Friday of last week I went over and setup the sound system for Clark Elementary school and Willy Wonka. April is directing the school production. They rented sound equipment from Rowton Audio and from the Market House Theatre. Wonka had its final dress rehearsal Monday afternoon and did its benefit performance on Monday March 29 in the evening. April and I are working for MHT doing this show but we also are working to make it a good show because our daughter, Jade, is in the cast along with lots of other Market House Theatre Youth performers. They had a school performance Tuesday afternoon and had their final performance Tuesday night at 6 pm.
Tuesday morning April did 3 performances at Ballard County Elementary School. The students there performed The Great Westward Movement. A play about the people who settled across the mid-west and into California, Oregon and Washington. April had two kids out sick for the first show, one of the performers began throwing up between the second and third show and was sent home and a few kids who said they didn't feel good before the 3rd show. She calmed down the kids who were thinking they might be getting sick and then scrambled to get other kids to cover the parts for the 3 missing kids. The kids did a great job (even those who thought they might be getting sick) and she finished up in time to head back to Clark for their performance.
The cast of Wedding Belles have been rehearsing during the evenings this week not only getting off book but dealing with all the props. Kris, who has never done a show with MHT before was trying desperately to memorize the entire script thinking she had to know her lines and everyone elses. When I told her that was not the case at all she was very relieved. I think there is probably a common misconception about learning lines. Generally you memorize your lines and the cue line right before your line. Kris was trying so hard to think of her next line before she had to say them. My answer to her is that the key is to listen to the person who is speaking to you. The best actors can't think of their lines at all before they speak them. They are a natural response to the cue lines. In fact if you are trying to think about your line before you have to say it that's bad. Often during rehearsal and I will stop the action and correct a problem and then go back and try to run a section again. I have to find a natural starting point which give them a context or the actors have no idea what their lines are.
People always comment about how much memorization is needed to do a play. The secret is to listen to the other actors and just respond to what they say. A good playwright has already given you the tools to make that easy.
Thursday Bonnie Daniels met with Creatures of Habit to go over costume ideas and colors. We talked through changes and how different costumes needed to function with dance movement and with color and texture choices related to the characters. Before meeting with Creatures of Habit she and I spent time going over conceptual and spatial ideas for the different scenes and how we might do the transformation from pumpkin to carriage and ball gown. We all took the ideas from our meeting and then will go back and work some more on the concept. This is a process that will lead to a final design. Often we start work on parts of the show long before we have finalized all the details. Theatre is a collaborative process. I can only laugh when people assume that I have an idea fixed in stone from the outset and it never changes. Working together we end up with a much better product than we could individually have created.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Saturday, March 20, 2010
March Madness
While MHT doesn't have a basketball team in the NCAA final four, March has certainly been an exciting and exhilarating month.
We opened There's a Boy in the Girl's Bathroom on March 11 and with school matinees and public performances it closed on March 16. The show had great attendance in both school matinees and public performances. The cast did a great job and April's direction was terrific. While we had several technical challenges in producing the show, it went off without a glitch. The show had over 20 scene changes with set pieces moving on, rotating around, and flying flowing seamlessly from one moment to the next in the show.
Three days later the theatre had been totally turned around with all the seats taken out and replaced with tables and chairs and the Curtain Call fundraiser was held Friday evening March 19. The theatre raised thousands of dollars Friday night to help support our adult and youth programming.
Immediately following the fundraiser last night the board and many volunteers turned the theatre around again and took out all that we had created for the fundraiser and returned it to performance ready for the Footlights final dress rehearsal that started at 8 am this morning. This afternoon we sold out the Footlights troupe shows.
Tomorrow we have the Elementary and Middle School Footlights Troupe shows and then we turn tear down the set and build Wedding Belles which opens in just a couple weeks. Tuesday the MHT Trustee donor group will meet to discuss the results of the Board of Directors Strategic Planning retreat that was held just 4 weeks ago. Wednesday the March Board of Directors meeting will continue that dialogue and finalize dates for next season.
March came in like a lion and is going out in the same fashion. We currently have Wedding Belles, Cinderella, The Murder Mystery Troupe, and Story Theatre all rehearsing. Wedding Belles, Murder Mystery Troupe and Story Theatre all have performances in April.
We have final four excitement every month!
We opened There's a Boy in the Girl's Bathroom on March 11 and with school matinees and public performances it closed on March 16. The show had great attendance in both school matinees and public performances. The cast did a great job and April's direction was terrific. While we had several technical challenges in producing the show, it went off without a glitch. The show had over 20 scene changes with set pieces moving on, rotating around, and flying flowing seamlessly from one moment to the next in the show.
