Past Productions 1995 to 1991
Click here to view 2000 to 1996.
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1995
For Our Daughters, written by Bonnie Morris, Kim Hines, and Michael Robins with music by Roberta Carlson, is created from the stories of breast cancer survivors. Joan Wernick is a breast cancer survivor who attributes part of her survivorship to the support she received from her family and her dear friend Gail Hartman. Gail and Joan ask if Illusion could create a piece portraying their journey and others’ journeys of living through a diagnosis and then treatment of breast cancer. Joan and Gail want people to know the need for emotional support and connection as one travels through this journey and how important it is to not go through the illness alone. Their friend, Corky Einzig, mobilizes a collection of friends to raise funds to create the play. Coffees are held in friends’ homes across the metro area asking for contributions. Illusion's Managing Director Bill Venne coordinates the effort. There are 41 coffees, over 300 people contributed, to raise over $150,000 in order to bring the play to life.
The performers include Beth Gilleland, Nancy Marvy, Yolande Bruce, Thomasina Pettus, and Michelle Francois. For Our Daughters tours throughout Minnesota, and with special support from Mary Milroy, throughout the state of South Dakota. Illusion produces a Symposium with the play as the centerpiece and noted author Dr. Susan Love gives the keynote address. The title For Our Daughters comes from Bonnie Morris' mother who underwent experimental treatments for her breast cancer in the hopes that something would be discovered “for her three daughters.”
1994 - 20th Anniversary
Three Viewings begins Illusion’s relationship with playwright Jeffrey Hatcher and director Kent Stephens. The play features Wayne Evenson, Mary McDevitt, and Shirley Venard. Three Viewings goes on to a celebrated production in New York featuring Buck Henry at the Manhattan Theater Club and continues to be performed across the country.
Since that first outing with Mr. Hatcher, Illusion has commissioned/produced nine plays of his including No Strings with Stephanie Lusco (1996), his adaptation of Henry James’s Turn of the Screw (1998), Good N’ Plenty (2001), Murderers (2005), Mercy of a Storm (2003), Mrs. Mannerly (2008), What’s the Word For (2012), Jeffrey Hatcher’s Hamlet (2014), A Night in Olympus (2016), Netherland (2019).
Kent Stephens begins his creative career with Illusion, going on to direct Patty Lynch’s play Earthly Delights, then their joint collaborations Death Valley Scottie and the Mystery Mine (2002), Mrs. MacKenzie’s "Beginners' Guide to the Blues" (1999), and then he writes and directs a tribute to Allen Ginsberg, Angel Headed Hipster (1998). In the Ginsberg piece are performers TR. Knight, Brian Goranson, Michael Tezla, T. Mychael Rambo, Terry Hempleman, and Michelle Cassioppi.
Kim Hines brings From Slavery To Freedom: Let Gospel Ring with the Minneapolis Gospel Sound to Illusion’s stage. The production is directed by Richard Thompson and features Kimberly Elise and Terry Bellamy. This begins a long creative period with Kim Hines as a writer. She writes Do Not Pass Go (1992), Cut on the Bias (1993), Don’t Let Them Catch You (1995), I’ll Believe I’ll Run On and See What the End’s Gonna Be (1999), Jus’ for a While (2001), If You Don’t Really Want to Know, Don’t Ask Me (2003), and collaborates on the books for Always and Forever (1996), 2-gether (1997) and Living Beauty (1998).
Kim is also part of the team that created For Our Daughters (1994) and Like Waters Flowing Down (1999).
1993
Patrick Scully, who choreographed Illusion’s signature work, Orlando performs Queer Thinking in Illusion’s Fresh Ink Series. The Star Tribune reports, "Scully is a gay activist who talks about the rules of conduct for living in a heterosexual world, how he survived a gay bashing incident and what it is like living with HIV. Scully doesn’t preach, he shares using the rich details of his full and interesting life. Kudos to the artist for creating such an uncompromising show and Illusion for staging it."
Later Patrick Scully performs The Naked Truth (2001) and with Djola Branner, Forever Hold Your Piece (1996), and in 2014 Patrick Scully launches his signature piece Leaves of Grass Uncut about Walt Whitman in Illusion’s Fresh Ink Series.
Enlightenments on an Enchanted Island is created by Marion McClinton. Marion is well known as a director, but it is harder and harder for him to get the time to write. The production features Kimberly Elise, Kathryn O’Malley, Trudy Monet, Jim Craven, Mark Cryer, Mary McDevitt, and Elizabeth Teefy. Later he pens Beauty is a Rare Thing (2007) and later Jazz adapted from Toni Morrison’s novel of the same name.
Illusion develops Celebrating Diversity as a play designed to be used in the workplace to highlight a variety of workplace diversity issues. Developed in such a way that Illusion could tailor it to fit any kind of workplace and be used as part of a company-wide or department training. This play tours to corporations, churches, schools, and colleges.
Bonnie and Michael create the position of Artistic Associate to give a home and health insurance to a number of artists important to Illusion—the first group is comprised of Kim Hines, Beth Gilleland, Dean Holzman, Peter Rothstein, and Kent Stephens.
1992
1991
David Feldshuh introduces Illusion to the actor /composer Michael Keck. He composes music for several Illusion productions including Hard Times Come Again No More.
