Tagged: Doug Schutte

The Bard's Town Theatre opened its production of "44 Plays for 44 Presidents" last night.

“George Washington in the Garden of Eden” opens the show with a creation story. James Garfield’s “Dance of a Thousand Ironies” is a tragic ballet. Thomas Jefferson isn't memorialized, he's roasted, stand-up comedy-style, by Benjamin Franklin. 

The Neo-Futurists of Chicago premiered "43 Plays for 43 Presidents" ten years ago (Actors Theatre of Louisville staged a production in 2008) with a brief play for each occupant of the Oval Office—Grover Cleveland gets two, since his terms weren't consecutive.

The more things change, the more things stay the same. 2,500 years after Aristophanes first suggested women could end a war by kicking powerful husbands out of their beds in “Lysistrata,” the idea is still compelling to playwrights and politicians alike (a Michigan state representative recently suggested a similar strategy).

The Bard’s Town Theatre is resurrecting the ancient Greek story of Lysistrata in the premiere of a new comedy about sex, politics and patriotism.