New Leaf Theatre

For those of you who haven’t seen it: a view of our space from the rarely-used stage: Circle reading at the beginning of rehearsal: Kristina Johnson in the foreground; PJ Schoeny, Marsha Harman, and Sean Fawcett in the background: Marsha and Sean rehearsing Jon Steinhagen’s ‘The Mailman...

I’ll be honest - for me, about 80% of any given general audition is about getting to know the person who’s just walked in the door...

Jess wrote last week about our plans for the Mid-North Association’sannual Summerfest...

This weekend we’re turning something that started as an experiment last year into an annual tradition. I like traditions...

The delightful Layne Manzer - whose heart can be won by loyalty (or steak) - shared these thoughts with us right before we entered tech for The Long Count. It was his first show with New Leaf - but we hope he’ll be back for more. 1. In a word, today I feel: Absorbent 2...

Well, ladies and gentlemen, tonight is our second Open Rehearsal for The Long Count. ”Open rehearsal?” you ask...

Acting ensemble member Alyse Kittner - who we’ve cross-posted once before - took our questions and used them as the starting point of a post on her blog. We’re happy to share her thoughts here, too! In a word, today I feel lazy...

So. Here we are. Opening night. A year ago, one of the Leafs made a casual suggestion: “If we can’t find a script that has everything we want, why don’t we write one ourselves?”And so The Long Count was born...

Mark Jacob Chaitin joined us for last year’s Summerfest new play readings and is back for his first full-length production with New Leaf. He is an actor, director, teaching artist, and love him some summer. He says this is entirely due to Chicago’s Pizza Fest in June. Mmm. Pizza… 1...

Joel recently wrote about his experience with The Long Count’s group mind - and now he’s back with answers to our Short Count questions...

Mary Jo first came to New Leaf last fall as Peg in Six Years and we are pleased as punch to have her with us again...

Joel Reitsma - a member of the acting ensemble of The Long Count (and all around lovely human being) - recently wrote about his experience of group mind in rehearsals on his blog. And then he said we could cross-post it here...

P.J. Schoeny joins New Leaf for the first time, but we’re already big fans. He’s a company member at TUTA, a sometimes-reckless bicyclist, and holds that Quantum Leap is the best TV series in the history of TV. For him, he says, it’s also family prerogative. 1...

New Leaf Theatre is proud to be part of the vibrant community of theatre artists coming together as part of Chicago’s first celebration of World Theatre Day...

Next up: Liz Vanderhoof. This is Liz’s very first show in Chicago. Her first pet was the incomprable Hercules, an Irish Setter Mix who was “the best doggie in the entire world,”though now she spends moretime in the company of cats. We’re real glad Liz chose Chicago. I think you will be, too...

Welcome to the first in a series of interviews with the ensemble creating The Long Count. In each interview with one of our fellow journey-ers, we’ll break out the internal compass and see where we are in our adventuring...

Ladies and gentlemen: it’s time. Hoist the anchor. Raise the sails. Grab an oar, just in case. For the last few months, we at New Leaf have been working (frantically, distractedly, doggedly) to construct this ship that is The Long Count...

Tonight New Leaf put together a draft of our working script for The Long Count. On the wall. In index cards. Rehearsals start on Wednesday.

It could happen tonight. [Thank You]

The title of this post refers to a fear of Friday the 13th. I consider myself a fairly superstitious person - but not about this sort of thing. I won’t mention the name of theScottish Play in the theatre. I knock on wood when I think I may have spoken too soon...

Now that Touch is up and running (with only two weekends left), we New Leafs are diving wholeheartedly into The Long Count...

This past weekend for New Leaf and the cast and crew of Touch was like having your work checked by your favorite teacher… No, that’s not quite right. It was like meeting your best friend’s mom and hoping she doesn’t think you’ve been a bad influence… That’s not it either...

“The full moon’s light obscures most of the other bodies in the sky. Which I hate. … Zoe used to say–but what about all that gorgeous light, sweetheart...

Kristina Johnson plays the role of Serena in New Leaf’s production of TOUCH. Which opens today. Tuesday January 6th 1:11am New Leaf doesn’t usually have previews, but we did tonight for Toni Press-Coffman’s Touch. Our first audience before we officially open tomorrow Wednesday January 7th...

So, here we are, in the home stretch again. Touch opens in a little over 48 hours. To continue our extended metaphor: the soup is ready, and now we are all frantically working on the garnish. This is the time of odds and ends...

From the first moment of conceptual discussion about Touch, it was clear that visually and sonically, this show needed to morph and change, to be full of light and hope one second and darkness and emptiness the next. It needed to shift, to be intangible, to float...

Fellow Leaf Marsha Harman and I are fond ofspeaking in metaphor. Some days we speak almost exclusively in metaphor to each other. Other days we speak almost exclusively in Scottish accents. If we’re speaking metaphorically inScottish accents, well…Look out...

Yesterday, the show cracked open for me. Some backstory - when we first read Touch as a company, it was a show that I *heard*. All plays have elements - puzzle pieces that get translated and fit back together by the production team into a unified whole...