For many Penn Staters, Thursday nights in Happy Valley mark the beginning of weekend festivities. However for some of the more creatively inclined student population, Thursday nights are devoted to theater, in a very unconventional sense.

Late Thursday nights around 11 p.m., the Outlaws assemble in the Theatre Building, usually Room 6, to perform in a black box theater environment. For those who aren’t theater-savvy, a black box theatrer are defined by Wikipedia as “simple, somewhat unadorned performance space[s]” and are generally used for experimental performances, a perfect classification for the performances put on by Outlaws.

A new show is staged each week, however these productions are not adapted from published playwrights. Shows are student submitted and directed and are usually staged in the week leading up to the performance, which, if you don’t know anything about theater, can be quite a feat.

Each week bring new plots and storylines. This semester alone Outlaws productions have covered topics from accepting homosexuality within families to light-hearted spoofs on recent films such as Twilight, 127 Hours, and the Saw series. Aside from the performance, each show ends with a talk back between the cast and creative team and the audience, giving audiences the opportunity to provide feedback for further script development.

Auditions for Outlaws are held sporadically through the semester on an as needed basis. For more information or to get your 15 minutes of Outlaw fame and submit a script, contact the producers!