Babes With Blades Theatre Company’s (BWBTC) 2024 season opens with The S Paradox, written by Joining Sword & Pen International Playwright Competition and Margaret W. Martin Award Winner Jillian Leff, directed by Morgan Manasa with fight direction by Samantha Kaufman, April 7 - May 18, at The Factory Theater, 1623 W. Howard St. Previews are Sunday, April 7 at 3 p.m.; Thursday, April 11 at 8 p.m. and Friday, April 12 at 8 p.m. The press opening is Saturday, April 13 at 8 p.m. with a performance schedule of Thursdays – Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 3 p.m. with select performances available for streaming. Tickets are $28 - $35 and are available at BabesWithBlades.org.
Babes With Blades Theatre Company says why wait for summer for the spy and sci-fi thrillers? Experience the action and mystery this spring with The S Paradox. BWBTC, known for using thrilling stage combat skills as a storytelling tool on Chicago stages for more than 20 years, is jumping down the rabbit hole to see if the character of ‘S’ can jump back in time to prevent the wrongs she made as her naïve younger self, Sloane. Complete with an interwoven storyline featuring our protagonist at two very different points in her life, a hilarious tech-nerd sidekick, and the wisdom of Sloane’s level-headed, librarian girlfriend, the audience witnesses Sloane as she works with the hope of making positive changes versus what the future is telling her.
“Babes With Blades Theatre Company’s audiences have consistently asked for more sci-fi adventures over the years and our new audiences have also embraced these productions,” states Artistic Director Hayley Rice. “Sadly, theater is still suffering from the aftereffects of the pandemic and audiences are reluctant to venture out on a new script or production that they are not familiar with. However, we hope that BWBTC’s reputation for taking risks both with stage combat and with storytelling will remind people why Chicago has continued to be the epicenter of new play development.”
The ensemble cast of 12 artists includes Elisabeth Del Toro (she/her, Dez); Luz Espinoza (she/her, Dez U/S and Older Dez); Cat Evans (any with respect, Ava); Kayla Marie Klammer (she/her, Sloane); Sonja Lynn Mata (she/her, Older Dez); Deanna Palmer (she/her, Nameless, Sloane U/S); Steve Peebles (he/him, William); Jessica Pennachio (she/her, Nameless, S U/S); Thomas Russell (he/they, Nameless, William U/S); Emily Sturges (she/they, Nameless U/S); Tina-Kim Nyguen (she/her, Nameless, Ava U/S) and Maureen Yasko* (she/her, S).
The production team includes BWBTC Ensemble Members Line Bower* (they/them, technical director), Jillian Leff* (she/her, playwright) and Morgan Manasa* (she/her, director) as well as Evy Burch (they/her, props designer), Rose Hamill (she/her, production manager), Rose Johnson (they/them, scenic designer); Samantha Kaufman (she/her, fight director), L.J. Luthringer (he/him, sound designer); Payton Shearn (she/they, production assistant), Taylor Stageberg (she/they, stage manager); Rachel M. Sypniewski (she/her, costume designer); Laura J. Wiley (she/her, lighting designer) and Theo Yaeck (they/them, assistant stage manager).
*connotes member of Babes With Blades Theatre Company ensemble member.
ABOUT JILLIAN LEFF, PLAYWRIGHT OF THE S PARADOX
Jillian Leff is a Chicago based playwright and actor, whose work has been produced in Chicago, Los Angeles, Florida and Indiana. The world premiere of Small World (co-written with Joe Lino) was a Jeff Award nominee for New Work. She is an ensemble member with Babes With Blades, where she has appeared in Richard III (Buckingham), Women of 4G (Pierce), The Good Fight (Cicely) and is excited to work with Babes as a playwright again after workshopping her play The Mark through Fighting Words. She has a BFA in acting from Ball State University and is an advanced actor combatant with The Society of American Fight Directors.
