Enjoying the Kudos...

We are halfway through the run of Nine and it has been a blessed experience.  This gang is such a good group to work with, not just the cast, but the crew and the Production Team - everyone is lovely.  There are a few who verge on crazy, but it's a good spirited crazy and it makes for more fun.  I am enjoying the kudos.  I have gotten quite a few emails and messages from people about how much they like the show.  Some of them complete strangers! It is gratifying to know that you are putting something out there that people respond to.  I don't want to have people leave thinking they didn't get what they deserved as an audience member.

The reviews we have received have been extremely ego flattering - there's one in the St. Albert Gazette and one on Sound and Noise online.  I expect we will have one in Vue Weekly sometime this week and the Journal had both a photog. at media call and media comps on Opening Night so I'm waiting to see if anything shows up there. We are doing quite well in the run - being SOLD OUT for 3 of the shows so far and fairly large houses for the remainder.  We are Sold Out tonight and it's a Tuesday, so you have to be happy about that!  Between the reviews and word of mouth we can be sure the news is good!

I know it will be a bit sad when it's over, but like Guido, I tend to live some of my time in memory so I am pretty sure I can call it all back if I need to.  For now, we shall enjoy the second half of the run and try to keep cool.  The theatre proper is Air Conditioned for the audience, but the actors are upstairs in a furnace (some of them camp out in the shop where it is cooler). I think that generous souls have brought Popsicles and other cool treats to beat the heat!

* photo of Kate Holley, Mama Maddellena in Nine, by Janine Hodder

Dramaworks - Working on a New Play with Vern Thiessen... sort of...

Dramaworks is upon us!  Hooray!  I am taking the One Weekend, One Play course with Vern Thiessen.  I had to wrangle some creative childcare to make it happen, but happening it is.  We started last night and continued today and we still have two more days to work on our plays.  The first evening was a refresher, but a welcome one.  Too often we only think of the abstract artistic part of writing - the ideas and themes and poetry of it all - and we forget the crafting and the nuts and bolts of it.  Thursday evening we reviewed and learned some techniques for that aspect.  This was very good for me.  I often have 'things I want to write about' but I have a hard time figuring out the best structure to tell the story, so a mechanics lesson was well received!

Today we applied those techniques to the plays we had percolating in our brains.  We had to pitch three of them and then choose one to go with.  I finally started working on Pitchfork, which I first thought about while driving over a year ago.  Sometime tonight I need to do a little more writing on it as we are to assemble 10 pages or so by lunch tomorrow! I have 2 done after today, that's a good start, I think... I am glad to actually be writing as it always feels so good to get something done, and this idea has not left me since I had it last summer so I think it is one of those ones I need to write.

There were some added benefits.  I know that I can apply some of the work from the past two days to Little Monsters and The Water Beneath Her Feet and Girls in White Dresses (the latter will require a total reworking after I get on it!). I am excited because I can see the techniques helping with all three of these.  I would like to finish some of these works on the shelf. A fresh start and new eyes and all that will help!

Tomorrow I will probably miss the afternoon of the session as I have good hopes of being elected to the Theatre Alberta Board.  Cross your fingers and vote for me! I am excited at the idea of joining this Board.  I have been a member of Theatre Alberta for many years and I love their mandate and the work they do. It will be cool to be on the other side of the equation!

Opening Night - Sigh...

Tonight Nine opened.  It was a fabulous night. I was so pleased with the show and the reception the fabulous audience gave it.  We were Sold Out (at least on paper - there were a couple of empty seats in the house so I guess we had a few no-shows).  I laughed and I cried and it was lovely.  The audience treated us to a standing ovation which is always so gratifying and a wonderful surprise. After the show was the traditional Opening Night Reception and it was great fun talking to my Walterdale friends and the cast and crew.  I realized that I know so many lovely, lovely people and I feel blessed. I will not be back to the theatre until Friday night for archive photos so it will feel weird tomorrow night to know they are all onstage and I am not even in the building.  They know their stuff and they do it all wonderfully, but I will miss not being there.  I came home to kudos on FB from friends and strangers.  A perfect evening.

* Nine marks #26 in my 2012 Theatre Goal

Fitting in a Show before Final Dress...

