A 24-hour play production from start to finish

The Little Theater at Montana State University-Northern filled with laughter then quickly fell silent as plays progressed, setting a pattern of realism from a headline taken from a national newspaper during the Montana Actors' Theatre 24-Hour Play Festival.

MAT escaped from the tradition of buying well-known productions to an innovative new concept of selecting a topic or news headline giving it to a team. Team's author writes a script through the night then hands it to a director with a group of actors who put it together as a well-thought out and acted production, accomplishing this in...