Phoenix Theatre (Indianapolis)
The Phoenix Theatre is a professional non-profit theatre located in downtown Indianapolis, on Park Avenue near Massachusetts Avenue. It was founded by Bryan D. Fonseca in 1983, initially to perform the three-part (three evening) science fiction play, Warp!. It is housed in a church where Jim Jones once preached, a fact that was brought into their production of Hedwig and the Angry Inch. The theatre continues to be run by Fonseca, who serves as Producing Director and directs many of the produced plays.
Fare at the Phoenix tends to be edgy, often with adult language and situations, violence, and even occasional nudity. They have often featured plays dealing with sexuality, homosexuality, women's issues, AIDS, African-American issues (they have done all of August Wilson's plays as they became available for regional theatre use), abuse, and mental disorders.
In 2002, they began using half-seasons, after a coup created by some scheduling problems allowed them to acquire the rights to Bat Boy: The Musical before it would have been available to theatres with full seasons, thus they were the first regional theatre ever to perform the play.
The theatre also hosts the annual Festival of Emerging American Theatre (FEAT) Awards, originally an open but now a closed competition, which has resulted in productions of anywhere from one to four world premiere productions each season. Toni Press-Coffman, with two FEAT wins, became playwright-in-residence in 2000, not long after the second of these was chosen.
Read more about Phoenix Theatre (Indianapolis): Production History
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