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MF24H: MusicalFare 24 Hours

As the future of the old Palace Burlesque at 710 Main Street slowly takes shape—that’s the building best known as the former Studio Arena—the first event out of the box is inventive and locally produced, and promises to be spectacularly fun. MusicalFare’s inaugural 24 Hour Musical Festival will take place in the facility on Saturday, June 23 at 8pm.

The intentionally daft concept is this: What might happen if the entire collaborative process of creating an original musical took place in just 24 hours?

MusicalFare, the Snyder-based musical theater, will create, develop, and stage four short musicals at 710 Main, in just one day. MF24H will feature a multitude of local theater artists.

Writers, composers, directors, and actors will be organized into four teams. Then, the event description tell us, “on the evening of Friday, June 22nd, there will be a reception at 710 Main Street where major donors will be viewing photos in 4 categories relating to Buffalo/Western New York: architecture, landscape, community and industry. They will then vote on their favorite photo in each category. The four winning photos will be assigned to one of the creative teams as the inspiration for their musical.”

Then, it’s guaranteed pandemonium as the artists go to rehearsal spaces to whip the elements they’ve been given into four original musicals inspired by sights and stories of Buffalo-Niagara.

The actors will report at 9am on Saturday, June 23 to begin rehearsals. These brand new shows will be rehearsed and memorized, to be performed (from memory!) at 710 Main Street at 8pm that same night.

Fantastic!

Writing/directing participants include the Albrights, Scott Behrend, Jason Bravo, Jon Elston, Donna Hoke, Chris Kelly, Billy Horn, and Michael Walline.

The actors are Todd Benzin, Megan Callahan, Charmagne Chi, Jeffrey Coyle, Maria Droz, Ellen Horst, Tara Kaczorowski, Sheila McCarthy, Katy Miner, Jennifer Swart Mysliwy, Kelli Bocock Natale, Loraine O’Donnell, Ben Puglisi, Brian Riggs, Michele Marie Roberts, Matt Witten, and Dawn Woollacott.

Tickets are available by calling the box office at 839-8540 or visiting www.musicalfare.com. VIP tickets are $150; general admission is $25; students and actors pay $15. (For VIP tickets, which include admission to two parties and the performance, callt the box office.)