Circus Act

The past couple of days have been spent trying to keep several plates spinning on the end of sticks. Last time I blogged about the surprise restrictions put on our choice for the musical in 2010. Since then I've applied for royalties for 3 other musicals all as alternatives. We are still waiting to hear back from the original publishing company to hear if our appeal was accepted. All of this happens as we try to announce our new season this Friday.

April has been holding auditions for the Secret Life of Girls. She has had a good turnout both nights. We are supposed to do a trial run next monday on the digital projections that are needed for that show. It will require words that look like real time texting and emails to appear as the actors type them on stage.

I've been rehearsing the Sugar Bean Sisters at 6:30 each night. The entire cast has at some point in the last 2 weeks been sick and without a voice. Tonight was Susan Anderson's first rehearsal as the Reptile woman. She came in and couldn't speak above a whisper. So far in rehearsal Marsha Cash who plays a dancer from New Orleans has had to crawl under a bed, jump on top of a table, climb ladders, run figure 8's around a couch and table and dance on top of a table. The actors are all getting a real workout doing the play.

Thursday evening is the first rehearsal for The Wizard of Oz. It will be a short meeting to give out rehearsal schedules, scripts, music, and talk about costumes, etc.. I've already had several people who told me that had no conflicts on that date now tell me that they can't make it. I'm hoping this is not a preview of coming attractions. I knew when I scheduled it that not everyone would be able to make it. To get ready I'm working through the script scene by scene assigning parts for all of the various munchkins and people from Oz. Deciding how long and when to rehearse the scenes and looking at the music and which songs will have what singers in the back. I'm hoping that Creatures of Habit which is contracted for the costumes for the show will be able to measure most of the cast Thursday night and we can do a costume plot and expense breakdown.

Friday night is the Curtain Call auction. Chris Black, who will be our auctioneer, came in today and met with Valerie Pollard, who is the fundraising chair, about the timeline for Friday evenings events. It seems like it was only a short time ago (last September) that we were brainstorming about how this auction might work. We're off to see the Wizard....

April has selected a Story theatre show that will tour in April and May. It is Jack and the Beanstalk. She has also selected the summer music camp and I've applied for the rights for the classes. April has 3 or 4 productions at various schools around the city all in rehearsal at this point.

Jim and I took several large set pieces back to the warehouse Monday after the Footlights shows this past weekend and brought back a van loaded to the max with 4'x8'platforms for The Sugar Bean Sisters production. We hauled all of the cubes and boxes April had used in the footlights shows back from the stage up to the second floor classroom. Jim began legging the platforms up this afternoon.

Marsha is catching up on contribution thank you letters, receipts and program ad invoices while Alexis is working out the new seating charts for next season and a brochure for the final push on buying a new seat. We are hopefully withing sight of the end of the new seat campaign. I'm writing a couple of grant applications for matching funding on the seats. Janice is sorting through and cleaning all the costumes from Ramona Quimby and the Footlights shows and helping April pull costumes for her school performances.

It's hard to believe that we are almost three fourths of the way through the fiscal year. March is almost over! (We start our next fiscal year July 1st and go until June 30th.) I got information on the July Fund Run for Charities, yesterday. I'm not ready for July yet.

On Monday March 30th a large group of directors from several of the arts groups in Paducah will get together for a working lunch to discuss items and dates of interest. We will also share challenges and as we face a tough year with the economy.

Today I received word that the arts had a partial victory in the KY Senate Bill 1. The final language, although taking out the testing component, still leaves in 80% of what Arts groups were hoping for in the bill. I'm waiting to hear more details to find out what this means for schools for next year. It's time to go back to spinning plates...

Hitting a sand bar

Things have been moving along this week as we prepare for the footlights shows tomorrow and Sunday. The ad campaign for Sugar Bean Sisters and the rehearsals are coming along. The auction for next Friday seems to be going well. Then our ship hit a sand bar- or in this case a publishing company that ground us to a stop and now we've got to get unstuck.

As Alexis proofed the final version of our next year's season ticket form with all the show descriptions, I happened to check on getting the rights for April's summer drama camp shows. This is with the same company I acquired the rights for our 2010 June musical. As I was looking up our account I saw that the show selected for 2010 was suddenly restricted. I called to find out what this change meant to us since I was issued a contract in Feb. I was told "Oh yeah-that got restricted last week because of a national touring company. Sorry- you can't get it now." Even though we had confirmed our desire to do the show and had a temporary agreement there is a clause in every contract that basically says that a publishing company can pull the rights at any time.

