“New” stands for New Edgecliff and for “new digs,” which brings us to the Newport part.

        New Edgecliff is taking a “test run” away from the Aronoff's Fifth Third Bank Theater, artistic director Michael Shooner says, to try its luck on the largely unknown theatrical landscape of Monmouth Street in Newport.

        New Edgecliff will debut at the Artery Theater (913 Monmouth St., upstairs from the gallery) Friday. The nakedness will be emotional rather than literal in I Stand Before You Naked, a collection of 10 dramatic portraits by Joyce Carol Oates.

        The show features Jennifer Dalton, Sue Breving, Elizabeth Harris, Molly Binder and Sara Elizabeth Timmins, mostly well-known names on the small theater scene. Cincinnati Shakespeare's Rebecca Bowman directs.

        The question is: Will they draw an audience to an untried address?

        It's easy to find — the Artery Theater (originally developed by Rick Adams as the No Name Theater upstairs from the Artery Gallery) stands almost in the shadow of Newport on the Levee. There's convenient parking.

        There's an elevator to take you up to the second floor, where a sweetly hip little space (about 50 seats) shouts off-off-off theater.

        Still, this is a far country, theatrically speaking.

        Mr. Shooner says the move reduces facility costs by about 85 percent, which means New Edgecliff can afford to continue to take risks. “If we can't continue to do that, I'll go sell insurance.”

        Director Bowman loves the risks that Naked provides and invites. The characters, which include an abused go-go dancer, a terminally cheerful receptionist, troubled teen-agers and a pregnant woman engaged in a life-and-death struggle with her malevolent fetus, “are extreme and sometimes frightening,” she promises.

        “These are women you'd see profiled on Dateline or on the cover of the National Enquirer, people on the fringes of society that we tend to pass judgment on.

        “Each of these monologues is an intimate encounter with the audience and forces us to listen to their logic and their lives and what it is they're pursuing and how it goes horribly awry.”

        Thursday's preview is pay-what-you-can with proceeds benefiting Women Helping Women.

        Performances are 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 2 p.m. Sunday through May 19. Tickets $15, students and seniors $12. Call 763-3844.

        Triple threat: Three of Cincinnati's favorite actresses — Dale Hodges, Marni Penning and Mary Tensing — come together for an informal reading of Life x 3 by Yazmina Reza (Art) at 7 p.m. Monday at Kaldi's (1204 Main St., Over-the-Rhine.).

        It's the first event in a two-week “mini-festival” by Women's Theatre Initiative intended to shine a light on women and theater and on the WTI.

        WTI producer Kristin Dietsche calls Life x 3 “an hilarious and poignant examination of our most personal intimacies and private longings” as a couple arrive for a dinner invitation a night early.

        The free reading introduces a summertime informal play reading series that will continue on alternate Mondays through September. Ms. Dietsche invites everyone to arrive an hour early for dinner and chat with WTI friends.

        Women's Theatre Initiative is also putting together two “WTI Nights” at local productions.

        WTI Night at Cowgirls is scheduled for Thursday. Hop in the saddle for a special ticket price, a deeply discounted $9, and a post-show conversation with playwright/performer Mary Murfett. Reserve by calling WTI at (513) 604-8545 or e-mail dietsche@fuse.net.

        The initiative will also host an evening at I Stand Before You Naked, May 10. Director Rebecca Bowman will lead a post-performance discussion at nearby York Street Cafe (738 York St.) Call New Edgecliff at 763-3844.

        Ms. Dietsche hopes a festival format “will encourage both women and men to make a special effort to support these shows and demonstrate that there is a demand for gender diversity in local theater and a desire in our community to experience a variety of perspectives through the performing arts.”

        Bring along titles of plays you'd like to hear to Monday's reading. “We're interested in everything — historic, experimental, international, classics and, of course, contemporary. Diversity is our goal, and we're interested in hearing as many different voices as possible.”

        Be sure to sign up on WTI's e-mail list to be notified of readings.

        The initiative has had one recent setback. Rights to present the Cincinnati premiere of Bridget Carpenter's Fall in June were canceled a week ago when the play was optioned for a New York engagement.

        Opening week: It's high season for community theater. Opening this week:

        • Cincinnati Music Theatre will commemorate the Richard Rodgers centennial with Carousel, May 3-11 at the Aronoff's Jarson-Kaplan Theater. Skip Fenker directs a cast that includes Marilyn Langley, Tom Sanders, Bill Hartnett and Josephine Keenan.

        The company will return to Rodgers and Hammerstein in November with The Sound of Music. Call 621-2787.

        • Tom Hansen makes his local directing debut with Closer than Ever for Footlighters, marking the 10th anniversary of the first time he directed the Maltby-Shire revue.

        Mr. Hansen moved to Florence three years ago from the Washington, D.C., area where he directed at a dozen community theaters. “But it takes a long time getting established in a new place,” he says.

        He started building sweat equity at Footlighters by working on set construction. He wanted to do Pippin, but Closer than Ever, which has “an overlying theme of relationships” was the show that was on both the theater's and Mr. Hansen's lists.

        Closer than Ever will play May 2-18 at the Stained Glass Theatre in Newport. 891-1965

        • Caryl Churchill tackled nothing less than gender, family, sexual repression, British colonialism, class, race and identity in Cloud 9, insightfully described by New York Times critic Mel Gussow as ""Rudyard Kipling as rewritten by Joe Orton.”

        Falcon Players tackles Caryl Churchill May 3-18 at Westwood Town Hall. Call 481-9042.

        • And Sunset Players offers Bernard Slade's Tribute, about a terminally ill charmer trying to reconcile with a son who knows better.

        Dennis Murphy and Patt Robb are co-directors. The show runs May 3-18 at Dunham Recreation Complex (1945 Dunham Way, West Price Hill). Call 588-4988.

        Contact Jackie Demaline by phone: 768-8530; fax: 768-8330; e-mail: jdemaline@enquirer.com.
       

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