24th hour of 'SLAM!' to crown a hectic day

"SLAM!" — Plan-B Theatre Company's third annual "celebration of Utah talent and descent into madness" — is this weekend in the Rose Wagner Center's intimate Black Box Theatre.

It's an evening of five, 10-minute plays — all written and rehearsed in the previous 23-hour period. Hour No. 24 is when the audience gets to see what the playwrights have frantically concocted.

The results, according to Plan-B's Producing Director Jerry Rapier, could range anywhere "from glorious to a train wreck."

The five playwrights are Matthew Ivan Bennett, Cort Brinkerhoff, Kevin Doyle, Calvin Haul and Eric Samuelsen. The directors are Kirt Bateman, Susan Dolan, Kyle Lewis, Kurt Proctor and Larry West.

The all-female cast (which Rapier describes as being a bit on the sassy side to balance out the all-male writing posse and the nearly all-male directing pool) consists of Anita Booher, Jayceen Craven, April Fossen, Andra Harbold, Anita Holland, Stephanie Howell, Colleen Lewis, JJ Neward, Lori Rees, Sarah Rife, Rebekah Samuelsen, Teresa Sanderson, Robin Smith, Stacy Sobieski and Yolanda Wood.

One of the 10-minute plays from the first "Slam!" in 2004 — Aden Ross' "Love Runs Uphill" — evolved into the 90-minute "Amerika," which had its fully staged debut two months ago. It will be performed in this year's Toronto Fringe Festival, scheduled July 5-16 (www.fringetoronto.com).

The playwrights will gather at 8 p.m. Friday night, when play titles and the names of three actresses will be drawn from a hat. They get to see the props, set pieces and other items they have to work with. After a half-hour question-and-answer session, they have from 9 p.m. to 9 a.m. to get their scripts written.

Saturday morning, copies of the scripts will be made for the actors and directors.

The entire 24-hour process, explains Rapier, is filled with surprises — and not just for the audience.

While the "SLAM!" playwrights know which actresses they're writing for, the players won't find out until Saturday morning which plays they'll be in. The directors will then pull the playwrights' names out of a hat to determine which script they'll be directing.

The five sets of casts and directors will rotate through different rehearsal halls at the Wagner, giving each of them opportunities to have two sessions — one for blocking and one for the "tech" work — in the Black Box venue.

Five rooms in the Rose Wagner are used for the rehearsals.

The design team, stuck with using what they can forage from the props already assembled for the evening, will be Cheryl Cluff, Greg Ragland, Pilar I., Randy Rasmussen and Cory Thorell, assisted by stage manager Jennifer Reed and solo crew member Misty Rhinehart.

The Saturday evening performance is sold out, but there will be a prepaid waiting list for any available tickets at the Rose Wagner Center box office one hour prior to show time.

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If you go . . .

What: "SLAM!"

Where: Rose Wagner Center, 138 W. 300 South

When: Saturday, 8 p.m.

How much: $15 (sold out)

Phone: 355-2787

Web site: www.planbtheatrecompany.org

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E-mail: ivan@desnews.com