Rivals of the West Premieres Original Production to Celebrate 10th Anniversary
You’ll Never Meet Mac DeMarco conceived as a story about life as a young artist at MICA
On April 5, 2018, the Rivals of the West Theatre Company will premiere its original production, You’ll Never Meet Mac DeMarco, in celebration its 10th anniversary. Running for eight performances, the play was conceived, written, and produced by the Rivals Company itself.
You’ll Never Meet Mac DeMarco is about what Rivals’player/playwrights know all too well — MICA. They make no claim to represent the whole of MICA’s vivid and varied landscape, but the company hopes the play will present a pleasant 90-minute tour of an interesting experiential real estate.
Rivals of the West, the College’s resident theater company, brings a vibrant and challenging tradition of provocative theater to MICA’s campus. Staging a full-length production every spring, the company is made up of students from the first year to the graduate level who represent every major discipline offered by the College. Led by faculty from the Humanistic Studies, Fiber and Architectural Design departments, students in the company gain in-depth, real-world, hands-on creative and design experience and training in all aspects of theater production.
Forming annually in the course The Play’s the Thing, Rivals of the West was founded and continues to be led by Humanistic Studies faculty member Christopher Shipley.
“Theater is perfect for an art school,” he said. “It is the absolute collaborative experience where everyone can get together and produce something that doesn’t just exist in class but is out there in the world.”
In its earliest performances, Rivals of the West staged full-length plays in Brown Center’s Falvey Hall. The construction of MICA’s Gateway building, which includes the BBOX performance space, has allowed Rivals of the West to present truly ambitious stage productions.
Described as a funny and bittersweet slice of life at MICA — sort of a “portrait of young artists trying to hold it together and mostly succeeding. Maybe.” — You’ll Never Meet Mac DeMarco runs Thursday through Sunday evenings, April 5, 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 14, and 15 at 8 p.m. in BBOX, The Gateway, 1601 West Mount Royal Avenue. Tickets ( $5 MICA community, $10 general) are available at The MICA Store, online at rivalsofthewest.org and at the door.
