Home Page
Now Playing!
Ticket Information
Directions to The Martin City Melodrama & Vaudeville Co.
Our History - You are here!
Contact Us
KomedyKids Summer Camps
Auditions
About Melodrama (for Teachers and Parents)
About Vaudeville (for Teachers and Parents)
Coming Soon
The Complete Season
Martin City, Jr./Children's Theatre

Our Story
WHO:

The Martin City Melodrama & Vaudeville Company is a live, professional theater company incorporated as a Missouri Not-For-Profit Corporation, qualified as tax-exempt under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.  Donations to the Company are fully tax exempt.

Jeanne M. Beechwood, Founder
Jon Copeland, Associate Artistic Director

WHAT:
 The Company produces original adaptations of literary classics in the historical melodrama style.  In addition, the Company recreates musical revues staged as historical vaudeville shows.  Once a year, the Company performs a fractured fairy tale operetta.

The Company also runs a very successful Komedy for Kids Summer Camp, which teaches the melodrama and vaudeville art forms to children.

The Company produces the Forgotten American Musical Series, bringing to the stage rarely done American musical classics such as The Marx Brothers in COCOANUTS.

Martin City, Jr. is our new children's theatre that began in the fall of 2003. In its first season, two shows were produced for runs in our theatre and numerous assemblies and workshops were conducted throughout the school year at various locations in the greater Kansas City area. Next year Martin City, Jr. will expand to three shows produced in our theatre while continuing to offer assemblies and workshops. One reviewer referred to our productions as "learning through laughter" and that continues to be our motto at Martin City, Jr.

WHEN:
Jeanne M. Beechwood founded the Company on October 2, 1985.  The Company performs year-round with six (6) main-stage productions and one Komedy for Kids’ Summer Camp children’s production.
WHERE:
The Company performed for 16 years in our original facility, now closed, at 13440 Holmes Road, the corner of 135th & Holmes in Martin City (south Kansas City), Missouri.  Forced to leave because of the building’s deterioration, the Company independently produced its shows at such venues as the Farris Opera House in Richmond, Missouri, and the Mabee Theatre on the campus of Rockhurst University until relocating at its present facility in the Metcalf South Shopping Center, 95th & Metcalf, Overland Park, Kansas.
HOW:

The Company has produced only family entertainment since its inception.  Season attendance averages 35,000+ patrons (and growing) per year.  The Company has always been fully supported by its earned revenues, a distinguishing feature among not-for-profit theaters.  The Company’s Komedy for Kids’ Summer Camp has also provided a healthy source of revenue.  We have increased our summer camps to year round classes as part of our Komedy Kidstitutetm.

[Home Page] [Now Playing!] [Tickets] [Directions] [Our History] [Contact Us] [KomedyKids]
[Auditions] [Melodrama] [Vaudeville] [Coming Soon] [The Complete Season] [Martin City, Jr.]