April 16, 2012

Getting Sara Married had its technical rehearsal yesterday and afterwards the cast and crew were fed by a terrific group of volunteers, Don and Renie Barger, Ralph and Stephanie Young, Dick Holland, and Valerie Pollard. They themed the food to reflect the show- pb&j and tuna wraps, spicy chicken chili, jalapeno cornbread, and wedding cake for dessert. Thanks so much to this merry band of culinary volunteers. The food as always was great and greatly appreciated.

We lost one of our supporting cast members for Getting Sara Married last week. Chris Stigall who was playing a small part in the show had to bow out due to work scheduling. This was an optional part in the script and we were sad to lose Chris. So instead of seeing the chiropractor (who had no lines) in the script "adjusting" Aunt Martha we now just hear about him.

Just before tech yesterday the Carson Center called and told us they needed their 5,000 lumen projector, that we had on loan back for an event this week. MHT owns a 3,000 lumen projector which is too weak to handle our needs for the set. We fortunately go through the tech with the borrowed projector before returning it. We are going to scramble to fill the need this week until opening night when the Carson Center projector is available again. I wrote and submitted a grant to the KY Colonels to help us purchase a 7,500 lumen projector that MHT would own so we don't have to worry about losing a key scenic piece during a rehearsal or show run. The Carson Center has been more than generous with the loan of their projector so far, but things always seem to happen at the worst times and this is one of those.

Dress rehearsals for Getting Sara Married continue tonight through Wednesday and opening night is Thursday.

After a 2 week delay in getting the renewals out for season tickets it looks like it will finally happen this week. The company we work with for box office software had delayed the feature we were trying to add this year which is online renewals. That hurdle was cleared last Friday and the Marsha Cash, Kristy Waddie and Barb Ryan will be putting in extra hours today and tomorrow to get those forms out.

The Hairspray cast has been hard at work learning lots of dance choreography. Last week we stage Good Morning Baltimore, Nicest Kids in Town, Mama I'm a Big Girl Now, I Can Hear the Bells, and Miss Baltimore Crabs. Each rehearsal is jammed with work from start to finish and everyone is working hard. It is really difficult to get the entire cast present for rehearsals with track meets, and choir and band concerts, and even some college kids off at school with classes and finals. Emily Yocum comes in on Fridays from Louisville to pick up the dance scenes that she wasn't there during the week. Emily Chapman Hensel is doing a terrific job of choreography with the numbers and helping me clean up and strengthen the musical numbers that I"m choreographing. Several of the cast went to Brad Rankin Photography last Thursday and he shot several publicity photos for us to use in our posters, billboards, and other media. A big thanks to Brad Rankin for doing that! Creatures of Habit are creating the costumes for the show and they had lots of fun costumes and wigs for the characters to do the publicity photos.

April is still working hard in the schools with classes after finishing up most of the shows she was directing at the schools before spring break. The Elementary Footlights troupe is working on a musical right now on Saturday mornings.

MHT is using http://power2give.org to help raise scholarship funds for low income footlights students. Please check it out and try to make a donation if you can. All donations are matched by Republic Bank so your dollar is doubled when you make the gift of giving a child a chance to increase their self confidence, improve their verbal and non verbal communication skills, and to expand their creativity.