Correct call time...

I'm still in rehearsal mode, apparently. Call time tonight is 7:00 PM, not 6:00. Enjoy your dinner!

FRIDAY AUGUST 17 Opening night!

We’re here! You have all worked so hard against really bizarre sorts of casting challenges. But I think the cast that appeared onstage last night was absolutely perfect! 

You guys are ready!

Patrick, I think this is the best role you’ve ever done. You’re Stage Manager transcends the boundaries of vintage sentimentality and yet still presents a heart warming tale. That’s a tough job. And you also cover a variety of other characters from all walks of life and even different genders! Bravo!

L.D., Doc Gibbs is subtlety nuanced; he’s open and gregarious with folks on the street, but not nearly as gracious with his own wife. And you still make him a likeable, lovable character. I absolute get lost in the scenes you have with Whitney; they’re too real for words.

Whitney, your eyes communicate so much longing. You barely have to finish the line about Paris and I understand how much that dream means to Mrs. Gibbs. And the body language you use as you putz around your kitchen??? It’s transports a paper-bound Mrs. Gibbs to the depths of a real person with a soul.

Robert, wow! I can’t believe that you just stepped into this role two and a half weeks ago. You’ve had a baptism by fire. And you’re hitting your stride, right on time! The entire cast, me especially, owe you a huge debt of gratitude. Thank you for taking George from the awkward throes of teenage adolescence to a grieving husband who has had his life ripped apart. Very powerful performance.

Peyton, you’re absolutely adorable. Rebecca is a forthright and engaging little sister who has a sense of wonder about everything. You bring that out at EVERY rehearsal! And I have no doubt you’ll now do it at every show.

Jeff, I have seen you push Editor Webb all over that stage! I love the amount of experimentation that you did to capture a time pressed and weary husband who loves his family even though he is trapped in it. Great depth of character there.

Rita, playing Myrtle Webb is tough for any actress. The easy job is to simply make her a nit-picking shrew who nags her family and ignores their emotional needs. But I don’t think that that’s what Wilder was writing. You’ve given us a real woman who has issues and conflicts AND a great deal of love for her family.

Playing Emily Webb is certainly an accomplishment. But Sarah, you’ve created an Emily who is more than just a saccharine sort of ghost who warns us all to take time to smell the roses. You die and say good-bye to the world every single night. I love how you bravely take that plunge! Now you’ll have a chance to take an audience along with you on that journey.

Sam, you go from being an active, adorable boy scout to being dead- what a range! I’m so glad that you’re a part of this show. Keep those pants pulled up at the knee!

Shaun, you have only a few seconds to let the audience fall in love with you before they learn that your character dies before he has a chance to live. It takes a really fine actor to accomplish that. Thank you.

Mario, I just love Howie! You spent a lot of time working on this almost incidental character and made him so believable.  Howie doesn’t just recite lines, he embodies them. And that laugh fest you have with Reid every night about the drunken Poles in the snow? Priceless!

Matt, thank you for making Professor Willard such a character. There are so many ways to interpret this guy; you’ve made him into someone we’ve all known and encountered before, namely that nerdy science geek from chemistry class. The audience all knows someone like this, and they’re going to relate to that onstage.

J, like Robert, you’ve had to just jump into this whole hog. Stimson, as you play him, is a tortured man with demons chasing his soul. The easy way out is to simply play him for laughs as the town drunk. But you dig deeper than that. Thank you.

Michel, you bring Mrs. Soames to a wonderful level. She’s not just a simple gossip. Even though she loves to dish about the people in Grover’s Corners, she also is passionate about her cares and concerns. And she wants to be heard! You make her all of that.

Reid, you tackle two different roles with equanimity. You’ve made Constable Warren a self-important, swaggering cop who also manages to age before our eyes. And your Joe Stoddard is a delicate layering of polite funeral director and concerned clergy. Excellent!

Gia, you’re such a cutie! I love how you’ve learned to scale back your tremendous musical theatre skills into something more nuanced and reality-based. Keep up the good work!

Doug, your Sam Craig is a completely convincing businessman. In your performance, I see a man who parlays a business trip into possible new leads, and then into a home coming, and finally into a true episode of grief as he confronts his own mortality. All that in just two or three pages!

