2014-15 Season
cymbeline
"Available Light Theatre’s stark staging and deft acting help make it a rare treat for discerning theatergoers... Director Brian Evans cuts to the emotional core of his intimate, modern-dress version...the strangely modern play sheds a fierce light on many of the Bard’s perennial themes of human folly."
- Michael Grossberg, Columbus Dispatch
July 31 – August 9, 2014
MadLab Theater
227 North 3rd St.
Columbus, Ohio 43215
Running Time: Two hours, including one intermission.
Talkbacks: After Thursday and Friday performances.
Available Light takes on one of Shakespeare's most rarely performed plays in stripped-down style, in the Central Ohio professional premiere of Cymbeline.
In this dark and twisty tragic comedy — a love story for adults — lovers Imogen and Posthumous have their fidelity tested through bouts of mistaken identity, confused jealousy, and a cross-continental war.
The focus for this production will be on the performances, directed by Brian Evans of Ohio University, a stellar cast of seven provides the rare opportunity to get the heart of this complex, classical drama.
Brian Evans - Director
Dave Wallingford - Production Manager
Jaylene Jennings - Stage Manager
Dan Winters - Lighting Design
Julia Ferrari - Costume Design
Acacia Duncan - Imogen
Drew Eberly - Posthumous/Cloten
Andrew Trimmer - Iachimo, et al
Kate Lingofski - The Queen, et al
Jay Hobson - Arviragus, et al
Laura Crone - Pisano, et al
Mark Passarello - Cymbeline, et al
dirty math 2016
A brand-new Available Light original, a poetic, impassioned cry from the heartland, a panoramic view of the last 30 years of the American Economy, and a science-fiction epic for the ages.
It's been years since Jordan, Ian, and Acacia tried to save the world with their production of Dirty Math in downtown Columbus. And now the economy needs their help again.
New heroes, evil villains, exciting missions, music, metaphor, and more time travel than anyone's expecting. This is the action-packed economy as you've never imagined it.
September 4 – 20, 2014
Riffe Center Studio Two
77 South High St.
Columbus, Ohio 43215
Running Time: Two hours, thirty minutes, including one intermission.
Talkbacks: After Thursday and Friday performances.
Director/Playwright - Matt Slaybaugh
Production Manager - Dave Wallingford
Stage Manager - Jeremy Hollis
Costume Design - Michelle Whited, Jaylene Henderson
Choreographer - Leigh Lotocki
Video - Matt Hermes, Brant Jones
Fight Choreographer - Brian Evans
Jordan Fehr - as Jordan
Acacia Duncan - as Acacia
Rudy Frias - as Marco Stranger
Whitney Thomas Eads - as Tempo
Elena Perantoni - as Caustic
Stefan Langer - as The Mechano Kid
Amy Rittberger - as Counterfeit
Ben Jones - as Onyx
Jay Rittberger - as Dick Fuld
Michelle G. Schroeder - as M-Botic
Ian Short - as Ian
Recommended if You Like: Dirty Math, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, The Colbert Report
24 hour theatre
24 Hour Theatre is the drag racing of the theatre world. It’s short, furiously intense, and something might explode.
Thirty artists, spanning the breadth of the Columbus theatre community, will create six brand-new short plays in just 24 hours. Starting at 8pm on Friday night, names are drawn, teams created, plays written over night, and rehearsals completed in 8 hours, all in time for opening night at 8pm on Saturday.
November 8 @ 8pm
Riffe Center Studio One
77 South High St.
Pay What You Want tickets will be available at the door.
Featuring:
Christopher Austin, Jim Azelvandre, Andy Batt, Jeb Bigelow, Tim Browning, Amanda Cawthorne, John Connor, John Dranschak, Whitney Thomas Eads, Andy Falter, Stefan Farrenkopf, Rudy Frias, Ashley Woodard Frisch, Max Glenn, David Glover, MaryBeth Griffith, Amy Hamm, James Harper, Philip Hickman, Rick Hole, Artie Isaac, Brant Jones, Shanelle Marie, Eleni Papaleonardos, Elena Perantoni, Sonda Rose, Audrey Rush, Adam Simon, Beth Josephson Simon, Jeremy Sony, Robyn Rae Stype, Donald Wahlenmaier, Sue Wismar, Jennifer Feather Youngblood, and more!
