Tag: Homegrown Theatre Festival

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I think it was a success

Another Homegrown Festival comes to an end and the reading of my new play seemed to go over well. We had reasonably sized audiences, about 20 the first night and then about 50 the next two evenings. The cast and I have heard feedback and no ones seems to have had anything negative.

Cast picture

The cast. Front row, L-R: Tracy Erman, Mary Sloan, Sophia Marnik, Tim Green, Doug Rutherford. Back row, L-R: Winluck Wong, Dave Paquet, Loughran Thorson-Looysen, Daniel Dunphy, Santana Berryman, Kieran Poile, Colin Milne.

 

There were a few interesting issues that showed up. I did learn early that, due to a rescheduling of a course he needed for certification, one cast member wouldn’t be available for opening night. That was simple to deal with, since I would read his part that night. However, with the show starting at 7 PM, I had a cast member pull out because he was booked to dance in another performance. Since the performance schedule was set in lots of time, I wasn’t happy.

I was still wondering what to do, other than read the two parts (it is amazing what you can get aways with in a stage reading), when I went to the theatre and saw a friend sitting in the lobby. I dragooned him into doing on the spot, and he did it perfectly, and almost cold since he had less than an hour with the script.

The final night took a bit of juggling when one of the cast was lowered by the flu. This involved a slight shift, with another cast member reading the part of the main protagonist and I read his part. For some reason, no one thought I would be a good teenager…

Thanks to the cast, and the Homegrown Festival people who all contributed to make this a lot of fun and let me get this in front of an audience…

 

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Homegrown Theatre Festival

My application form and fee are in for the 2014 Nakai Theatre Homegrown Theatre Festival. This runs from May 6-11 in Whitehorse and looks to promote local theatre developers. Most productions get three runs through the festival.

This year, I am entering the play I started writing last January. It’s presently called And on the second day, although this is its second and fourth title. I started writing it after the Newtown shootings and it deals with school shootings, from the perspective of the shooter.

I’m going to do it as a reading, as things stand now. The play has a large cast, a total of 15 with 10 speaking parts. I’m not sure, given how popular the festival is and how hard it is to get people, if I will get all 10, but I can have some people read more than one part. I looked to try and “cull the herd”  bit, but there is no way to tell the story without this many characters.

So, I’m still doing final edits. I’ll probably be looking for readers sometime in March and will put out a call for people then.

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Another Nakai Playwriting Challenge comes to a happy end

I entered the Nakai 24 Hour Playwriting Challenge (it used to be Festival but that seems to have changed) again this year. I wanted to work on a play I had started in January, planning to enter the category for play already in development.

That part is called the Nakai Next 24 Hour Challenge. I thought, with a prize for best new play, shouldn’t there be one called Best Used Play? This suggestion has been frowned upon by the hosting organization, by the way.

After the shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, I wanted to look at the question of school shootings and why someone would actually do it? What would make a person take one or more firearms to school and use them?

After a little preliminary research, I found that this a far more frequent occurrence than most of us believe, and in most cases, does not reflect the ones we see displayed on the national news organizations as a whole. In fact, my underlying question has changed now to, “Why doesn’t this happen more often.”

The short version is I won (second time in three years, he gloated). Now, it’s time to shift gears and look at putting the play in the upcoming Homegrown Theatre Festival in May. Right now, I looking at doing a reading of the full play. This, however, means I will be looking for 10 readers (it has a rather large cast). A call for readers will go out later…

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Opening night survived

We survived opening night and it seemed to go over very well. Some people found that it wasn’t what they had expected, although I do try to explain that the earthquake is the backdrop to the play and not the play itself. Yes, it has funny moments. Yes, the scene we present does end with a bit of a surprise. I like surprises.

However, there was a bit of playwright abuse at the end. Clara explained something to Heather and me that my grandson, Ryan, had commented upon.

Ryan: I think Heather has a crush on Poppy.

Clara: Why?

Ryan: She laughs at all of his jokes and they’re not that funny.

I got a bit of a giggle out of that until Heather responded, “It’s the only way I could get cast.”

Fortunately, it was the only abuse I got last night. I can live with that…

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Opening night

Well, it all seems to have come down to this. At 8:15, the play gets to see the light of day, so to speak. Actually, an audience gets to see part of the play.

After all this time, I would assume that I would be well inured to all of this getting ready, rehearsing, etc. Nope. I’m a wreck. I didn’t sleep well last night, running through dialogue. Then, when I finally got to sleep a little bit, we got a phone call and had to take a friend to the hospital. This was my morning. I was going to pace myself a wee bit and work up to this evening. Oh, well.

I have a few things to pack up and a bit of hockey to watch. Then I’ll grab a shower and go and pick up Heather and head off to the theatre. Am I ready for this? I guess we’ll know in a few hours…

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Dress rehearsal day

Dress rehearsal day seemed to be a bit more hectic than most. It started first with heading down to CBC for an interview. Two of us, Amanda MacDonald and I, were interviewed about our plays in the Homegrown Theatre Festival. The interview can be found here.

We had tech and dress on the same evening. This was slightly dampened by Heather being sick as a dog (it was dress rehearsal… someone had to be sick). She suffered through it though and I have to give her the “Tougher than a Boiled Owl” award for outstanding performance while nauseous.

Photo from dress rehearsal

Image from dress rehearsal Dress went well, but fortunately, not too well. After all, a good dress rehearsal seems to result in a not so stunning opening night…

 

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First rehearsal down

I always enjoy the first read through of a play. I’ll discount the fact that I kind of know the contents. However, when you get to see an actor’s interpretation of the dialogue, it is always neat. A script is really nothing more than words on a page and how it gets presented is always a congruence of the vision of the director, the actors and the designers.

There’s a great quote, although I can’t remember who said it or exactly how it goes. Basically, you pour your heart and soul into writing a play, and then, hand it to a directors, actors and designers who ruin it. Since I’m the director and the designer and half the actors, and since Heather is doing a stunning job in the other half, I don’t think we’ll ruin it…

There are a few things left to get on this weekend. I’m going to need a large coffee urn, although I do have a backup plan if I don’t get it. I need to draft the press release for the play. I need to line up someone to videotape the play during tech week. I also have to do a bit of design work yet, too. I don’t know what days the play will run or the times it will run. I find that out next week. At the same time, I find out which of the two rooms we go in, and I’ll need that to finalize quite a few things.

I also want to fit in some work on the motorhome. After all, camping season is coming right after the festival and I need to be ready. With the winter we’ve had, the lakes should be open early and the sooner fishing comes, the better…