Mainstage Productions
Our fully staged productions featuring new works, and unique perspectives on existing work by established and emerging artists alike.
Inspired by True Events
JULY 2024
Written by Ryan Spahn
Directed by Knud Adams
In the green room of a community theater in Rochester, the Uptown Theater performers are getting ready to play to a full house after opening to rave reviews the night before. When their star actor arrives in a dangerously unhinged state, they must improvise on and off stage in ways they could not have imagined. By turns hilarious, harrowing, and horrifying, Inspired By True Events follows a tenacious group of show people who must determine at what cost the show must go on.
Inspired By True Events received development workshops with New York Stage & Film, The Vineyard Theatre and EST.
See What I Wanna See
SEPTEMBER 2024
Words and Music by Michael John Lachiusa
Directed by Emilio Ramos
Music Direction by Adam Rothenberg
Choreographed by Paul McGill
See What I Wanna See, a musical by Michael John LaChiusa, is based on three short stories by Ryūnosuke Akutagawa. The story unfolds like a classical Japanese screen painting, opening each act with a prologue inspired by Kesa and Morito, a pair of fatally contentious lovers. The first act, set in 1951, follows a murder in Central Park from contradicting perspectives where everyone’s truth may be a lie. Act two centers on a priest in 2002, wavering in his faith and creating a hoax about a miracle. His ruse attracts attention; however, the result is something he hadn't bargained for.
OOTB's production of See What I Wanna See features an all-AAPI cast of actors and elements inspired by traditional Asian theater practices, bringing LaChiusa’s Americanized adaptation into conversation with the Asian-American experience.
Call Me Abigail
2025
Written by Shelli Pentimall Bookler
Call Me Abigail is a comedic drama about a father and daughter conflict based in politics and the adult entertainment industry. Though focusing on family conflict, obscenity is challenged in light of other scandals highlighted, giving a unique perspective of art and censorship. Call Me Abigail was previously produced by Out of the Box Theatrics and Jennifer Campos Productions in OOTB's 2022 reading series Building the Box.