"The Guys" at the Black Box Theatre -- September 9 through 12.

Thursday, September 9, through Sunday, September 12

Black Box Theatre, 1623 Fifth Avenue, Moline IL

Lauded by CurtainUp.com as a “straight-from-the-gut, beautifully written two-hander” in which “laughter is heard as often as sobs,” playwright Anne Nelson's The Guys makes its area debut at Moline's Black Box Theatre September 9 through 12, this work presented in honor of the heroism of first responders described by the Christian Science Monitor as “a play that tackles the horror of September 11th with an intimacy that's both unsettling and healing.”

Produced locally in conjunction with the events' 20th anniversary, The Guys takes place less than two weeks after the September 11th attacks, when New Yorkers, along with the rest of the world, are still in shock. One of them, an editor named Joan, receives an unexpected phone call on behalf of Nick, a fire captain who has lost most of his men in the attack. He’s looking for a writer to help him with the eulogies he must present at their memorial services, and Nick and Joan consequently spend a long afternoon together, recalling the fallen men through a recounting of their virtues and foibles, and fashioning the stories into memorials of words. In the process, Nick and Joan discover the possibilities of friendship in each other and their shared love for the unconquerable spirit of the city. And as they make their way through the emotional landscape of grief, they draw on humor, tango, the appreciation of craft in all its forms, and the enduring bonds of common humanity in this stage work – one based on a true story – the New York Post called “a generous, sad, touching play about the braveries of grief.”

"The Guys" at the Black Box Theatre -- September 9 through 12.

Directing The Guys for the Black Box is the venue's co-founder and artistic director Lora Adams, who performed in the recent Murder in Green Meadows and whose most recent directorial offerings for the theatre include Hate Mail, Love, Loss, & What I Wore, and Dick Tracy: A Live Radio Play. Portraying Nick is the venue's I Never Saw Another Butterfly co-star Jim Harris, a born-and-raised New Yorker who has an especially close relationship to 9/11, as he watched the towers fall and discovered that his publishing partner’s son had been on the 102nd floor of Tower One. Jennifer Cook Gregory, a veteran of the First Presbyterian Church of Davenport's summertime production of Guys & Dolls, plays Joan, and Adams is also responsible for the show's set design.

The Guys will be staged locally from September 9 through 12,, with performances Thursday through Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. Due Due to Illinois' new COVID restrictions, patrons are required to wear masks and the actors will be in face shields, and admission is $13-16. For more information and tickets, call (563)284-2350 and visit TheBlackBoxTheatre.com.

Support the River Cities' Reader

Get 12 Reader issues mailed monthly for $48/year.

Old School Subscription for Your Support

Get the printed Reader edition mailed to you (or anyone you want) first-class for 12 months for $48.
$24 goes to postage and handling, $24 goes to keeping the doors open!

Click this link to Old School Subscribe now.



Help Keep the Reader Alive and Free Since '93!

 

"We're the River Cities' Reader, and we've kept the Quad Cities' only independently owned newspaper alive and free since 1993.

So please help the Reader keep going with your one-time, monthly, or annual support. With your financial support the Reader can continue providing uncensored, non-scripted, and independent journalism alongside the Quad Cities' area's most comprehensive cultural coverage." - Todd McGreevy, Publisher