In May 1993 Brian Posen, now the producer of the annual Chicago SketchFest, found himself living at home again. Having just earned his master’s, he’d signed a six-month contract with the American Players Theatre in Wisconsin, but he’d had to break it so he could care for his father, who was ill. While his father recovered, Posen worried about his job prospects. “What the hell?” he remembers thinking. “I just got this grad degree, and here I am in the room I grew up in.”
Posen has been teaching ever since, even as he’s made a name as a director and producer. “I’ve never had a plan, a goal,” he says. “I think that if you start doing what you love, you’re going to do it well, and then more opportunities are going to reveal themselves.”
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One hour and 150 students later, Posen had decided he wanted to be a teacher. “Without even really consciously knowing it,” he says, “I abandoned going for my MBA or my law degree.” The next fall he enrolled in an MFA acting program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
The Theatre Building reps called to say they couldn’t find a new renter. Posen knew the Cupid Players, whom he’d been directing for almost three years, were talented, but he didn’t think they could carry a seven-week run by themselves. He sent an e-mail to several other local directors he knew, suggesting they put together a sketch-comedy showcase. Within two weeks he had 33 groups, veterans and novices.
Last year he expanded the festival to fill all three stages of the Theatre Building, hosting 71 groups during a two-week run that drew close to 5,500 people. He included experimental events such as Octasketch, in which a local veteran director is given five performers, chosen randomly from different ensembles, and eight hours to create an original half-hour show that’s performed the same night.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Joeff Davis.
