Ohio State Marion is pleased to welcome the Five Nights on Campus presentation, Howling at the Moon to Morrill Hall Auditorium, Thursday, May 8, 7:30 p.m.

Howling at the Moon is a company of eight women artists over 60 who write and perform their lives as Live Art readings. The Exquisite Art of Aging offers fresh insights about growing older in today’s world. A HOWLING features a little sherry, a little jazz, and funny to deeply personal monologues written by each presenter.

Jane Celehar (managing director), Mevelyn Estis, Jo Fell, Shiow-Ling Ko, Dotti Lipetz, Joy Reilly (artistic director), Marlene Talbott-Green, and Tatyana Yassenov bring a variety of different cultures, artistic backgrounds, and life experience to their performances. They are immigrants from Russia, Taiwan, and Ireland, a farmer, teacher, psychologist, college professor, school secretary, business owner, poet, painter, dancer, actress, director, and playwright.

The first HOWLING happened at the 2002 International Festival of the Senior Theatre League of America hosted in Columbus by The Ohio State University Department of Theatre, and the company has been touring, writing, and howling ever since.

According to Reilly, the group has made an effort to craft their shows to be as simple as possible.

“It is about having a conversation with the audience during a performance,” she explained. “It is about the word, what we are talking about.

“Another thing that sets the show apart,” said Reilly, “is its basis in reality to each individual cast member’s life.”

“I often say I am my own research,” she added.

“We are writing about what it is like to be older Americans today. It is certainly not like when my mother went through it,” stated Reilly. “We have to reinvent the image of aging and look at how it’s changing and ask different questions about what is aging.”

Although the cast comes from different nationalities, walks of life, and professional backgrounds there are several common bonds throughout.

“We are all artistic women and rather eccentric. We laugh and cry. We laugh a lot,” said Reilly. “We laugh despite the challenges.”

Performances in 2007 included readings at the Ohio Association of Gerontology and Education Conference in Newark, Ohio, The Ohio State University at Lima, the Wexner Center for the Arts at The Ohio State University in Columbus, and Columbus State Community College. In August, Howling was featured on the Erickson Retirement Living Television’s Art of Living cable television program and will be the headliner for the Eden Alternative Living national conference on June 4 at the Hyatt Regency in Columbus. Howling has presented workshops and performed at national festivals in Las Vegas, St. Louis, and Port Clinton, Ohio.

Company members were guest artists for the intensive seminars on the Practice of Theatre and Aging taught for the past three summers in the Department of Theatre at Ohio State by Dr. Joy Reilly.

More on the Howling group can be found at their website, www.howlingatthemoon.org.

For more information on Howling’s upcoming programs, please contact Managing Director Jane Celehar at jcelehar@columbus.rr.com or call 614/436-1887.

Tickets for Howling at the Moon are available in advance or at the door: $10 for adults, $9 for seniors (60 and older), and $4 for students. Marion campus faculty and staff, which includes all Ohio State Marion and Marion Technical College personnel, are eligible for $8 discounted individual performance tickets. For tickets or information on upcoming performances contact Bronwen Babich in university community relations at 740-725-6341, or email babich.5@osu.edu.

Five Nights on Campus is made possible by local community-minded businesses and organizations such as: Clear Channel Radio, Marion; Commercial Savings Bank; Herald Printing; Marion Technical College; Whirlpool Corporation, Marion Division; the Warren Brown Family Foundation; and Wyandot Inc.