Emily, you’re a true ensemble member. You’ve read in for other actors who couldn’t make rehearsal, you’ve taken those small parts and made them perfectly real and genuine, and you’ve done it all consistently every night. I love listening to you ask about drinking every night. I hear the concern and just a little bit of self righteousness from this teetotaler who sits in the back every night!

Sophia, you’re also a trouper. You have a small role in this show, but you’ve shown that you have a real heart for theatre in making every small moment count. Continue making those small moments into much bigger ones.

Estus, you have graced our stage. And I mean that in all sincerity! Without you, our pack of baseball players would be immeasurably diminished and our school kids lacking that extra spark!

And Desi, I would like to have lunch with your Artistic-Lady-in-the-Box. Just that one line, and you’ve created someone who has life and depth and reality. 

This show would never have made it this level without the hard work and commitment of our AD, Katie. It has been a complete pleasure to partner with you on this show and I can't thank you enough for your innumerable contributions to the staging and directing of Our Town. 

I woke up with this tune in my head; watch and enjoy. See you all at 6:00.

T-Shirts and other fun stuff

Congratulations on a fantastic show!  I know our audiences will love what you and the production team have created.  There's a lot of information below, but it's all important, so please make sure you read carefully and completely, and ask Lisa, Katie or me if you have any questions.

T-SHIRTS:
Each shirt is $10, and you can order as many as you like.  All sizes are available.  If you want to order more than one shirt, you can mix sizes - just make sure to let me know exactly what you want on the order form, which will be backstage starting tomorrow.  I have found that the shirts seem to run just a hair small, so if you want a loosely fitting shirt, order a size larger than normal, especially if you've got a little "extra" around the middle or a large neck like I do.

As I mentioned last night, the shirts will have the show logo and performance dates as well as the HFAC logo on the front, and will have all of the names of the cast and production team on the back.

All you need to do is fill out the indicated information on the form and give me (or Lisa or Katie) your payment.  We can accept cash or checks made to HFAC.  If you need to pay with a credit card, let me know, and I'll figure out a way to run that through the box office credit card machine for you.  We'd like to get a final count by the end of this Sunday's matinee show so that we have a chance to get the shirts printed and distributed no later than the cast party.  We'll accept your order prior to payment, but you must pay before you can receive your shirt.  Duh.  :-)

PARKING:
In addition to the earlier note about where to park, please note that for tomorrow and Saturday that the Academy has a show PRIOR to our show, so the parking lot is likely to be full of parent's cars when you arrive at call time.  Your best bet is to park in the lot at the park across the street.  Their show today runs concurrently with ours, so parking shouldn't be as much of an issue since you'll be arriving before most of the Academy parents.  VITALLY IMPORTANT: Near the far east end of the parking lot there are often two spaces with reserved parking signs for one of the other tenants.  If the signs are posted (they are portable), and you park there, you WILL be towed.  Consider yourself warned.  If the signs are not posted, then you can park in those spaces.

CIRCLE:
As Lisa wrote yesterday, circle is mandatory for all actors and crew.  However, the prayer near the end of circle is voluntary.  While we'd love for everyone to stay for this short prayer, we certainly respect the wishes of anyone who desires not to participate.  Note that the motto recital, "Touching hearts, touching lives, in a dramatic way" is spoken immediately after the prayer ends, so if you skip the prayer, you may not get back to the circle quickly enough for that fun part of our routine.

POST-SHOW:
Again, as Lisa wrote yesterday, our patrons enjoy meeting the cast in the lobby after the show.  If you choose to participate in this HFAC tradition, you have the option of going to the lobby immediately after bows, or changing into your street clothes first.  We also understand if you choose not to participate or if you need to skip this from time to time as we know there are often other demands on your time other than this production.

CAST PARTY:
It looks like it will be on Sunday, September 2nd after our matinee.  That would put it at about 6:30 or 7:00.  Since the next day is Labor Day, hopefully most of you won't have to worry about making it an early night.  The party will be at Lisa and Mario's house, which is near Goodson Middle School in Cypress (about 20 minutes north/northwest of HFAC).  Her cast parties are always great fun, and you won't want to miss it.  We'll let you know by next weekend if we will have enough room for you to bring a guest (obviously the kids can have a parent present), and if you need to bring anything (if so, it's typically a dessert).  They do have a nice pool, so bring a suit and towel if you think you might want to swim.

