Ten West has fallen in love with the Sacred Fools Theater

Recently Ten West began a passionate love affair with the Sacred Fools Theater www.sacredfools.org
Sacred Fools is...
"One of the city’s most provocative and whimsical theater troupes!" -L.A. Weekly
57 NOMINATIONS, 22 HONORABLE MENTIONS and 18 AWARDS SINCE 1997!

Suffice to say that it's quite an impressive theater and theater company and Ten West is honored to have been a part of some of the amazing theatrical productions one can experience at Sacred Fools.

We've taken part in Ten Tops, 360 and have recently been voted back for our third Serial Killers episode. Check out the website www.sacredfools.org or ours www.tenwest.net for more info.

And we are pleased to announce that you will now be able to...
Find your inner child at Sacred Fools with two great shows in one evening!

I WROTE THIS!
A caged baby. Dangerous scientific experiments. A greedy Queen. A difficult pregnancy.
Moral outrage. And more. Kids notice more than you think.
Directed by Corey Klemow & Ruth Silveira

Followed by...

TEN WEST
Vaudevillian comedy to make yoursides split and your heart hurt.
written & performed by TEN WEST(Jon Monastero & Stephen Simon)
directed by Bryan Coffee
more details at www.TenWest.net

JANUARY 19 - FEBRUARY 4, 2006
Opening Thursday, Jan. 19 @ 8pm then running Fri-Sat @ 8pm / Sun @ 7pm
Special Matinee of I WROTE THIS!Sunday, Jan. 29 @ 2pmfollowed by Q&A with cast & crewand reception w/cookies & milk!
Adults: $15 (Matinee - $10)Kids 12 and under: Always $5
Reservations: (310) 281-8337or Purchase Tickets Online!
Come out to Sacred Fools and experience the transformative power of theater!

Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival

In November of 2005, we traveled to Toronto, Canada for the first ever Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival. Our travel date coincided with Thanksgiving (the US version of the holiday) but the absence of turkey was made bearable by the warm greeting we received by some very friendly Canadians. Special thanks to Sasha Wentges & her roomate Shelley Simmons who graciously opened thier home to two strangers from LA. True to form we were very superficial with them and tried to take advantage of their warmth and hospitality at every opportunity. We broke some of their possessions, stole others and left empty bottles of botox scattered on their floors. We also left the seat up. We made LA proud!
More special thanks to Paul Snepsts and Julianne Baragar who produced the festival and Jay Morneau who ran our tech flawlessly. BIG Thanks to the rest of the staff and volunteers, too.
Our show on Sat. night, Nov. 26th was well received by the audience at the Gladstone Hotel on Queen St. Stephen spent the night there Sat. night and slept safely and soundly in a room decorated with GINORMOUS photo collages of C. Thomas Hall, Shawn Cassidy, Ralph Macchio, Patrick Swayze, Matt Dillon etc... hanging on the walls. There was also a painting of a large naked man carrying another large naked man with a fig leaf covering his privates. Suffice to say that Jon returned to Sasha & Shelley's house for the evening.
Ten West had a great time up North and we are all the more sad that America's attempt to make Canada our 14th Colony in 1775 failed. Damn that Benedict Arnold!

Rabbits, Horses & the joys of children's theater

Ten West recently completed a second run of The Velveteen Rabbit at the Morgan-Wixson Theater in Santa Monica. The play is adapted from the very popular book of the same title by James Still and was funded by the Santa Monica Theater Guild and the Youth Education/Entertainment Series of Santa Monica. Jon played the Velveteen Rabbit & Stephen the Rocking Horse (Skin Horse in the original book by Margery Williams). The play was directed by Tara Redepenning and Produced by Tara's husband Darin Goulet. Tara & Darin are marvelously talented and have a true gift for working with children (ie patience, love, compassion and understanding). It was a great experience, the first run of the play in Jan. & Feb. 2005 drew such large crowds that it was brought back again, and Ten West would do it a third time if asked even though it pays zero American dollars. Most of the original cast returned and the new cast members brought wonderful new energy to the production. Jon & Stephen learned a lot from their second experience in Children's Theater, including the following:
kids are young...and small
kids say things like, "what about if I was a wizard and I made all the audience turn into giant sharkheads and then a helicopter came and took them to a river in the forest where all the bunnies were at and my wand was like a super laser? What would happen? Huh? Huh? What then?..."
being asked to sign an autograph for a three year old who thinks that you are a "real" Velveteen Rabbit or Rocking Horse is pretty cool
some kids will cry when the Velveteen Rabbit tries to shake their hand after the play
kids talk & yell stuff during the show and only mean people shoosh them
there is not a lot of money to be made in children's theater
Marilu Henner is not attracted to men in fluffy bunny suits
carrying a stuffed animal will lower blood pressure
stuffed animals should be sent to all world leaders in the name of peace or as a ploy to lull them into complacency while Ten West took control of the world with an army of giant sharkhead people