Dear Trouper,
Thanks to you, the Mime Troupe made it through 2013 and we're gearing up for 2014. If you've donated to our efforts already, thank you. If not, today is your last chance to donate with a tax benefit for 2013! Please consider donating as generously as you can to help us mount our 2014 production geared toward both inspiring and enabling activism and social justice involvement. Our aim is to make it the call to action these dysfunctional times require but we need to raise the funds to make it happen!
As you consider giving to the Mime Troupe, we hope you'll think about both how you and your friends and family may have enjoyed the Troupe over the years and also about how the Troupe's work inspires other artists and activists. In the eloquent words of prolific Bay Area playwright Eugenie Chan who has been involved with the Troupe in the past:
"The Troupe is a singular gem: a vibrant and nationally-acclaimed center of political theater right in our backyard. Their annual summer shows -- from their long ago commedia origins to their current musical theater comedies -- challenge us citizens to question the way we participate and collude with the economic, societal, and governmental institutions that organize the way we live. The work entertains, as much as it impels us to think -- and hopefully act for the common good. And their work travels to where men and women of all creeds, color, and socioeconomic backgrounds congregate because it is free and excellent theatre for the people.
The Troupe's contributions don't stop at their huge summer shows and tour. Within their studio, the Troupe runs a youth theatre program that educates local students free-of-charge in the power and discipline of theatre. The kids' culminating project is a student-devised show open to the public. The Troupe also holds an institute for international theatre artists from all over the world to engage in political theatre-making, also cost-free. The Mime Troupe is a rare theatrical bird - a collective that talks the talk and walks the walk by continually challenging the status quo in word, performance and deed".
Thank you so much for all the support you have offered in the past and all new support you are able to offer. May we all work together to challenge the status quo in 2014!
In Solidarity and Forward into the New Year,
The SFMT Collective and Staff