Three days later the theatre had been totally turned around with all the seats taken out and replaced with tables and chairs and the Curtain Call fundraiser was held Friday evening March 19. The theatre raised thousands of dollars Friday night to help support our adult and youth programming.
Immediately following the fundraiser last night the board and many volunteers turned the theatre around again and took out all that we had created for the fundraiser and returned it to performance ready for the Footlights final dress rehearsal that started at 8 am this morning. This afternoon we sold out the Footlights troupe shows.
Tomorrow we have the Elementary and Middle School Footlights Troupe shows and then we turn tear down the set and build Wedding Belles which opens in just a couple weeks. Tuesday the MHT Trustee donor group will meet to discuss the results of the Board of Directors Strategic Planning retreat that was held just 4 weeks ago. Wednesday the March Board of Directors meeting will continue that dialogue and finalize dates for next season.
March came in like a lion and is going out in the same fashion. We currently have Wedding Belles, Cinderella, The Murder Mystery Troupe, and Story Theatre all rehearsing. Wedding Belles, Murder Mystery Troupe and Story Theatre all have performances in April.
We have final four excitement every month!
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Bathroom Tech
The technical rehearsal for Boy in the Girl's Bathroom ended just before 6 pm today. The cast had a delicious meal of lasagna, salad, bread and cookies provided by board members Cindy Miller, Heather Dorr, and Sid Hancock after the tech rehearsal. The last three days have each been 16 hour work days for both April and I, and Jim has put in a full weekend as well getting ready for the rehearsal. Zach Story, a Lone Oak Middle Student who is April's assistant for the show asked technical director Jim Keeney yesterday while we were setting light cues "So you guys work here all day getting ready for the rehearsals?" To which Jim replied in a very nice way-"Did you think all this happened by magic?" Last night we took apart and reconfigured the sound equipment to add in the wireless microphones for the actors who animate the stuffed animals in the show.
We have almost 80 light cues, 35 screen changes, 40 sound cues. and about a dozen piece of scenery that move on and off the stage. Before the rehearsal today I asked Jim to rework the bed and how it moved on and off the stage. It wasn't working as fast as we needed to make the changes. Anything that takes longer than 30 seconds is unacceptable when you have over two dozen scene changes. Many of the changes after today's rehearsal are now completed in 10-15 seconds. He spent a couple of hours redesigning what had been working in rehearsal but now needed to work much faster. We must have rehearsed how to get the classroom desks off and getting the bedroom on about a dozen times today until we were sure it could be done quickly every single time in just a few seconds.
April is working with Wyatt and Chance who playing the young boys on becoming more expressive with their voices, faces, gestures, and body. Wyatt has several scenes with stuffed animals that talk and move around. Trying to get his face and body to react as if the animals are real would be a challenge for anyone. Both of the boys in the show get beaten up by one of the girls. I've had to teach one of the girls how to throw a punch and put someone in a headlock. The boys have to learn to react as if they have been punched. All of the kids in real life wouldn't dream of getting in a fist fight with someone else.
It's also a learning process for the adults and younger kids that acting isn't just saying your lines. Your face has to react to what other people are saying. Your arms and body are expressive using gestures. We react both physically and vocally to others. April must have worked one scene several times at least to get 4 boys to walk onstage as if they were looking for a fight but not really wanting to get in one. Trying to work on two levels at the same time is something first time actors no matter whether adults or children always seem to have a difficult time with. Bradleys father in the play loses his temper and yet he doesn't walk into a scene angry. We have to see what sets him off. We have to see him struggle with not getting angry. We have to see him frustrated by his son who always has some excuse and blames someone else for his faults. The wonderful part is watching the boy slowly change over the course of the play.
For me one scene in the play always makes me angry no matter how many times I see it. It is a scene when the parents of one of the children demand that the principal fire the school counselor so that they can put more computers in the classroom. It doesn't matter how much good the counselor is doing for their child or others.
The parents demand the counselor tell them what their child wanted to talk about. When the counselor refuses the parents get very upset stating that a child doesn't get to have secrets. That children's feelings and confidences they share with others don't deserve the same respect as an adults. The sad/funny thing is that the child only wanted to talk to the counselor about inviting a boy she likes to her birthday party. The counselor told the young girl that she needed to get permission from her parents first before she could talk to her.
