Maryville University Required Students to Strut Their Hour Upon the Stage

Cult TV hit It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia provided the class work for a group of Maryville University students required to take arts classes toward a liberal arts bachelor degree.

Performance Workshop classes at the university require students to select, direct, rehearse and act in five- to 10-minute plays.

The performing experience likely lays the groundwork for public speaking in  graduates' professional lives.

Instructor Ann Schwartz had her classes of 20 students break up into groups of about five to produce the mini-plays.

Thursday, the first plays of the semester got under way on stage by 8 a.m. in the university's auditorium. The crowd grew the later it got.

The only musical in the bunch was "The Nightman Cometh" and students sang a cappella. "Nightman" was written as part of the half-hour TV show but proved so popular, it went on tour across the nation during the summer.

Plays performed Thursday were:

• The Man Who Shot Santa Claus, by Carl L. Williams
• The Kickass Librarian, by Jason Wilkins
• The Nightman Cometh by Charlie Day
• Be the Hunter