ABOUT MORGAN MANASA, DIRECTOR OF THE S PARADOX
Morgan Manasa, a graduate of the Chicago College of Performing Arts and Theatre Conservatory at Roosevelt University, has been a theatremaker in Chicago for the past 20 years. Manasa is an ensemble member of Babes With Blades Theatre Company where she’s been seen in their production of Henry V (Fluellen) and Witch Slap! (Goody Blunt). She has directed a handful of one-acts and 10-minute play festivals but made her mainstage directorial debut with Arthur M. Jolly’s The Lady Demands Satisfaction (Jeff Recommended) with BWBTC. Most recently she directed JANE: The Abortion Underground with Idle Muse Theatre Ensemble where she also directed In The Next Room (or The Vibrator Play) and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
ABOUT JOINING SWORD & PEN INTERNATIONAL PLAYWRITING COMPETITION AND THE MARGARET W. MARTIN AWARD
The Joining Sword & Pen international playwriting competition launched in 2005 to generate more scripts that featured women in roles involving stage combat. Created in collaboration with Artistic Advisor and Fight Master in the Society of American Fight Directors David Woolley who sponsors the competition, scripts inspired by a specific image are submitted and go through a blind judging process. The winning script goes through BWBTC’s new play development program, but also receives a full production, a cash prize and the Margaret W. Martin Award.
Margaret W. Martin was ahead of her time. In the 1960s and 70s, she maintained her full time job, taught piano, and raised a family of 6 children (4 girls, two boys) all while she traveled the globe from the States to Saudi Arabia, across Europe and Vientiane Laos during the height of the Vietnam war. She founded the American International School – Riyadh (K-12) in Saudi Arabia in 1963, and it has flourished as an institution since then. The Margaret W. Martin Award is in honor of Artistic Advisor and SAFD Fight Master David Woolley’s mother.
ABOUT BABES WITH BLADES THEATRE COMPANY
Babes With Blades Theatre Company – for more than 20 years and continuing into the future – strives to develop and present scripts focused on complex, dynamic (often combative) characters who continue to be underrepresented on theatre stages based on gender. Babes With Blades Theatre Company uses (and will continue to use) stage combat to tell stories that elevate the voices of underrepresented communities and dismantle the patriarchy.
In each element of their programming, they embrace two key concepts:
1) Folks of marginalized genders and underrepresented communities are central to the story, driving the action rather than responding or submitting to it.
2) Everyone is capable of a full emotional and physical range, up to and including violence and its consequences.
The company offers participants and patrons alike an unparalleled opportunity to experience every person as heroes and villains; rescuers and rescues; right, wrong and everywhere in between: exciting, vivid, dynamic PEOPLE. It’s as simple and as subversive as that.
Babes With Blades Theatre Company’s (BWBTC) 2024 season opens with The S Paradox, written by Joining Sword & Pen International Playwright Competition and Margaret W. Martin Award Winner Jillian Leff, directed by Morgan Manasa with fight direction by Samantha Kaufman, April 7 - May 18, at The Factory Theater, 1623 W. Howard St. Previews are Sunday, April 7 at 3 p.m.; Thursday, April 11 at 8 p.m., Friday, April 12 at 8 p.m. The press opening is Saturday, April 13 at 8 p.m. with a performance schedule of Thursdays – Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 3 p.m. with select performances available for streaming. Tickets are $28 - $35 and are available at BabesWithBlades.org.
BWBTC’s 2024 programming is partially made possible by the kind support of The Gaylord & Dorothy Donnelley Foundation, a grant from The Illinois Arts Council Agency, a CityArts Grant from the the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs & Special Events (DCASE), and the support of the Small Business Alliance Shuttered Venue Operators (SVOG) grant program.
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT STATEMENT:
Babes With Blades Theatre Company produces theatre in venues located on the traditional homelands of the Council of the Three Fires: the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations. Many other tribes such as the Miami, Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Sac, and Fox also called this area home. This region that we now commonly refer to as “The Chicagoland Area”, has long been a center for Indigenous people to gather, trade, and maintain kinship ties. Today, one of the largest urban Native American communities in the United States resides in Chicago. Members of this community continue to contribute to the life of this city and to celebrate their heritage, practice traditions and care for the land and waterways.