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Department of Theatre and Dance

2017 Lab Theatre Banner

Lab Theatre

The university's black box performance space was established as a laboratory for students to explore new ideas and put classroom studies to practical use. Today it's another stage where you can enjoy compelling live theatre.

The Lab Theatre is located at 1400 Wheat St., between Sumter and Pickens, in the Booker T. Washington Building. Show times are 8 p.m. nightly unless otherwise noted. Tickets cost $10 per ticket and are sold online or at the door. Arrive early for best seating. Performance dates, times and locations are subject to change.

2018-2019 Lab Theatre Season

Double Durang

Double Durang: An Evening of One-Acts by Christopher Durang

Get a double dose of the acerbic wit of Tony-Award winning playwright Christopher Durang (Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike) with two of his most outlandish short comedies! In For Whom the Southern Belle Tolls, Durang’s twisted sendup of Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie, a fading Southern Belle tries to set up her neurotic, cocktail-stirrer-obsessed son with an outlandish “feminine caller.”  In the absurdist Wanda’s Visit, the lives of a bored married couple are turned upside down by the unexpected guest from hell. 

By the Bog of Cats

By the Bog of Cats

Set in the ghostly landscape of the bogs of Ireland, By the Bog of Cats traces the desperate journey of Hester Swane, as she fights for respect in the face of a lover’s abandonment and a society that derides her lineage.  Playwright Marina Carr’s haunting adaptation of Euripides’ Medea mixes mysticism and hard-hitting modern realism to weave a riveting tale of betrayal, sacrifice, and vengeance. 

Stages by David Lee Nelson

Stages

Presented in partnership with the Colorectal Cancer Prevention Network.  In 2017, award winning performer David Lee Nelson received news that would change his life. At 38 years old he was diagnosed with Stage Four Colon Cancer. He kept a blog of his time in chemotherapy – a heartbreakingly funny chronicle of a disease which affects over nine million Americans. This material became the basis for his newest solo play. Stages is not simply a play about sickness: it’s a story of life’s setbacks and surprises, and about searching for hope in the most unlikely of places.

Wonder of the World

Wonder of the World

This outrageous comedy by Pulitzer-winning playwright David Lindsay-Abaire (Rabbit Hole, Good People) is a trip you’ll never forget!  After Cass discovers a dirty secret about her husband, she runs away to Niagara Falls, hoping to find a life that’s passed her by.  Her soul-searching adventure quickly goes over the edge as she encounters a succession of ever more eccentric fellow travelers, including a suicidal alcoholic, a lonesome tour boat captain, and a pair of bungling, bickering private detectives.