Recommended if You Like: Jack Bauer, 24 Hour Comics, the distinct possibility that someone will fall flat an their face.
she kills monsters
"Deceptively breezy and rather ingenious. The whole enterprise is kind of dopey and kind of invigorating and kind of remarkable. It will slash and shapeshift its way into your heart."
- The New York Times
"Clever, funny, moving, and delightfully geeky! Nguyen is a refreshing, break-the-rules writer!"
- Chicago Tribune
Dec 4 — 20, 2014
Riffe Center Studio Two
77 South High St.
Columbus, Ohio 43215
Running Time: Ninety minutes, with no intermission.
Talkbacks: After Thursday and Friday performances.
An ingenious trip into the world of fantasy role-playing games, as played by Tilly Evans, a lonely, geeky, and gay Ohio teenager who takes refuge in her action-packed imaginary world.
She Kills Monsters is a tribute to the power of stories, packed with homicidal fairies, raunchy ogres, bloodthirsty cheerleaders, and more 1990s pop culture references than you can shake a thigh-master at.
Playwright - Qui Nguyen
Director - Ian Short
Production Manager - Dave Wallingford
Stage Manager - Jaylene Jennings
Dramaturg - Max Glenn
Set Design - Brad Steinmetz
Costume Design - Julia Ferreri
Lighting Design - Chelsea McPhilimy
Kimberly Martin as Tilly
Krista Lively Stauffer as Agnes
Whitney Thomas Eads as Vera/Tina
Emma Lou Andrews as Farrah/Gabbi
Mark Hale as Chuck
Laura Crone as Lilith
Allison Brogan as Kaliope
Jordan Fehr as Orcus
Adam Humphrey as Miles
Daniel Shtivelberg as Steve
next stage initiative 2015
Recommended if You Like: Exploration, risk, and experimentation
January 8 — 17, 2015
Riffe Center Studio Two
77 South High St.
Pay What You Want
There will be a casual, post-show conversation with the cast and crew after every performance. Playwrights will be included as indicated below.
The Studio 2 Theatre will become a hothouse for new works in January! Be part of the growth & nurturing of some soon-to-be great plays.
If you’ve been following AVLT for a while, you know that we’ve a vested interest in daring, new plays. We’ve presented dozens of free readings over the years, and the Next Stage Initiative is the logical step into the future.
The Next Stage Initiative returns in January 2015 with 6 hot playwrights and their works in progress. Included this year will be Jen Schlueter of the much-loved for/word company and her new adaptation (developed with the AVLT ensemble) of Cervantes’ Don Quixote, which will will be fully produced by AVLT later this season.
Thursday, January 8 @ 8pm
by Amy Crider
directed by David J. Glover
Talkback with the playwright.
Featuring Shelby Anne, Christopher Austin, Jordan Fehr, Rudy Frias, Dylan Hopcraft, Jeff Horst, Ray Ouellette, Spurthi Reddy, and Johnny Robeson
Enter the world of Saturday morning cartoon animators in 1975. The lead actor has just died a scandalous death. The head writer, fed up with Watergate, the loss of heroes, and corporate corumption would like to write the hero’s demise into the script to give him a heroic death. But FCC regulations do not allow death on a Saturday morning cartoon.
An earlier version of this play was a semi-finalist at the O’Neill last year. It was chosen as a first place winner and given a reading at the Chameleon Theatre Circle’s New Plays Festival in 2013 in Minnesota.
Friday, January 9 @ 8pm
by Jen Schlueter
directed by Matt Slaybaugh
Talkback with the playwright.
Featuring Acacia Leigh Duncan, Drew Eberly, David J. Glover, Kim Hopcraft, and Elena M. Perantoni.
