history and mission
Tongue in Cheek Theater (TIC) is an Off-Off Broadway theater company dedicated to producing seriously funny theater.Our mission is to use comedy to make our audiences think.
TIC's inaugural season kicked off in early 2006 with Paula Vogel's Baltimore Waltz, followed by Wearing Me Down, a collection of three one-act plays presented by Prospect Theater Company's Dark Night Series in October 2006. In 2007, TIC associate-produced Sure Thing and Variations on the Death of Trotsky with Merete Muenter. 2008 saw a revival of A.R. Gurney’s Love Letters and a sold-out run of Five Flights by Adam Bock. In 2009 the company expanded its production schedule, with Recent Tragic Events by Craig Wright at the end of February, Up a River/Down the Aisle by Jake Lipman in two summer festivals, Psych by Evan Smith for two weeks in September, and the inaugural Plus 1 Solo Show Festival during the dark nights of Psych.
In April and May 2010, TIC produced the Tony and Pulitzer award-winning play Proof by David Auburn, as well as the Spring 2010 Plus 1 Solo Show Festival. About tic’s production of Proof, NYTheatre.com raved, “This production is first rate. Auburn’s story is given vivid life by a quartet of talented actors ... exceptional.” The production was nominated for a 2010 New York Innovative Theater Award for Outstanding Sound Design.
The 2010-11 season started with the New York premiere of William Missouri Downs’s Dead White Males, with the playwright in attendance. TheaterOnline called the production “sterling...a trenchant critique of America’s education system in crisis...fascinating...The ensemble is first-rate.” The Fall 2010 Plus 1 Solo Show Festival ran concurrently with Dead White Males for two sold-out shows.
TIC’s spring 2011 production of The Drunken City by Adam Bock in April and May was hailed by BlogCritics.org as “fun through and through ... Kudos to Ms. Lipman and Tongue in Cheek Theater for making manifest what's funny, and what's sneakily smart, in the blurry scrim of these six characters.” The Spring 2011 Plus 1 Solo Show Festival ran concurrently with The Drunken City, continuing the festival’s recent tradition of two sold-out shows.
In August 2011, TIC made its debut in The New York International Fringe Festival (FringeNYC) with William Missouri Downs’s Books on Tape in its New York City premiere. In November 2011, the Fall 2011 Plus 1 Solo Show Festival once again played to two sold-out audiences. May 2012 saw Kate Hewlett’s Humans Anonymous play to enthusiastic audiences, and the Spring 2012 Plus 1 Solo Show Festival was again a sold-out, runaway hit.
TIC’s next scheduled production will be the Summer 2012 Plus 1 Solo Show Festival in July 2012, followed soon in October 2012 with Thornton Wilder’s Our Town and the Fall 2012 Plus 1 Solo Show Festival.