Four staged readings of two brand new shows.

September 24-26, 2026
Art House North, St. Paul, MN

Missed the Boat Theatre is proud to host its 2026 New Works Lab on September 24-26 at Art House North in Saint Paul, MN. These two plays, originally submitted for our 2025 New Works Festival, will be workshopped to help the playwrights edit their scripts. These plays were chosen to be read dramatically onstage, in front of the playwright, director, and an audience. This is a key stage of development before these shows are ready to be produced fully. This lab is dedicated to the development of shows written from a Catholic Christian worldview.

Festival Schedule:

Thursday, September 24, 7pm: The Women of Cheboksary
Friday, September 25, 7pm: The Lost Art of the Private Eye
Saturday, September 26, 2pm: The Lost Art of the Private Eye
Saturday, September 26, 7pm: The Women of Cheboksary

The Lost Art of the Private Eye

Written by Hannah Reller
Directed by Samantha Wend Vargo

Private Investigator Eustace Wonderly has just taken on a new partner—his younger, starry-eyed brother Ned—when an art-loving eccentric client wanders into their office. The Wonderly Brothers find themselves chasing after a precious sculpture, stolen directly under their noses. This story is full of twists, turns, and reveals in the beloved noir detective style, and its characters seem straight out of a classic mystery novel. Can the detectives find the truth and pursue justice in the midst of the art world's greed and idolization of beauty? And can they recover the priceless Alabaster Child before it's lost to the world forever?

  • Hannah Reller studied screenwriting through the Act One Hollywood Writer’s program and earned a BS in media production from the University of Mary. Upon returning home to Central MN, she shifted her focus to the stage, publishing her first one act play in 2022. In 2023, she wrote The Lost Art of the Private Eye with grant support from the Five Wings Arts Council. Hannah works as a marketing and design specialist and, in her free time, enjoys developing creative projects and living the adventure of life with her wonderful husband Jeremy.

  • Playwright: Hannah Reller
    Director: Samantha Wend Vargo
    Dramaturg: Fr. Kyle Kowalczyk
    Stage Manager: Sam Patet

  • CHAD BERG
    STEPHEN BREWER
    MADDIE HUBLY
    ROSIE OSTERBAUER
    BELLA SCHAPS
    JEN FRIEDEN
    MICHAEL CONROY
    KRIS FOLLMER
    SOPHIA MAERTENS
    GRACE HERBERTZ

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The Women of Cheboksary

Written by Emily Schoenbeck
Directed by Dr. Jimmy Bickerstaff

Alexander and Elena's wedding marks the beginning of the midsummer Kupala Festival in their Russian village of Cheboksary. But what should be a time of delight and celebration develops into an increasingly tangled web as they instead attempt to protect their friend Nina from being sent off to Moscow with all the other unwed maidens in town. Can they trick their community into believing their deceptions without compromising their virtue or honesty? Can their clever wordplay and misdirects keep the village united, or will it turn everyone against them when their scheme is revealed? This comedy explores the rich history of medieval Russia through the humorous lens of friendship, gossip, loyalty, and honesty. 

  • Emily Schoenbeck is a playwright and theater scholar with a PhD from the University of Minnesota, where she studied Early Modern Theater. She has worked as a freelance playwright for several years, including writing multiple fairytale adaptions for Once Upon a Stage, a children’s theater camp. The Women of Cheboksary is her first full length play. It received Top Honors Thesis at The College of Saint Benedict, Honorable Mention in The American College Theater Festival’s Playwriting Contest, and was the 2017 Full Length Play Winner in The Chameleon Theater Circle’s New Play Festival, where it received a stage reading. When not writing plays, Emily can be found performing on stage, working in costume shops, and studying stage combat.

  • Playwright: Emily Schoenbeck
    Director: Dr. Jimmy Bickerstaff
    Dramaturg: Eleonore Wagner

    Other roles to be announced.

  • RACHEL AUDI
    PAUL VALLENTOS
    CATHERINE KRACHT
    KELLY MAYNARD
    NATALIA FOLEY
    LAURA HUNT
    FR. ARIC AAMODT
    LEO MARTIN
    MARK GEIS
    NICK PLEISS
    CLARE KRACHT
    JOHN MAILAND
    NICOLE WAGNE

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