Anyone can perform at ShenanArts' new weekly theater outing. Just leave your inhibitions at home.

    By RACHEL BOWMAN
    Daily News-Record
    Dolores Curry has no shame.
    Curry, 70, looks every bit the proper grandma as she perches on a folding metal chair facing the audience gathered at Shenanarts' Verona Stage. That picture quckly explodes, however, as she launches into a five-minute musing on the mind-boggling array of condoms she observed during a recent trip to the pharmacy to fill a prescription.
    If you have five minutes and original material you're eager to show off, you, too, can have no shame. ShenanArts will present the "open-mic" approach to performing on its new Verona Stage beginning at 9:30 p.m. every Saturday night, and the theater company is asking folks to step up to the mic.
    No Shame Theatre premiered last weekend.
    "Anyone who feels they have five minutes of original material they want to share -- this will provide a venue for that material," says Nancy Kiracofe, director of Shenandoah International Playwrights.
    Last weekend's inaugural No Shame proved that anything can happen during a show. With minimal props and snappy scene changes, performances ranged from serious scenes to silly sing-alongs, rapid-fire poetry to a hormone-raging Romeo.
    This fast and loose approach has governed No Shame Theatre since its inception in 1986 on the bed of a Dodge pickup truck, says founder Todd Ristau. The only rules for performing in No Shame are that pieces must be original; pieces should be no more than five minutes in length; and nothing can be broken during a performance -- not the audience, the theater or any laws.
    Ristau, an assistant professor of theater at Mary Baldwin College in Staunton, began No Shame as an undergraduate theater student at the University of Iowa.
    At that time, the university's playwrights held a weekly "Midnight Madness," a free-form production during which graduate student playwrights presented short original works.
    "The actors liked doing Midnight Madness," says Ristau, because it provided acting experience without having to audition beforehand.
    The graduate student playwrights eventually closed Midnight Madness. In an ensuing gripe session, he and his fellow undergrads bemoaned losing the experience. "You can do theater anywhere," he recalls saying. "You don't need to be ashamed [of the venue you perform in]."
    At that, Ristau says his friend, Stan Ruth, yelled, "No shame! No shame!"
    Later, Ristau and several friends gathered in the university theater's parking lot around midnight to kick off what they called No Shame Theatre, in honor of the friend's defiant battle cry. As actors performed on the back of Ristau's truck, a motorcycle headlamp illuminated the makeshift stage and the vehicle's stereo system served as a soundboard.
    Since that time, the No Shame franchise has spread across the country to New York, Miami, Chicago and Fairbanks, Alaska.
    No matter where No Shame settles, the original three rules apply. Another tradition is a late-night performance schedule.
    "It works well to have it late night," says Ristau. For the theater, No Shame can bring in revenue on a space that is unused following a performance. For actors, the later time allows them to perform "edgier" works following traditional shows earlier in the evening. Audiences to those late shows also are more open to "riskier" performances. "An 8 o'clock audience wants something more traditional," he says.
    In April 2001, No Shame debuted in Live Arts Theatre's Live Arts B studio, and "it's been successful," says Ristau. The weekly shows generated more than $8,000 in revenue last year for the company.
    To kick off Verona's No Shame, several members of Charlottesville's Live Arts were on hand to introduce the concept to the Verona audience.
    Curry, who has performed in Charlottesville's No Shame for a year, says the condom monologue was the first comic piece she has performed. Her first No Shame performance was a hammered dulcimer musical number, and she frequently does serious scenes written by a playwright friend.
    Hearing the laughter that her monologue elicited, though, has convinced her to do more comedy at future No Shame evenings.
    "Being associated in No Shame frees you to do things like this," Curry smiles. "Try it out! It's wide open, what you can do."
    Trent Gray Westbrook, who performed two dramatic scenes, also values No Shame's no-risk approach to acting. "I can try out all these things that are random thoughts," Westbrook says. Although he's not a theater major, he's been a member of Chalottesville's No Shame for more than a year. "I'm in it for the fun," he says.
    Ristau says No Shame's no-risk, no-fear environment is beneficial to novice actors and playwrights, especially high school students or non-theater people who think they have something creative to share. "It's a great place where you can try everything," he says. "You can take a professional risk and not suffer personally."
    In turn, the audience need not suffer. With 15 scenes filling out a typical No Shame show, "if you don't like something, it will be over soon," says Ristau.