Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind
Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind is a fast, funny, and ever-changing theater show from Chicago’s Neo-Futurists. It features 30 original short plays performed in 60 minutes, all written, directed, and acted by the same group. The pieces mix personal stories, performance art, and news-style moments, and are part of the Neo-Futurism movement, a modern take on early 20th‑century Futurism with playful, experimental ideas.
The show is built around audience participation. Ticket price is decided by rolling a die. When you arrive, a cast member asks for your name and gives you a nametag with a joking, made‑up name. You’re handed a “menu” of the night’s possible plays, and audience members shout out numbers to choose which plays will run. Each piece starts with “Go!” and ends when someone calls “Curtain!” The list of plays changes every week, with two to twelve titles removed and replaced by new ones.
The experience is known for its spontaneity and interaction, and there’s a tradition that if a show sells out, the cast orders a single pizza for the whole audience to share.
The Chicago edition opened in 1988 and ran for many weekends each year until 2016, when Greg Allen paused Chicago performances to pursue a different artistic goal. Other Neo-Futurists groups in New York, San Francisco, and London kept up their own versions. Since 2017, those groups have carried on with their own two‑minute plays in a late‑night show called The Infinite Wrench, while London has its own version called The Dirty Thirty. Allen later started a Detroit company, UnTheatre, which produced Too Much Light sporadically.
Too Much Light is a clear example of Neo-Futurism: theater that feels like daily life, with performers playing themselves and aiming to keep the stage open and unpolished, right in front of the audience.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 07:09 (CET).