A local production this weekend will feature playwrights, directors and actors aiming to create six new plays in the span of 24 hours. 

LoneTree Live is hosting its third annual “The 24 Hour Plays: Memphis” on Saturday, June 29. The event will take place at TheatreWorks at the Evergreen, 1705 Poplar Ave. 

Six writers, six directors and 24 actors were chosen through an application process that was open to the public two weeks ago. The remaining individuals were picked as on-set assistants. 

24 actors, 6 plays and 24 hours from first script to final performance

“We usually try to give priority to people who haven’t participated,” said LoneTree Live Executive Director Julia Hinson. “Then it’s kind of just like casting a show: ‘Have they been on stage a lot? Have they been on stage a little?’ We love to have a combination of both.”

The actors, writers and directors will introduce themselves on Friday, June 28 at TheatreWorks with a prop in hand.

After introductions, the actors leave. Directors are then paired with writers before an actor’s script is written.

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“The casts are formed, and then the writers know who they’re writing for which is pretty cool,” Hinson said. “Then the writers have all night to write.”

The writers are given between 9:30 p.m. Friday through 6 a.m. Saturday to complete their scripts. The directors return to TheatreWorks Saturday morning to spend an hour analyzing it over before the actors show up. 

“They rehearse all day long,” Hinson said. “So, from like 10 (a.m.) to say six o’clock (p.m.) (Saturday) which is about the time we have to get the theater ready for our audience, they’re in rehearsal. Then at seven o’clock (p.m.), the show goes on.”

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Brooklyn, New York theater company The 24 Hour Plays began the concept in 1995. LoneTree Live has partnered with the organization for three years to produce a version of the event in Memphis.

“Our theater company’s mission is to foster new talent in the city,” Hinson said. “We really want to showcase the writers that are here, but also directors and actors.”

The plays will be 10 minutes each and cover genres from drama to comedy. 

“Our last two years, we would have some that would be sort of like an ‘SNL’ sketch comedy type of show, and then you might find one that’s quite very serious, or there might be something totally absurd and totally out there,” Hinson said. “So, each year when we bring on different writers, we get a new set of stuff which to me is what’s exciting about it.”

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Musician and composer Eileen Kuo will introduce “The 24 Hour Plays: Memphis” with a piano performance. She will also perform composed music from Friday night between plays to tie the show together. 

Hinson founded LoneTree Live in 2011 while living in Omaha, Nebraska, as the Lone Tree Theatre Project.

“I had lived in Memphis before, and so I just decided to come back to this really wonderful community here and start my theater company here,” Hinson said.

Since 2017, it has partnered with TheatreWorks for live performances. LoneTree Live also occasionally uses the space to hold workshops and classes in acting, movement, ensemble work and storytelling.

“Then 24-hour plays came about three years ago when just coming out of the pandemic, I didn’t know what I was going to do in my space,” Hinson said. “I had a theater space at TheaterWorks, reserved to do a show and I had nothing to produce. I met some wonderful artists, and they brought this idea to me.”

LoneTree Live’s “The 24 Hour Plays” will be performed from 7-9:30 p.m. Saturday, June 29 at TheatreWorks at the Evergreen. Tickets are $15.