Have a great final dress rehearsal tonight, and I'll see all of you at opening night tomorrow!

Tracy

WEDNESDAY AUGUST 15

Robert is out tonight; Doug, you've become the go-to guy to read in parts. Would you mind reading his part in again?

Here's some notes and reminders of what to do on show days:

• Call time is always 1 hour before curtain: 7:00 PM for Fridays and Saturdays and 2:00 PM for Sunday matinees.
• Please do not park right next to the doors of the theatre. Save those primo parking spots for your audience, some of whom might be arriving late. Park further down, at the ends of the parking lot, preferably facing Grant Rd, so that head in spots can be saved for the audience. You can also park across the street at Matzke Park.
• When you arrive, SIGN IN!
• LD will be giving you count downs to 3 different times, first to circle, next to house, and finally to curtain or places. Here's what happens during each:

1. 7:15 (2:15) is mandatory cast circle. Since our cast is relatively large, we'll do this onstage. (LD, can you leave the rollup door open until after circle?) We'll have a few brief announcements and last minute notes, followed by a brief prayer, and our traditional HFAC chant which is "touching hearts, touching lives, in a dramatic way." Please check props, if you have any. You are free to move about the stage or house. In respect for actors who are preparing for roles, please keep it quiet. You can certainly carry on a conversation, but be mindful that some actors are working very diligently to prepare for the performance.
2. 7:30 (2:30) The rollup door will be closed and the house is open. You can no longer go out on stage and must be quiet backstage. Get into costume and makeup.
3. 8:00 (3:00) Places. 

• During the show, keep it quiet backstage. Kids, bring some sedate activity to keep yourself occupied. A game with the sound turned off, e readers, comic books, knitting, embroidery, yoga- these are all quiet things that don't disturb others. Performance time is NOT a good time to play a group game or run around. If you really want to be a good performer, practice being a good actor backstage.
• Each intermission is 10 minutes long. 
• After the performance, you may exit to the lobby to greet your audience. This is not required, but we have found that out audience loves to meet and congratulate you.

Katie and I can't repeat this often enough: stay focused, keep up the pace and sell your audience the best performance that you have!

UPDATE ON PHOTOS

Picture day will be tomorrow, Wednesday the 15th.

Once again, Emily is photographing the entire show from start to finish. Just do what you normally do and don't worry about getting in her way. She's very good at being unobtrusive.

We'll take the cast photo immediately after the Act II wedding scene. Everyone is all together at the same place, same time, and you're all dressed nicely. Simply exit as you normally do, but troop back onstage. Between Reid, Mario, Matt, and Doug, could we get the ladders back onstage for the photo?

Tomorrow, I'll go over our typical pre-show routine at HFAC from call to curtain.

Reminders: Everyone sign in when you get there tonight and no one in the house after we start unless you've been blocked to be there.

TUESDAY AUGUST 14

Great job on your first tech rehearsal. We had a lot of ground to cover last night and you guys did it; we finished all three acts! Tonight will go much smoother, and faster.

One change for tonight- no photographs yet! I apparently didn't book the photographer when I thought I had. So please wear costumes, but we won't get pictures done tonight. I'm hoping for Wednesday. Will keep you posted.

One last thing, for Family and Friends night on Thursday, you can tell your peeps that we'll probably start between 7:15 and 7:30. I want to give our outliers time to get into costume and makeup before we begin.

Thanks again for being patient and (mostly) focused for a grueling tech rehearsal. The end is so close I can smell it!

SUNDAY AUGUST 12 The home stretch!

Lots of info today! And no fun fact at all. Sigh.

 TALKBACKS

I’m in the process of scheduling talkbacks with the audience after all of our Sunday matinees. Depending on the audience, the talkback might last 20 to 30 minutes.

