The third installment of the ShortShow by the Honors College Club Theater features six short plays, produced, written, directed and cast by students. It’s a light theater experience for students who enjoy both participating in theater and watching but can’t make a huge time commitment, to Club Theater writer John Hemmick said.
Hotel and restaurant management junior Katelyn Halpern formed the Honors College Club Theater two years ago, frustrated by the inaccessibility to UH theater and dance productions for non-theater majors and minors.
"The Club Theater is designed to provide extracurricular activities to students who want to act write or direct shows, who aren’t in the theater program," Halpern said.
The ShortShow will be performed at 8 P.M. from Friday through Sunday in the Honors College Commons. Each play ranges from two to 10 minutes with the entire show running just less than an hour.
Hemmick describes his play as an abstract piece about the creative process, set in a culinary school. It’s a surreal comedy with a radio theater feel, he said.
"I’d love for more people to come and see what we are up to," Halpern said, "not only to gain an audience but to see who might want to join us. We want to keep momentum going so we can keep doing what we like to do."
The Club Theater accepted the six plays out of a dozen scripts submitted earlier in the semester. After auditions, it was up to the cast to manage and direct themselves. The writers and elected team leaders of the plays set the schedule and the amount of rehearsal time.
The show’s co-producer, Daniel Unate, an engineering sophomore, said the show will be a performance that is "very whimsical, very diverse and very entertaining." It is a great way to get into theater, Unate said, and it has been a great outlet for his creative side.
In its short time on campus, the Honors College Club Theater has organized three productions: and the Club Theater found doing student plays to be a lot more fun, Hemmick said, and they are working toward producing a full-length play written by students for a fall performance.
They receive a small budget from The Honors College and based on this and contributions from members they have built their own collapsible stage and obtained props and costumes.
Admission is free.
