After last year’s hit, student-produced, zombie musical “Francis,” seniors Ian Jagel and Peter Richards collaborated to form the new theater troupe called 12 Stones in hopes of  producing high-quality, student-sponsored and student-supported theater.

“We’re hoping for an all-inclusive, non-denominational theater outlet for all students on campus,” said Richards.

They also hope that the organization will bring both the theater and non-theater communities together.

“We want to foster a student theater group outside of any academic department that is efficient in and of itself,” said Jagel.

Jagel and Richards will be hosting a celebratory fundraiser on Oct. 31, Halloween night, in order to raise money for the up-and-coming productions as well as for other non-season shows.

“The idea is that we will provide a structured organization that will provide resources for other shows while shows already being produced are running,” said Jagel.

Posters and news concerning this event will be coming soon.  The theater troupe also hopes to become an ASWC-funded club in order to continue into later years.The reason behind their extensive bid for funding centers around one of their main goals.

“We’re hoping for something completely collaborative and entirely student produced, but with very high artistic values,” said Jagel.

Despite lacking resources that other organizations like the theater department have, Jagel and Richards remain optimistic.

“Just because it’s not run by the [theater] department doesn’t mean it won’t look like it’s run by [the theater department],” said Richards.

As the co-founding managers and artistic directors of 12 Stones, who both aspire to work in the theater industry after college, Richards and Jagel encourage students interested in writing, directing, acting or just generally helping with shows to get involved.

“Right now we’ve gotten one submission from an interested participant,” said Jagel. “We are focused on creating original works,” said Jagel. “That’s a big part of what we’re doing.”

“We’ve got people from all different departments, both staff and students, interested in doing these plays,” said Richards.

Even though they expect high-quality work, Jagel and Richards hope to keep the schedules flexible for students working in Harper Joy Theater productions.

“We want to respect the commitments students make to [Harper Joy] shows,” said Jagel. “We’re not going to ask people to cancel on their commitments for our shows.”

According to Jagel, 12 Stones has selected five student-written plays for this year alone, some of which are nearly or fully written works just waiting for a production start date.

“Right now we have . . . an episodic children’s fantasy, a ballet, a musical, a noir piece and a multicultural myth I’m writing in the works,” said Jagel.

The basic outline of the 12 Stones’ mission statement, according to Jagel, includes supporting student-produced theater, with a strong focus on audience experience and more site-specific theater.

“We really want the audience experience of an event as opposed to a separated show,” said Jagel. “And we want to do theater in non-traditional locations. [Those are] kind of our vague tenants for 12 Stones.”

The first season show, tentatively titled “Christina and the Clockwork Boy,” will premier on Dec. 5.