Celebrating 25 Years of Madly Dangerous Drama!

Twenty-five years ago Jason Nodler’s post-apocalyptic, punk opera In The Under Thunderloo was performed at the punk club, Catal Huyuk. The name of our first theatre company, Infernal Bridegroom Productions, came to us from a line in our second production, Brecht’s In the Jungle of Cities which we performed in a boxing ring at Commerce Street Arts Warehouse. We cut our teeth on plays by Brecht, Beckett, Shepard, Foreman, and Fornes, and along the way we assembled a motley crew of writers, performers, musicians, and misfits who would go on to collaborate for decades. After a few more productions together, IBP was made “official” with the signing of a cocktail napkin at Warren’s Inn. Soon after we formed a non-profit and the rest is history.

Our highlights reel is impossibly long. Throughout our 25-year history we have had the honor of working with artists like Suzan-Lori Parks, Lisa D’Amour, Mickle Maher, Miki Johnson, and now Chana Porter. We were often the first company in Houston to introduce audiences to work by these playwrights—many times we’ve been the first in the country. Suzan-Lori Parks’ Fucking A received its world premiere at Infernal Bridegroom Productions and was directed by Suzan-Lori herself, just before she would go on to become a Pulitzer Prize winner and MacArthur Fellow.

In addition to the myriad regional and world premieres our companies have produced, we’ve also been prolific creators of original work. We’ve collaborated with artists such as Daniel Johnston, Frank Black, Jim Parsons, Brian Jucha and Carolyn Wonderland on the creation of new work. Original works by artistic director Jason Nodler including Speeding Motorcycle and Bluefinger: The Fall and Rise of Herman Brood, have garnered international attention and have contributed to Houston’s stature as a creative center. I’m also very proud of the success of my original summer musicals, which have developed a cult following in Houston. After 21 Tamarie Cooper Shows I think it’s safe to say summers with Tamarie have become a Houston institution! The work of both IBP and Catastrophic has been documented in a permanent archive at the UH libraries Special Collections, bestowing permanence on our theatre. But we still have plenty of new work to create and many emerging, young playwrights to discover.

We are as committed as ever to imagining, commissioning, developing, and producing provocative, highly emotional new work.  This mission will never change, no matter how established our brand becomes, how much our audience grows, or how much cleaner our bathrooms may be. While we will always fight to retain our edge, we are ready to grow up in some ways in order to become a sustainable and hopefully permanent contributor to Houston’s cultural landscape. This year we are embarking on a strategic plan with ambitious goals that include raising artist fees, increasing our staff size, establishing an education department, and developing the size and scope of our audiences. We are at a pivotal point in the organization’s history, but the future is bright for The Catastrophic Theatre. 

Twenty-five years ago we never imagined we would still be making ground-breaking theatre in Houston. Yet here we are—a long way from the sweltering warehouses where we started. None of this would have been possible without the tremendous support we have received from Houston’s arts community—the artists, audiences, donors, and foundations that believe in our mission. Jason and I and many of the artists that signed that cocktail napkin have devoted more than half of our lives to making “madly dangerous drama.”

We look forward to sharing the next 25 years of madly dangerous drama with you.

With love,
Tamarie Cooper
Associate Director