Books in the mail! I love books in the mail!

Sexy Chesley-Award winning off-Broadway playwright,
cabaret singer & bon vivant Chris Weikel will be your Master of Ceremonies!

So many beautiful books...and yet I must give them away...

Still, they are sitting by my desk right now, and I am enjoying the sight of them.

HUGE thanks to Gareth & Brian at the International Dublin Gay Theatre Festival for setting up a payment link on their website. We will speak no more of the online payment service that dared to try to thwart our plans! Rest assured that everyone who did manage to pay through Paypal (There! I said it!) will be in the drawing or have their name at the box office, depending on what you purchased.


The pace is picking up as we approach next Monday's event. We've got a running order for the show, an MC (the lovely & talented Chris Weikel), and other things falling into place.

And today I came home to find these volumes from Joel Derfner! I originally met Joel when he was in dear Ed Valentine's play "Snipe Hunt," which made me laugh and laugh. When I found out that Joel is also a writer, I asked him to come read at Drunken! Careening! Writers! where he memorably stripped to his underpants and stood on the bar to read the chapter about becoming a gogo dancer. One of our best readings ever! Joel is currently in production with the musical "Signs of Life," which runs through March 21.



And also, Mark Finley, whose play, "Swans Are Mean" you will see next Monday, stopped by my desk at work to deliver a copy of his play, "The Mermaid," produced by TOSOS, and published by United Stages (who are donating programs for our event!) "Swans" was inspired by TOSOS's trip to Dublin last May: it's set on St. Stephen's Green, and involves a Bridezilla, her put-upon best friend, and a cute Irish photographer.

Also got a package from David Bell, whose "The Play About the Naked Guy" had an off-Broadway run at EAT, that made me laugh and laugh. It also has the best Marian Seldes joke I ever heard.

And now would be a great time to mention Jonathan and Ian at United Stages: they are donating the playbills to us, and are responsible for a significant amount of important work being done off-off and in the independent theater being given a permanent record in beautiful, affordable published volumes. They are also purveyors of some of the nicest (and most affordable!) playbills around. I've been a fan (and customer) of United Stages since the early '00s, and wouldn't consider using any other playbills. Lots of other groups feel that way as well. (And huge thanks to J. Stephen Brantley, who served as playbill wrangler for this event).

So I hope we'll see you at TADA next Monday (which Emerging Artists Theatre has graciously let us use for the evening). We'll have the box office open for ticket sales, and you can purchase tickets for the raffle on-site starting at about 6:30. Doors will be at 7-ish, and the show is set to start at 7:30(ish).

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Kathleen W.