McMaster's School of the Arts is in week three of the Directors' Series 2004. Week three includes only one play, 7 Stories.

All shows were directed by McMaster School of the Arts theatre & film students in their final year of study. This series brought together a combination of professors and more than 30 students who earned academic credit for their work on the shows.

7 Stories by Morris Panych, directed by Amanda Wilson, is a fast-paced, sophisticated and hilarious play. A man contemplating suicide on a seventh story-building ledge confronts the stories of the people who live inside the building. These “seven stories” lead to a charming and surprising ending.

Writer, director and actor Morris Panych has appeared in more than 50 theatre productions and in numerous television and film roles. He has directed more than 30 theatre productions and written over a dozen plays that have been produced throughout Canada, Great Britain and the USA, including 7 Stories (1990) and three plays for young audiences, Other Schools of Thought (1994). In 1994, he received the Governor General's Award for his play The Ends of the Earth (1993). Vigil won three Jessie Awards in 1996, including Outstanding Original Play. Talon has published Lawrence & Holloman (1998), and most recently, Earshot (2001).

Morris Panych has been awarded several Dora Mavor Moore awards: most recently for Girl in a Goldfish Bowl and for his directing of Sweeney Todd and the OverCoat, which is currently touring England and Australia.

7 Stories runs on March 11 at 8 p.m., showing second in a double bill and on March 12 at 12:30 p.m. and 8 p.m.

Admission is free but donations are welcome. The play will be held in McMaster's Robinson Memorial Theatre, Chester New Hall, Rm. 103.