I caught TOWTTB's production of Avenue Q tonight at La Cite.  We had a tba rehearsal scheduled for Nine that I was delighted not to need and managed to get a ticket so I could see the puerile puppet musical.  I was not too familiar with the show beforehand, but had a sense of what was in store.  It was a very well directed and well produced show.  The cast had clearly done their puppet homework as I don't believe many of them were puppeteers before they started rehearsing.  Nicole English and Corben Kushneryk seemed to be seamless in their puppet handling and voicing. Very impressive.  My favorite songs were The Internet is for Porn and The More you Ruv Someone.  The show's gimmick is the puppet thing, however, so musically there is a bit of a repetitive sound (they are parodying Sesame Street, so it make sense).  It's full of funny lyrics and quite rude (in an entertaining way) and the audience was frequently in stitches. All the performers are strong singers and good storytellers so it's well worth seeing. There's only one show left and I think it's pretty much Sold Out, but you never know, sometimes there are a handful of tickets at the door.

* This marks #25 in my theatre goal for the 2012

Media Call - I call it Nervous Day...

Well, I survived another media call!  For me, media call is the most nerve wracking day of the whole show experience, but it went quite well.  I was running from interviewer to interviewer and also trying to set up the scenes for shots so it flew by.  I think I sounded articulate and intelligent, so hopefully that will come across in the interviews. It was actually quite fun because there was a variety in the kinds of questions asked so I got the opportunity to talk about the different things I have researched and read up on for this show.  I spoke about the set, the source material 8 1/2, Salvador Dali and surrealism, pole dancing, the shift from reality to imagination to memory, religion, theatre arts training programs, the Edmonton theatre community, and music. It is a bit of a blur.

The pictures from our wonderful photographer, Douglas Stewart, are online.  You can check them out here.

Photo below of Erika Noot as Carla and Cory Christensen as Guido.

A Night Out in a busy time...

Despite being ankle deep in pre-tech and tech week for Nine, I went out with some friends from the cast to catch Kiss me Kate on Saturday night.  We had a lot of f un together and it was great to see familiar faces both on stage and in the audience.  Cole Porter's music is the star of the show (which I had never seen before) and the soloists were all in very strong voice.  It was great just to hear them belting out those standards like I Hate Men, Always True to You in My Fashion, So In Love, and Too Darn Hot (just to name a few). The script is a little dated, but this cast is enthusiastic and they run with it!

Afterwards our little gang sought out ice cream but had to settle for BP's instead, but the conversation was hysterical as we related storied of encounters with bugs, kids and body parts, and past show experiences.  It's always fun to have interactions with members of your cast and team outside rehearsal.  One of the things I live about doing theatre is that development of connection and friendship.  This night was great for that.  Now we dive into the business of tech-week.  Our Q2Q on Sunday whizzed by and took about 3 hours from start to finish (FOR A MUSICAL!!!) and I am so pleased with how it looks.  I will see the costumes under lights tonight and I am so excited.  We are a week away from Director's Preview and I cannot wait!


* Kiss Me Kate marks #24 in my 2012 Theatre Goal

To Get You Warmed Up...

There are a couple of musicals on in town (or son to be on) that you can catch while you wait for Nine at Walterdale.

The first is Two One Way Tickets to Broadway's Avenue Q.  It's the puerile puppets that aren't quite what you saw on Sesame Street.  Several Walterdale alumni are involved including Nicole English, Lauren Kneteman, Martin Galba, Linette Smith, Brad Melrose (who is also lighting Nine), Travis Metzger, and M.J. Kreisel.  I will be seeing the show later in the run as my tech week has me pretty busy right now, but the show runs to June 30th. From what I hear it's hilarious but one should not be expecting clean humour (someone told me the funniest song is called 'The Internet is for Porn').

The other show is ELOPE's Kiss Me Kate which opens this weekend. There are many Walterdale alumni in this one too - Elizabeth Marsh, Gary Carter, and Kathleen McDonald to name a few.  I am catching it this weekend.  It's the musical adaptation of Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew and features the songs 'Too Darn Hot' and 'Brush Up on Your Shakespeare'.  It also runs until June 30th.

You can let these warm you up before you come to see Nine in July!