I told Alexis "Stop the press! Hold off on anything else with the season ticket renewal order forms until we find a show!" This sounds like the classic theatre script of the 1940's.

So today I'm scrambling to find a suitable replacement that is in the same style as the one the play selection committee picked and approved. I'm looking for a big name show that will sell lots of tickets and everyone wants to audition for that doesn't cost a fortune to produce, and here's the kicker.... finding a show we haven't done recently! There are several shows right on the edge of being released but won't be until next year. All of the other titles that are well known, we've already done if it can fit on our stage. So the race is on! Can we find a show before we announce the season next Friday. You'll have to buy tickets to the event to find out the answer to that question!

To quote a classical television actor- "Hey, Rockie, you wanna see me pull a rabbit out of my hat." For those that don't know the actor who said that...don't ask- it will just make me feel even older.

Omens, Auditions, and Fundraisers

I can't decided if it is an omen or just that it wore out. Over the course of the last month I've lost 3 of the 5 desk drawers from my office desk. They have simply fallen apart. Yesterday I opened my middle drawer and put a pencil in the drawer. I closed the drawer and the bottom fell out spilling the contents everywhere under my desk. (No it wasn't that overloaded!) Last week I put a pen in the side desk drawer and when it closed the bottom gave way and it fell to pieces. I now have a large bin next to my desk holding the contents of 3 desk drawers.

Jim Keeney's father in law passed away last Monday. He had been ill for some time and this was not totally unexpected. Jim and his wife Cathy and daughter Elisabeth will be traveling to Arkansas this week for the funeral. Our thoughts and prayers go out to Keeney family.

April has settled on the shorter version of the Secret Life of Girls script. Auditions are next Monday and Tuesday and scripts are available to check out.

Sugar Bean Sisters had its first rehearsal on Monday and we started staging the show last night. The cast will be off book in 2 weeks! (That means they have to have their lines memorized.)

Kim came in with the flu/cold stuff to the read through on Monday. Tuesday Sue came in with the cold/flu stuff. Lots of people are out suffering with flu like symptoms right now. At the Monday school matinees there were almost 70 kids missing because of sickness. April has several kids out this week from the footlights final rehearsals due to illness.

Alexis is working on the forms for season ticket renewals and I wrote a first draft of the season ticket renewal letter. I still have to draft the show description letter. We announce the season a week from Friday at the Curtain Call fundraising event! We hope to have season tickets on sale very quickly after that announcement.

Ramona Quimby exceeded its box office budget goal! Thanks to sold out performances on the final Saturday and Sunday and sold out school matinees the show exceeded expectations. April, the cast, and crew all did a terrific job! Thanks to ilistpaducah.com for helping to promote the show as well!

So far this year the youth shows have exceeded their box office goals and the main stage shows have been slightly under. The ice storm in January put a big dent in our box office income projections for the mainstage shows but the youth shows have really helped keep us close to our budgeted goals. Groups have been buying tickets for Sugar Bean Sisters since the quilt show announcement was made a couple of weeks ago. Yesterday Alexis said a group from Canada bought tickets for the show.

I'm trying to get the cast of Wizard of Oz together for a brief rehearsal on Thursday March 19 at 7 pm. Denise Bristol assistant director will start contacting everyone in the company today to try to set this up.

The board is in full swing getting ready for the Curtain Call fundraising event on March 20th. It should be a great time and tickets are available at the box office or from board members.

Ramona is now history

It's funny how in the space of less than 2 hours a show goes from full performance to history. Nothing left but an empty stage that once held the show. This afternoon Jim is returning stock scenery and furniture pieces that we repaint or adapt each show to the warehouse. We added to the stock scenery with this show by building furniture and some walls that will now be cycled into youth shows.

The stage is being readied for the Footlights troupe shows which perform next Saturday and Sunday. The following week is the big Fundraiser onstage and then 3 1/2 weeks later the Sugar Bean Sisters opens. The first read through of Sugar Beans is tonight at 7 pm. Story Theatre troupe will start rehearsing soon for the spring tour and auditions are next Monday and Tuesday for the Secret Life of Girls and as of that point we will again have 3-4 shows in rehearsal at the same time. When we planned all these shows I didn't realize what a marathon event it was going to be. Of course part of the marathon was caused by the ice storm which moved the auction back into March. Moving the auction was only made possible because we postponed Having Our Say.

