About the playwrights

Christian Neuhaus is a writer whose comic short plays have appeared onstage since the late 90s. Madison theatre reviewer Nadine Goff said one of Christian’s short comedies, which pitted Shakespearean characters against each other in a WWE-style wrestling match, “was certainly one of the best new plays of 1998.” He is a regular participant in Mercury Players Theatre’s Blitz, in which plays are written, rehearsed, and performed within 24 hours. Other writing activities include Are We Delicious? — an ensemble that develops short plays and performs them within a single week — and arts writing for Dane101.com, a Madison news and culture site. He is a member of The Dramatists Guild of America, Inc.

Rick Stemm is an award-wining writer, designer, and fight choreographer. Rick’s musical, Open Sesame! A Bollywood Pantomime, premiered at The Overtime Theater in October 2012 and was among San Antonio Express-News’s “The Best of 2012: Stage.” It broke box office records for The Overtime Theater, consistently voted the favorite theater in San Antonio. In 2013 he was commissioned by the city of San Antonio to produce a multi-part, audience-interactive narrative for Luminaria, a nationally renowned arts festival. Rick is currently creating Heroes Must Die, a video game whose sequel will be a live theater show in the world of video games. He is a member of The Dramatists Guild.

Together, Christian Neuhaus and Rick Stemm are a comedically mismatched duo with an uncanny ability to co-write and not kill each other. For years they have collaboratively written commercials, short film scripts, comedy sketches, and Blitz Smackdown scripts, including the 2010 winner and the 2009 brilliance that inspired this work. They have acted together in radio dramas and action movies, participated in a film podcast, complement each other’s strengths, and once tried time-travel, with mixed results.