PDF Theatre Kids: A True Tale of Off-Off Broadway

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Theatre
Kids
A
True
Tale
of
Off-Off
Broadway
Description
Friendship. Grief. Jazz hands.In
2004, in a small, windowless
theater
in then-desolate Williamsburg, Brooklyn, an
eccentric family of broke art-school survivors
staged an experimental, four-hour adaptation of
William Faulkner8217snovel As I Lay Dying
inside an enormous wooden coffin that could
barely fit the cast, much less an
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audience.The production8217scast and
crew8212inluding its sweetly monomaniacal
director8212pored their hearts and paychecks
into a messy spectacle doomed to fail by any
conventional measure. It ran for only eight
performances. The reviews were tepid. Fewer than
one hundred people saw it. But to emotionally
messy hack magazine editor John DeVore, cast at
the last minute in a bit part, it was a safe
space to hide out and attempt sobering up
following a devastating loss.An unforgettable ode
to the ephemeral, chaotic magic of the theatre
and the weirdos who bring it to life, Theatre
Kids is DeVore8217sbuoyant, irreverent, and
ultimately moving account of outsize ambition and
dashed hopes in post-9/11, pre-iPhone New York
City. Sharply observed and bursting with
hilarious razzle-dazzle, it will resonate with
anyone who has ever, perhaps against their better
judgment, tried to bring something beautiful into
the world without regard for riches or fame.