Local artists create plays in 24 hours for BPP fundraiser

Jeff Torbenson, coach for the Bloomington Playwrights Project’s little league team, threw a ball with this year’s themes written on it to the stage.

BPP Producing Artistic Director Chad Rabinovitz caught the ball with a baseball mitt and read what the nine different teams had to work with during the weekend.

A bike horn. Underdogs. “I’m not who you think I am.”

These were all themes of the 2012 Ike and Julie Arnove Playoffs fundraising event Saturday and Sunday at the playwrights project.

The playwrights, who met with the actors and a director they chose, had until 6 a.m. the following morning to submit their drafts.

Performers including “managers” (playwrights), “coaches” (directors) and “players” (actors) had 24 hours to prepare 10-minute plays integrating this year’s themes.

After Sunday night’s performances, audience members voted for their favorite play and actor to decide who was the most valuable player.

Some participants of the playoffs began raising money at the end of September.

This year’s proceeds amounted to more than $20,000, the largest fundraised amount in the theater’s 32-year history.

All proceeds went to the BPP.

“This is our largest fundraiser, our most successful fundraiser,” BPP Managing Director Jessica Reed said. 

The fundraiser is named in memory of current BPP board of directors member Robert Arnove’s parents, Isadore and Julie Arnove.

Following his father’s death in 2007, Robert inherited a World War II painting by French orientalist painter G. Washington.

The painting was thought to be worth about $200, but world-renowned art auction house Sotheby’s discovered the painting was worth thousands of dollars.

Robert donated the money to the child advocacy program at Middle Way House and the playoffs.

A founder of pharmaceutical business Parkway Drugs in Chicago, Isadore was a pragmatist while his mother was a romantic, Robert said.

“She liked ... to dance to music barefoot around the house, and she was a poetic soul,” he said. “So I think it’s a very fitting way of remembering them.”

Reed said participants of the playoffs are involved with the BPP in some
capacity.

“There really isn’t a method,” she said. “We just put out a callout to find people who want to participate and, if they’re willing, to do a little bit of the fundraising. We have a lot of the same people year after year do it.” 

Team names included Mötley Crüe, the Far-off Broadway Bombers and Ball Girls.

Former ballet dancer Jack Johnson was the chosen director of the team, $9 Martinis.

Their play “Honk Me,” performed Saturday and Sunday evenings, was written by Atlas Bar owner Jennifer Hileman.

Hileman, who did not have prior theater experience, said the play was about a son, a father and a grandfather.

It involved a magical bike horn that made the characters change body shapes.

The body changes represented interpersonal conflicts.

“When I got her script, I howled, I loved it,” Johnson said. “For it being under such time constraints, she made it easy.”

Winners

Audience Choice Award: "Voting Rites" by Greg Ellis

World Series Trophy: "The Games" by C. Niel Parsons

Most Valuable Player" David Sheehan, actor