CONTACT: Tim DuRoche
Community Outreach Coordinator
Portland Center Stage
Gerding Theater at the Armory
503.445.3794
timd@pcs.org


DATE: October 25, 2006

Community Forum Unites Three Different Theaters
with a Common Theme

Portland, Oregon -- When the city's largest theatre, one of its smallest and a thriving middle-sized one discovered they had something unusual in common in their 2006-2007 season, the response was, well, predictable.

"My uncle's got a barn, let's put on a show." That's how Portland Center Stage's Tim DuRoche describes the decision to stage a Panel Discussion and Community Forum addressing the place of art in politics, and its relevance in the past, and today.

"With our staging of I Am My Own Wife, Insight Out Theatre Collective's production of Leni, and Readers Theatre Repertory's show, Address Unknown," he says, "we discovered a fascinating coincidence. All of us are telling stories about art and artists, set against a backdrop of Hitler's rise to power." Adds PCS Public Relations & Publications Manager Thom Trick, "That told us there was something here to examine as a community, in addition to telling the stories onstage."

The event, called "Three Theaters: Tales of Identity, Art & Fascism" is planned for Monday, October 30th, and will be held in the Studio at The Gerding Theater at the Armory, from 6PM to 8PM. The evening is FREE of charge.

The panel will be moderated by Wendy Radmacher-Willis, Executive Director of City Club of Portland, and includes the plays' performers and area experts. "We have some of Portland's finest artists involved in all of these plays," says Trick, "JoAnn Johnson, Cecily Overman, Wade McCollum, Tobias Andersen and Michael Mendelson. We're also lucky to have nationally-recognized scholars on the subjects of art, history and fascism right here in the region. It makes sense to take advantage of that and really extend the reach of these stories -- and the questions they inspire."

Additional panelists include Stephanie Snyder, John and Anne Hauberg Curator and Director of the Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery, Reed College.

Nicole Lane, Insight Out's Marketing and Public Relations Director, says "It's interesting to us that here are three companies resonating to these themes. Certainly, something in our community climate drew us all to produce plays focused on the relationship between art and politics -- it will be fascinating to explore those choices."

Audience participation is expected and planned for. "This is a discussion that needs to take place in the public square, among citizens," says Mary McDonald-Lewis, RTR's Co-Artistic Director, "so we hope everyone there will contribute to an exchange of ideas."

Along with the panel discussion and community forum, the theaters' collaboration will continue with the three plays' cross-promotion in mailings and on the Internet, along with a discounted ticket rate for anyone bringing a ticket stub or program from one production to the other two.

Insight Out's Leni opens on October 10th and runs through November 11th. At Portland Center Stage, I Am My Own Wife opens November 7th, closing on December 17th. RTR's Address Unknown runs from April 6th to April 21st, 2007.

The timing of the unexpected partnership is fortuitous in other ways as well. Portland Center Stage, newly relocated in the Pearl District as the Gerding Theater at the Armory, is eager to actively engage with other similar arts organizations. Insight Out Theatre Collective's co-founder, Wade McCollum, is starring in I Am My Own Wife, and the company believes the intermingling of talent and vision broadens audience for all three theaters. After six seasons as a staged reading company, RTR feels the support of its larger colleagues will help ensure its fully-staged efforts in the future.

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WHO: Insight Out Theatre Collective
Portland Center Stage at the Gerding Theater in the Armory
Readers Theatre Repertory

WHAT: "Three Theaters: Tales of Identity, Art & Fascism."

WHEN: 10/30, 2006 6-8PM

COST: Free

WHERE: Portland Center Stage, The Studio Theatre at the Armory, 128 NW 11th Ave


Insight Out Theatre Collective, founded in 2003, was created to give a voice to unheard stories. Insight Out is passionately devoted to celebrating cultural awakening and dedicated to honoring the integrity of theatrical traditions, while encouraging innovative technique. We celebrate the common human experience by acting as a cultural bridge. Our mission is to explore contrast and harmony through theatre, music and dance. Insight Out has produced 10 theatrical productions since 2003 and co-produced an additional three plays. We believe that through our work and artistic collaborations, we affirm that we are more alike than different.

PORTLAND CENTER STAGE, established in 1988, is Portland’s flagship theater company, attracting more than 90,000 theatergoers annually. With five main stage and four studio theater productions in the 2006-2007 Season, PCS produces a blend of classical, contemporary and world premiere works in addition to its annual summer playwrights festival, Just Add Water/West. PCS is engaged in a $36 million capital campaign to fund the renovation of the historic Portland Armory, our new home in Portland’s Pearl District. The Gerding Theater at the Armory houses a 599-seat main stage and a 200-seat black box studio theater, and is the first building on the National Register of Historic Places, and the first performing arts venue, to achieve a LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Platinum certification. To date, more than $27 million has been secured for the project. The new Gerding Theater at the Armory opened to the public with a critically acclaimed production of West Side Story which runs through November 12, 2006.

Readers Theatre Repertory was founded in 2001. With its focus on one-act plays, RTR is dedicated to staging "small stories with big ideas at their heart" -- using intimate theatre to tell tales that alternately amuse, confront, assuage and inspire.