Shows Category: 2017-18

Anthony arrives at Caroline’s door bearing waffle fries, a beat-up copy of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, and an urgent assignment from their high school Lit teacher. Living most of her life online, Caroline is sick and hasn’t been to school in months, but she is as quick and sardonic as Anthony is athletic and popular. As these two let down their guards and share their secrets, this seemingly vanilla poetry assignment unlocks a much deeper mystery that has brought them together. I and You is a valentine to youth, life, love, and the strange beauty of human connectedness.

The no-holds-barred story of a Chicago public high school slated for closure at the end of the year. The impending shut-down causes tensions in the school’s already volcanic neighborhood to rise to the breaking point, but a small group of teachers launch a last-minute battle to save their school. Over the course of the year, they put their careers, their future and their safety in the hands of a fast-talking administrator who comes on strong: but might actually have no clue what he’s doing.

It’s the age of artificial intelligence, and 85-year-old Marjorie — a jumble of disparate, fading memories — has a handsome new companion who’s programmed to feed the story of her life back to her. What would we remember, and what would we forget, if given the chance? In this richly spare, wondrous new play, Jordan Harrison explores the mysteries of human identity and the limits — if any — of what technology can replace.

The Wisconsin Wrights New Play Festival is supported by the Marcia Légère Binns Distinguished Playwright Residency. As a UW-Madison student in the early 1940s, Marcia Légère won the inaugural Wisconsin Playwrights Contest with a piece that her professor submitted secretly. Légère graduated from the university with a degree in Comparative Literature, going on to a successful career as a writer for documentary films and television.

Légère decided that she wanted to give back to the university that had provided her with one of her first great accomplishments as a writer. Saddened to hear that the Wisconsin Playwrights Contest was no longer in existence, she worked with the University of Wisconsin Foundation to bring the competition back to life, to support local playwrights, and to strengthen the relationship between the two. Today, Légère’s generous contributions continue to give students and local professional playwrights an opportunity to produce original theatre.

In March 2018, the Wisconsin Union Theater and Wisconsin Union Directorate Performing Arts Committee will host the 27th annual Marcia Légère Student Play Festival.