Isabel is walking 500 miles across Spain on the Camino de Santiago. What is she looking for? And is she ready for what she will find? Her Quixote is a splintering of Cervantes’ massive (and metafictional) novel, remixed with a wide variety of writing about walking. It examines the power of pilgrimage, how we get lost, and how we can find ourselves again.
Like Schlueter’s work with the for/word company, this play is collage out of a wide variety of sources including Kathryn Harrison’s The Road to Santiago; Elaine Orabona Foster and Joseph Foster III’s In Movement There Is Peace; Jack Hitt’s Off The Road; Donald P. McCrory’s No Ordinary Man: The Life and Times of Miguel de Cervantes; Jane Christmas’s What the Psychic Told The Pilgrim; Conrad Rudolph’s Pilgrimage to the End of the World; Donald and Maria Schell’s My Father, My Daughter: Pilgrims on the Road to Santiago; Paolo Coelho’s The Pilgrimage; Robert Ward’s All the Good Pilgrims; Wendy Lesser’s “The First Novel,” Jorge Luis Borges’s “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote,” Rebecca Solnit’s body of work including The Faraway Nearby, A Field Guide to Getting Lost, A Book of Migrations, Men Explain Things To Me, and Wanderlust; the vast collection of pilgrim’s photography and recollections on tumblr, especially Goldiknocks; and Edith Grossman’s elegant translation of Miguel de Cervantes’s Don Quixote. It was developed in workshop with members of Available Light Theatre (Columbus, Ohio) including Acacia Duncan, Drew Eberly, Kim Garrison-Hopcraft, David Glover, Eleni Papaleonardos, Elena Peratoni-Fehr, Michelle Schroeder, and Matt Slaybaugh.
Saturday, January 10 @ 8pm
by Brett Beach
directed by Francesca Spedalieri
Talkback with the playwright.
Featuring Meg Chamberlain, Emily Kacsandi, Trent Rowland, Danny Turek, Geoff Wilson, and Sue Wismar.
Movement Coach: Sarah Ware
Sound Design: Jordan Fehr
Stage Management: Riley Hutchinson
On the hottest day of the summer, Marjean’s carefully controlled life—a small empire of drug deals and police payoffs—begins to fall apart. How long must we wait before we our misdeeds catch up to us? After examines the consequences of a shocking act of violence nearly a decade before, and the ways in which some people live while others can only hope to survive.
Thursday, January 15 @ 8pm
by Carrie Barrett
Performed by Karie Miller
The end of the world is coming. In a cozy, full-equipped, and completely secure underground bunker, a woman walks us through how to survive the apocalypse. But what exactly brought her down here in the first place? And what’s the price of completely safety? Find out in this giddily morbid one-woman show.
Friday, January 16 @ 8pm
by Bianca Sams
directed by Yolanda Board
Featuring Hillary Billups, Michael Billups, Shelby V. Holden, and Taryn Toone.
Sound Design: Michael Billups
Trapped by a stranger in her office, psychologist Dr. Devra Mendoza must use all of her training to maneuver her way through a game of cat and mouse with life and death consequences. Rust on Bone looks at the personal cost of war, societal stigmas of therapy, and the ripple effects of trauma and mental illness.
The play has received a workshop presentation at Ohio University, a public reading in NYC directed by Chuck Smith in July 2014, and took part of the New Play reading series at Gulfshore Playhouse in Naples FL in September 2014.
Saturday, January 17 @ 8pm
by Max Glenn
directed by Whitney Thomas Eads
Talkback with the playwright.
Featuring Acacia Leigh Duncan, Stefan Farrenkopf, Adam Humphrey, Nikki Montana, Elena M. Perantoni, and Sarah Ware.
Sound Design: Jordan Fehr
Stage Management: Michelle Whited
Step behind the curtain as Gorgeous Gladys Valentine works her way up through the ranks of the unreal business of 1940s professional wrestling. As Gladys watches Ida Jean – the champion and her idol – get forced out of the spotlight, she realizes that rules of the game are not what she believed.