I'm please to say that Ramona Quimby sold out the final two performances of the run. A general note for everyone about sold out performances is that generally we can always get several people in even when we are sold out, because there are always audience members who end up turning in tickets because someone in their party couldn't attend. Saturday afternoon we got 12 people in at Curtain time and Sunday we got about 15 in at curtain. We are looking for crew for Sugar Beans and Wizard of Oz. If you think you might like to do this contact Marsha Cash.

Another Opening of Another Show

To quote the lyrics from a song in Kiss Me Kate "another opening of another show". Ramona Quimby MHT's 500th production opened Thursday morning at 9 am to a full house of elementary students. By the end of the day on Thursday the cast had completed 3 performances and everyone was settling into the groove.



It was a hard road to get there. There were several nights in a row spent painting until almost midnight or after. You can always tell when we get to "hell week" because the stress levels go way up trying to get everything ready for the opening night. We are the only business that sells a product that hasn't been created, or exist in a physical form, and then makes sure it is ready on time to deliver at a precise day and time. On Tuesday and Wednesday evening a couple of volunteers stayed and painted. Betty Wise worked solid for the last two weeks before opening helping. Marsha Cash also camped out at the theatre painting all of the trees and bushes that are on the stage. Marsha and Betty stayed until after midnight on Wednesday to help with the final push. Heidi Yocum and her family of all ages came in and painted for two days. At first I wasn't so sure about how that would work with some of the kids being under 6 years old. The whole family was a great help and they seemed to have a good time. special thanks goes to Marsha and Betty for above and beyond help. In fact after the morning school matinees Marsha and I returned to do the final touch up on the bushes. I still have one more painting element I want to add today to really finish the set even though we are now officially open. This morning there are another two sold out matinees at 9 am and 11:30 am. A workshop after the 11:30 show and then a break before tonight's performance.



The show itself is terrific. Brenna who plays Ramona, and Kye who plays Beezus, do an outstanding job. I heard one person say Brenna acts all the way from her toes to the top of her head. I think that is right on target. Mary Kathrin Dorr is the stage manager for the show and she has stepped up and is doing a great job with Stage Managing a difficult show. There is a real art to being a good stage manager and she is showing all the signs of being a good one. April as always has done a great job of molding and shaping the show into a great production. Jim has worked long and hard on the sets as well and Janice has designed and built lots of great costumes for the play. There is a special thanks to the mom's who are covering backstage. Heather Dorr and some of the actor's mothers are taking turns "wrangling" kids. That is a job of keeping a large group of children quite and focused and making their entrances on time for the 1 hour production. It is no easy job to keep that many young children quiet.

I've done a couple of interviews about this being the 500th production. The one thing that keeps coming up is the efforts of all of the volunteers and staff to make a show happen. Thanks to one and all. If you don't have tickets for the play you should get them.

digital image breakdown

I forgot to mention in my last post that my computer which has been runing the digital projections has decided to have a nervous breakdown during the middle of the program. I'm sure it is a "Vista" problem with the equipment. The word "Vista" and "expletive deletive" have gone together many times during the last two days. This hasn't helped the time crunch.

crunch

It has been almost a week since I last posted. It has been non stop since then. With getting Ramona Quimby ready for opening I have been covered over. We set light cues last Thursday two days earlier than usual which should have helped but it hasn't. Friday and Saturday were pretty much playing catch up because I agreed to help on a talent show that needed judges. Tech rehearsal was Sunday afternoon.

There are still blank walls on the stage two days from opening that need to be painted and I've been putting in 16 hour days working on the lights, sound, and painting. The biggest problem I'm facing is that the style of painting I had envisioned for the set isn't working. So I'm forced to repaint areas and develop a new style. It is a painstakingly long process for me because the illustrated style of painting is very difficult for me. I'm really frustrated at the moment and trying to get to that breakthrough point. With recent budget cuts I also don't have the funds to bring in some of the really good artists I would have hired in the past to do this. I've spent the last couple of nights painting only to come in the next day and repaint over most of what I did the night before. April is frustrated, I'm frustrated, and there isn't a lot anyone can do to help until I put in the time to get it worked out. Time is also getting short as we open Thursday morning for an auditorium full of school kids. The show will be done by opening. It is taking a lot of work to get there.