Conceived and launched in 2019, the thesis of my SciFi Reading Hour was to put more stories of the future by more local writers in front of the eyes of the community. The elevator pitch is this: We need more women, more people of color, more immigrants and queer folk writing the future, so that someone else isn’t writing us out of it, or writing our futures for us. I also think artists thrive on collaboration, and good theater is easier to come by combining talents in different media. In 2019-2020, and now again in 2025 this presents as two writers (poets, novelists, playwrights, experimental writers, others!) collaborating with one musician on future-looking stories on a stage (thank you Bryant Lake Bowl!).

Imagine being read to by professional level writers, with gorgeous, live underscoring by professional level musicians- it’s an immersive experience where you the audience are invited to think about the future. The performance has interviews with the performers at the end of the show, down-to-earth conversations about what we value and how we can nurture that in our communities. Performers have included Kai Stewart, Dameun Strange, Naomi Kritzer, Dissociate, Kyle Tran Myhre (aka Guante), Caly McMorrow, Khary Jackson, Jasmine (Jazz) Castañeda, John Heimbuch, Abra Staffin-Wiebe, Ben San Del, and Duck Washington.

For the time being, it works like this: technically, the SciFi Reading Hour is my pet project, my vanity project. I can and will show up for others on their projects, I can and will collaborate with others on projects where ownership is shared, but to keep this show rolling, I’m the producer/director/whatever. I keep a list of writers and musicians I know or who have been recommended to me, and optimistically, I reach out a few months before the beginning of the season to check on interest and availability. We rehearse 2-4 times before the show, which is the first Sunday of the month unless noted elsewhere. BLB manages box office, tech, and table service and keeps half of the ticket sales. I get a check for the other half, which I take taxes out of (because I will have to pay taxes on the income), and then split evenly between me and the other performers, by show.

Practically, the show is “small” cast-wise for a few reasons.

• While there are lots of spaces to get 3-10 minutes on stage around town, I want to make space for more skilled future-gazing writers to have a meaningful amount of time (generally 20-40 minutes) to connect with an audience.
• It is easier to schedule rehearsals with just three cast members.
• These shows don’t make a ton of money, and a three-way split of the profits means I don’t have to divvy out embarrassing ten $5-10 checks or keep the money for myself and feel guilty about that.
• It feels intimate to collaborate with just three performers- everyone has plenty of space to feel heard and make space for others to feel heard.

What am I looking for in collaborators?

• Reliability (Are you going to show up?)
• Social ease (I don’t want to work with someone who is going to make me or others uncomfortable, no matter how talented or famous you are. This generally means either I know the performers or have humans I trust who will vouch for them. Occasionally, I will ask a potential collaborator to coffee to do a vibe check.)
• Quality/quantity of work (Writers: can you fill 20 minutes with quality future-looking work? Musicians: can you perform for about 50 minutes and collaborate with writers who might not have musical background?)
• Diversity of experience/background (I specifically try to have seasons which have at least 50% not white performers, and 50% not men. For the time being, I’m not trying too hard to make sure the balance is the same in writers and musicians, but I’d love that to be the case eventually, too. As it’s my show and I’m always there, I don’t count myself into the demographics.)
• Fewer repeat performances in writers (aside of myself, to get more voices on stage). Musicians, I’ll come back to folks regularly, because I have a smaller number of solo musicians in my circles, but I’m still always looking to incorporate new folks into the mix.

Wherein this is my passion project and I make the calls:

• I choose the writers and musicians. If writers/musicians have special requests on who they’d like to perform with, I have not yet said no. I like to think that I’m putting together voices that will be complementary, but maybe also inspire/challenge each other to access new parts of our creativity. I also like to balance perceived celebrity and circles, to maximize audience interest/cross-pollination.
• I choose the dates folks perform. Obviously, I don’t schedule folks for when they’re not available, but I like to build that audience interest.
• I conduct the interviews at the end, and dictate the general vibe of the show.
• I draw the art. I am not a fantastic artist, and the art doesn’t have anything to do with a particular show. I do this to have a cohesive vibe and to make myself draw something once a month or more.
• I ask to see the proposed writing before we begin rehearsals. This has more to do with ensuring the work is done in time for rehearsals, and ensuring I have a complementary piece length-wise and vibe-wise, than it does with quality control.
• I get finally say on the performance order. Generally, this is a conversation with the other performers about what works best for the flow, and generally, we agree on how it should go.
• I will perform almost every month of the show. I’m producing this show partially as a way to keep myself writing and performing, not just for the production’s sake. Some months it’ll be about the same amount of time as the other writer, some months a lot less, some a lot more (a lot of that is dependent on how much the other writer wants to read.)

Wherein I am flexible and trust my collaborators:

• I don’t need the show to be hard science fiction, and will produce some work that isn’t exactly SciFi, but is SciFi adjacent. If my guest’s work is further from SciFi, I try to balance that with work of my own that is more easily categorized as SciFi. There has been some fantasy, some nebulous speculative fiction, some nonfiction, etc. I have not had a complaint about this show’s lack of science fiction yet.
• The 20-40 minutes is flexible. If I really like the writer’s work, but they don’t quite have 20 minutes of content, I can probably fill it. If I like the writer’s work but it’s more than 40 minutes, I can just do a couple of poems. That said, I’m not going to be railroaded by someone who wants the full time. It is a vanity project after all- if they want their own vanity project, they can produce their own show or negotiate for me to do it.
• It doesn’t have to be prose, it doesn’t have to be fiction, it doesn’t have to have a satisfying narrative arc. My writers are poets, playwrights, screenwriters, flash fiction writers, novelists, whatever they are- they’re talented as hell and I trust them. They can (and have) asked me to read with them, to have outside actors come in, to experiment with the performance.
• I have yet to censor someone. I’m not going to invite a misogynist, a racist, or the like to perform, and if I get NOPE vibes off of some piece, I’m going to at very least have a conversation about it, but the work itself can make the audience uncomfortable, can be full of swears, etc if it makes sense and isn’t glorifying something that ought not be glorified. So far, the folks on my stage have not required any such conversations. Swears are allowed. Contact me before a show if you are worried about bringing a kid or some such and I’ll give you any necessary warnings.