I AM SO EXCITED! 

Dominican University  in River Forest is staging

The Laramie Project!

They have a great Performing Arts Center and do all kinds of wonderful shows, in all genres. And it's very exciting this play is being staged in the Chicago area. I am sure you must know, the play revolves around the Matthew Shepard murder. Matthew was a gay  student at the University of Wyoming who was tortured and subsequently murdered near Laramie.

The anti-gay Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kansas, led by Fred Phelps, picketed Shepard's funeral as well as the trial of his assailants, displaying signs with slogans such as "Matt Shepard rots in Hell", "AIDS Kills Fags Dead" and "God Hates Fags".

When the Wyoming Supreme Court ruled that it was legal to display any sort of religious message on city property if it was legal for Casper's Ten Commandments display to remain, Phelps attempted and failed to gain city permits in Cheyenne and Casper to build a monument "of marble or granite 5 or 6 feet (1.8 m) in height on which will be a bronze plaque bearing Shepard's picture and the words: "MATTHEW SHEPARD, Entered Hell October 12, 1998, in Defiance of God's Warning: 'Thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind; it is abomination.' Leviticus 18:22."

As a counterprotest during the  trials, Romaine Patterson, a friend of Shepard's, organized a group of individuals who assembled in a circle around the Phelps group wearing white robes and gigantic wings (resembling angels) that blocked the protesters.

Police had to create a human barrier between the two protest groups. While the organization had no name in the initial demonstration, it has since been ascribed various titles, including 'Angels of Peace' and 'Angel Action'.


The Laramie Project is a play by Moisés Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theater Project about the reaction to the murder of Shepard. The play draws on hundreds of interviews conducted by the theatre company with inhabitants of the town, company members' own journal entries and published news reports.


It is divided into three acts, and eight actors portray more than sixty characters in a series of short scenes.- It was made into a 2002 film of the same name.

DOMINICAN UNIVERSITY has learned the hateful  group  from Westboro Baptist Church is planning to picket the Laramie performance on Sunday March 1st. 

"Our students are rallying a peaceful counter-protest (I believe many people are planning to come wearing angel wings).  We’ll have a pre-protest ‘briefing’ in the main hall of the PAC that afternoon to make sure all supporters are on the same peaceful page and pledge to remain so (the WBC makes money by inciting counter-protesters to violence and then suing them).


Boston activist CHRIS MASON organizes PHELPS-A-THONS across the country. Thbe Phelps clan will be protesting 2pm-3pm at Dominican. For every minute they protest, donations are being  collected for COMMON GROUNDS, the gay/straight alliance at Dominican University. It is a fun, positive way to turn Phelps' hate into something good for LGBTs!!

Pledge any amount. 25 cents a minute or more. Pledge online!

PLEASE GO SEE THIS SHOW and support Dominican Univeristy!





By Moisés Kaufman and members of the Tectonic Theatre Project
Directed by Krista Hansen   in the  Martin Recital Hall
(an intimate theatre that seats just under 200 people)


3 performances ONLY

February 27 through March 1, 2009
Friday and Saturday, 7:30 p.m., Sunday, 3:00 p.m.

BUY TICKETS ONLINE NOW


The Dominican University Performing Arts Center is located at 7900 W. Division Street, River Forest, IL 60305.
Just a stone's throw outside of Chicago!  The Performing Arts Center faces South on Division.
The West Parking Lot is right next to Lund Auditorium for free and easy parking for all events.