Bonnie Morris and Michael Robins founded Illusion Theater in 1974, to create silent plays. Morris had studied improvisation, and Robins had studied mime in France. For two years they explored that medium exclusively, then began to branch out. Their first departure from silent work was their production of Orlando, Orlando, adapted from Virginia Woolf's novel . To create their production of Orlando and incorporate the elements of music, mime and physical movement, the six members engaged in readings and improvisation, and then in 1979 toured around Minnesota and elsewhere—continuing their improvisation along the way—and including dialogues with the audience as well. They continued to support new playwrights every season. In the late 1970s and early 1980s Illusion Theater's "applied theater program" was created. It included programming designed to address specific social ills. Sexual abuse was addressed with groundbreaking work around 'Good Touch, Bad Touch' created by Cordelia Anderson in collaboration with Hennepin County to help reduce the incidence of child sexual abuse. They presented the play called Touch—which broke new ground in helping children identify harmful actions—to thousands of people starting in 1982, around Minnesota and the U.S.. Their initial name was The Illusion Theater and School, and works created for performance at schools was a primary activity. The Bush Foundation, the McKnight Foundation, the St. Paul Foundation, United Way, the Gannett Foundation and others provided partial funding for those activities, helping to make the Twin Cities an internationally-recognized center of programming by and for children. Another thrust of Illlusion Theater's applied theater program directed at teenagers began with a production in the early 1980's called No Easy Answers that was performed around the state. In the 2000s they pioneered a peer-education program for high school students, funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts. In the mid 1980s, Illusion moved from a warehouse space on Washington Avenue in downtown Minneapolis to their current location, in the Hennepin Center for the Arts on Hennepin Avenue. In the 1990s, Illusion developed two works for use in the workplace: Both Sides Now and Celebrating Diversity, which were performed at workplaces around the Twin Cities. Support of new playwrights was always integral for Illusion Theater. In the mid-1980s Illusion staged a showcase of company members' new projects. In 1988, Illusion launched a long-running series of new works called Fresh Ink, in which new projects underway are workshopped and collaboratively honed with audience participation. Often those works continue to be developed, emerging on main stages at Illusion and elsewhere in future years. Some of the playwrights who launched their work in Fresh Ink include Dane Stauffer, Jeffrey Hatcher, Marion McClinton and Ping Chong. Illusion Theater's budget includes ticket sales, group program revenue, and funding from the Minnesota State Arts Board and others.
Works
Illusion Theater's mainstage productions are almost exclusively original work, usually by Twin Cities artists—often works that have been nurtured in its Fresh Ink process. Some artists return to Illusion Theater regularly, including Miss Richfield 1981 who explores gender identity through humor, and appears on Illusion's stage most years. Illusion's production range from full musicals to noir dramas to comedies, all in the service of illuminating the illusions of the human condition.