In the same scene a very funny moment occurs when the same parents make up a very strange example of a child who might run around biting others on their backside. What would the counselor do if the child bit her? This funny, yet sad scene is all too real in modern education it seems.
There's a Boy in the Girl's Bathroom has lots of levels that will appeal to both children and adults. Even in the technical rehearsal, focused on lights and scenery and sound there were some wonderful moments that made me laugh and think as I watched the play.
We have almost 80 light cues, 35 screen changes, 40 sound cues. and about a dozen piece of scenery that move on and off the stage. Before the rehearsal today I asked Jim to rework the bed and how it moved on and off the stage. It wasn't working as fast as we needed to make the changes. Anything that takes longer than 30 seconds is unacceptable when you have over two dozen scene changes. Many of the changes after today's rehearsal are now completed in 10-15 seconds. He spent a couple of hours redesigning what had been working in rehearsal but now needed to work much faster. We must have rehearsed how to get the classroom desks off and getting the bedroom on about a dozen times today until we were sure it could be done quickly every single time in just a few seconds.
April is working with Wyatt and Chance who playing the young boys on becoming more expressive with their voices, faces, gestures, and body. Wyatt has several scenes with stuffed animals that talk and move around. Trying to get his face and body to react as if the animals are real would be a challenge for anyone. Both of the boys in the show get beaten up by one of the girls. I've had to teach one of the girls how to throw a punch and put someone in a headlock. The boys have to learn to react as if they have been punched. All of the kids in real life wouldn't dream of getting in a fist fight with someone else.
It's also a learning process for the adults and younger kids that acting isn't just saying your lines. Your face has to react to what other people are saying. Your arms and body are expressive using gestures. We react both physically and vocally to others. April must have worked one scene several times at least to get 4 boys to walk onstage as if they were looking for a fight but not really wanting to get in one. Trying to work on two levels at the same time is something first time actors no matter whether adults or children always seem to have a difficult time with. Bradleys father in the play loses his temper and yet he doesn't walk into a scene angry. We have to see what sets him off. We have to see him struggle with not getting angry. We have to see him frustrated by his son who always has some excuse and blames someone else for his faults. The wonderful part is watching the boy slowly change over the course of the play.
For me one scene in the play always makes me angry no matter how many times I see it. It is a scene when the parents of one of the children demand that the principal fire the school counselor so that they can put more computers in the classroom. It doesn't matter how much good the counselor is doing for their child or others.
The parents demand the counselor tell them what their child wanted to talk about. When the counselor refuses the parents get very upset stating that a child doesn't get to have secrets. That children's feelings and confidences they share with others don't deserve the same respect as an adults. The sad/funny thing is that the child only wanted to talk to the counselor about inviting a boy she likes to her birthday party. The counselor told the young girl that she needed to get permission from her parents first before she could talk to her.
In the same scene a very funny moment occurs when the same parents make up a very strange example of a child who might run around biting others on their backside. What would the counselor do if the child bit her? This funny, yet sad scene is all too real in modern education it seems.
There's a Boy in the Girl's Bathroom has lots of levels that will appeal to both children and adults. Even in the technical rehearsal, focused on lights and scenery and sound there were some wonderful moments that made me laugh and think as I watched the play.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
5 minutes to post
It is 5 minutes before I have to go over to Boy in the Girls Bathroom rehearsal. Then run straight out of that to Wedding Belles Rehearsal. We have stage the first act of Wedding Belles in 4 days. I'm exhausted from running from one stage to the next. Working on an NEA grant for the city, meeting with the RAMP River Area Master Plan- consultant, ordering scripts for April for next season to look at, securing the rights for the summer drama camp, trying to read murder mystery scripts so we can do a show in 5 weeks for that, getting ad copy for Wedding Belles program, putting in bios and information for wedding belles photos, getting logos and contracts for next mainstage season and adjusting some dates for other events for next year.
This weekend will only get worse with tech on Sunday and a great deal of lights, sound, and scenery to finish. Oh and I took photos today to send to a writer at the NEA who is doing an article on the Market House Theatre for the NEA quarterly magazine. One of their interviewers is trying to locate studio space so they can do an interview for a podcast. I need another 2 of me just to stay even. Oops rehearsal time!
This weekend will only get worse with tech on Sunday and a great deal of lights, sound, and scenery to finish. Oh and I took photos today to send to a writer at the NEA who is doing an article on the Market House Theatre for the NEA quarterly magazine. One of their interviewers is trying to locate studio space so they can do an interview for a podcast. I need another 2 of me just to stay even. Oops rehearsal time!
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