SEE SHOWS
Burgerboy Chronicles by Minimum Wage. BackStage Magazine gave an award to this musical
comedy piece about burger-flipping nerds, and it was a hit at Montreal's fringe festival, too. Manic
riffs about spatula techniques and the history of the burger contrast with polished a cappella
singing. Friday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 8 and 10:30 p.m., Sunday at 2 and 7:30 p.m.
6000 Feet to Salvation by Second Thought Theatre. Steven Walters has established himself as a
young playwright to watch with four scripts produced locally in little more than a year. This one
slams together two brothers – an atheist dying of cancer and a not-all-that-orthodox seminary
student – on a Grand Canyon road trip. Tuesday at 7:30 p.m., March 11 at 8 p.m. and March 12 at
5 p.m.
This Is How It Goes by WaterTower Theatre. Neil LaBute, America's most explosively controversial
playwright, crosses the line again with this play about a white woman married to a black man, and
attracted to his white former classmate. In this high-stakes game, the race card is still trump.
Thursday at 7:30, Saturday at 2 p.m., Sunday at 5 p.m., March 11 at 5 p.m. and March 12 at 2 and
5 p.m.
Tulsa Skyline by Richardson Theatre Centre. Dallas' other promising young playwright, Lee Trull,
stars in his own play about an affair rekindled where it left off eight years before. Regan Adair
directs for a veteran company trying to remake its image and establish a higher profile. Sunday at 2
p.m., March 10 at 8 p.m. and March 12 at 7:30 p.m.
Evolution by Theater Fusion. This new troupe makes its first venture into comedy with Jonathan
Marc Sherman's pop culture fable about a Harvard grad student who travels to Hollywood on his
spring break. Andi Allen directs; Nye Cooper stars. Saturday at 2 p.m. and March 11 at 5 p.m.
"We're a little disappointed that a couple of companies that participated in the past wouldn't play
with us this year," WaterTower artistic director Terry Martin says. "Echo Theatre and Theatre
Quorum had to withdraw when we were hammering out details." Both theaters have run into a
financial rough patch.
"There are certain other aspects we are disappointed about as well," Mr. Martin says. "There's not
as much dance as we would like – we just haven't had as much interest from dance groups. Some
more unusual music would be nice, too. We approached the East Village Opera Company in New
York, but they had just had a piece on NPR and we just couldn't afford it. We just want to be a little
more well-rounded."
There's no denying, though, that an emphasis on new and young companies is partly the nature of
this enterprise. Out of the Loop has become known as a venue where young artists can establish
reputations and build careers.
Two talented young actors, Mike Schraeder and Elizabeth Van Winkle, co-starred in a play called
Tape at the 2004 festival. This year both are back as presenters with their own companies.
"It was very good exposure," says Mr. Schraeder, who played the festival just after he moved to
Dallas following award-winning stints in Detroit and New York. "I was expecting something smaller in
scale than Out of the Loop actually is. Doing some low-scale theater in New York, I was used to
working by the seat of our pants, but here we had everything prepared for us. I was really
impressed by the professionalism of how everything was run. And the audience base is expecting
some good, edgy theater."
In the following months, Mr. Schraeder co-founded Second Thought Theatre with four other Baylor
University graduates. Second Thought presented a world premiere by its playwright-in-residence,
Steven Walters, at Out of the Loop last year.
"Our name was thrown around in that festival, and Steve's play was one of the most popular – it
even got extended by a day," Mr. Schraeder says.
"We were able to pass out fliers for our next show and expanded our audience base quite a bit," he
recalls.
WaterTower offered to sponsor part of the group's current regular season in its Addison studio
space, and it looks as if the entire Second Thought third season will be staged at the venue.
Second Thought has another new Walters play, 6000 Feet to Salvation, in this year's fest. And the
troupe's comedy wing, Second Thought Dramatics (better known as the STDs), will do four late-
night improv performances.
Ms. Van Winkle, Mr. Schraeder's 2004 co-star, just finished a sold-out run in Addison's Stone
Cottage Theatre in her new company's first production. Theater Fusion's second show will be just
across the lawn in the Studio Theatre as part of Out of the Loop.
Ms. Oristano, a Dallas actress who recently returned from several years in the Big Apple, was
talking about Minimum Wage, which includes a recent SMU graduate, as well as a couple of
brothers, three additional performers "and two sound guys," according to Mr. Lemons. The a
cappella harmonies should resonate with a generation raised on boy bands and hip-hop – and that
grew up in funny hats with logos on them, flipping burgers.
"This is the perfect showcase for the up-and-coming," Ms. Van Winkle says. "Even though our first
show was a success, I still feel that need to be tested and to prove what we can accomplish.
Evolution is 180 degrees from Turn of the Screw. It's hip, edgy, and most importantly, funny."
Hip and edgy, after all, are a big part of what Out of the Loop is supposed to be about.
"Eventually we want to develop Out of the Loop into the Dallas fringe festival," Mr. Martin says,
"showcasing new work and other material that doesn't fit the profile we develop during our main
season."
While he's at it, he wants to turn the festival into a propaganda machine for Dallas theater in
general and WaterTower in particular.
Also online
Out of the Loop Festival performance schedule
"We want to spread the word of us nationwide," he says. Think about it – Dallas known across
America for its hip theater scene.
E-mail ltaitte@dallasnews.com
Thursday through March 12 at Addison Theatre and Conference Centre, 15650 Addison Road, Addison. Festival
pass $50, individual events $5 to $15. Call 972-450-6232 or visit www.watertowertheatre.org.