Don Quixote: a pilgrimage
"A funny, fluid and fantastical new work ... Schlueter, director Matt Slaybaugh, and Available Light have created a fiction, a lie, and a wandering wonder."
- Jay Weitz, Columbus Alive
"Whimsical, poignant and lyrical, Don Quixote: a pilgrimage offers images and insights that illuminate life’s erratic journeys."
- Michael Grossberg, Columbus Dispatch
Recommended if You Like: bobrauschenbergamerica, John Cage 101, tilting at windmills

March 26 – April 12, 2015
Columbus PAC
Van Fleet Theater
549 Franklin Ave.
Columbus, Ohio 43215
Running Time: Ninety minutes.
Talkbacks: After Thursday and Friday performances.
In this splintered adaptation of Cervantes’ novel, Isabel makes a 500 mile pilgrimage across Spain on the Camino de Santiago. Don Quixote: a pilgrimage mixes the massive (and metafictional) novel with a wide variety of modern sources. It examines the power of pilgrimage, how we get lost, and how we can find ourselves again.
Available Light’s latest world premiere production is the result of a year-long collaboration between playwright Jen Schlueter (Joint Artistic Director of the for/word company) and Available Light’s company of artists. Rather than attempting to directly adapt Cervantes’s nine-hundred page masterwork (widely regarded as the first modern novel) the collective used the book as a starting point to explore its structure, characters, themes, and contemporary relevance.
Playwright - Jen Schlueter
Director - Matt Slaybaugh
Production Manager - Dave Wallingford
Stage Manager - Emily Fisher
Costume Design - Travis Bihn
Lighting Design - Jarod Wilson
Acacia Duncan as Isabel
Drew Eberly as Sancho Panza, et al
Elena Perantoni as Rocinante, et al
Kim Garrison Hopcraft as Catalina, Ana, et al
David J. Glover as Cardenio, et al
Alan Woods as Father
Don Quixote: a pilgrimage is supported by grants from the Greater Columbus Arts Council, the Columbus Foundation, and the Ohio Arts Council. Additional funding was provided by more than thirty individual supporters through the GCAC’s Power2Give online crowd-funding platform.
the Christians
“The Christians is the kind of play that keeps me going to see theatre and I’d encourage anyone with an interest in theatre or the shifting tides of faith in the contemporary United States to see it.”
– Richard Sanford, Columbus Underground
“It doesn’t take the easy way out… In the wrong hands, this could be a purely intellectual exercise. Available Light’s moving production grounds thought in emotion, which makes the play’s unanswered questions reverberate on a deeper level.”
– Margaret Quamme, Columbus Dispatch
Recommended if You Like: We Are Proud to Present, 33 Variations, and having something to argue passionately about for the next 6 weeks
May 21 — June 6
Riffe Center Studio One
77 South High St.
Pay What You Want
Directed by Acacia Duncan
Featuring: Whitney Thomas Eads, Jordan Fehr, Matt Hermes, Michelle G. Schroeder, and Ian Short.
The hottest, most discussed play from this year’s Humana Festival of New American plays is The Christians. This play been called “a theological bombshell.” It’s the one play that everyone came back from Louisville talking about. As one review put it, “there are plays that make you think, and there are plays that make you capital T-H-I-N-K.”
Lucas Hnath is one of the brightest voices of the newest generation of playwrights. Here he presents us with a stylized service in a midwestern mega-church, as Pastor Paul delivers a revelation that will rock the very foundations of the congregation.
Schedule:
Thursday, May 21 @ 8pm
Friday, May 22 @ 8pm
Sat. May 23 NO PERFORMANCE
Friday, May 29 @ 8pm
Saturday, May 30 @ 8pm
Sunday, May 31 @ 2pm
Thursday, June 4 @ 8pm
Friday, June 5 @ 8pm
Saturday, June 6 @ 8pm