I’d like to know if any of you have an interest in participating. It would be too much for all 21 of you to stay every time, but I’d also like to give all of you a chance to entertain questions from the audience and share your thoughts on the show. I’ll have a sign up sheet posted backstage if you’d like to be included in a talkback. You have four different opportunities to sign up. This is completely optional!

FLOOR

After looking at all those stripes that I painted, I’ve decided that discretion is the better part of valor and have staged a retreat. The lines are going! I will still paint the house “blueprint,” but in a much more subdued color. The back wall now has a lovely texture on it that hides a lot of the seam lines.

LIGHTS

John was in the theater half a day Friday and almost all day Saturday setting lights. "Amazing" doesn't even begin to cut it. He has taken the lighting at HFAC to a whole 'nother level, and you guys are going to look like professionals at The Alley. If you see him around, be sure to thank him for his artistic endeavors.

BOWS

After much consideration, I have decided to alter bows a bit.

The beauty of an ensemble bow is that it gives the audience one huge picture all at once and they’re usually so overwhelmed, that they instantly rise to their feet. And I want you guys to get a standing ovation EVERY NIGHT! But I do want to also give you all a moment of glory, particularly since some of your parts don’t give you lots of stage time.

Let’s see if we can accomplish this right out of the shoot on Monday night. It has to go quickly, beofre the audience tires of slapping their hands together.

Step 1: Everyone enters the stage, just as before and bows a single time. Stay in this same position until it’s time for your second bow; don’t shuffle around.

Step 2: All kids trot forward in a single line and bow. Please put taller kids on ends and shorter ones in the middle. So Desi and Emily should be on the outside, next should be either Peyton or Shaun, with Samuel, Gia, Estus and Sophia in the middle. Split center and move to the sides and upstage. Patrick, you should be at the back of the pack by now.

Step 3: Adult roles move forward and bow: Matt, Mario, Michel, J., Reid, and Doug. Michel is in the middle, but all bow at the same time. If you can sort by height, great. If not, don't sweat it. Split center and move SL and SR. Kids should be upstage of you.

Step 4: LD, Whitney, Rita and Jeff move to center and bow; ladies first, then gentlemen. Move SL or SR.

Step 4: Sarah and Robert move to center, bow individually, move SR.

Step 5: Patrick takes center and bows.

Step 6: Now comes the tricky part. I really don’t like the curve, so I want to see if we can make two  straight lines. All kids from step 2 move to the front, with all other actors in a line behind them. One more company bow, recognition of tech crew with the right hand, one final bow, and lights.

Whew! Remember, don’t clap for each other. I do think it would be a nice gesture for you to show your appreciation of the tech crew by applauding them a few times, right after you extend your hand to them.

SCHEDULE FOR THIS WEEK

On Monday and Tuesday, I’ll be focusing almost exclusively on tech. Katie will be taking notes for you. If we have time, she can give them at the end of rehearsal. If not, she will probably be happy to post them on the blog for you. (Thanks, Katie!)

Here's what else is going on this week:

  

Monday

Julie Montgomery, from HFAC Marketing Committee, will be on hand to videotape interviews with actors. These will be posted on HFAC’s FB page to generate interest and buzz about the show. In the past, these videos have tended towards the why-should-someone-buy-a-ticket-to-this-show kind of format. And by “interview,” I mean a short, two or three question kind of thing.

Since our cast is so large, it’s not necessary that she videotape everyone. Even if she did, she wouldn’t be able to use all the footage. But I did want to make leads available to her in a timely fashion. She will set up around 7:30 (not sure just where; she may rove around some.) Towards the end of Act I, as soon as you have exited, I’d like Julie to see Rita, Whitney, and LD. At the end of Act I, she can see Jeff, Sarah, and Robert. Julie will snag other adults and kids as she can. I’m not sure Patrick has much free time to be interviewed at all. L

On Monday, you may wear costumes or street clothes tonight, whichever is easier for you. I recommend practicing costume changes, but there will likely be a number of restarts as sound and lights finish their programming, so you may gain a false sense of security as to how much time exists between cues, so be careful.

Tuesday

Tonight is photo night so full costumes and makeup for everyone!

Emily Talbot, our photographer, will take pictures of the entire show from start to finish. She doesn’t use a flash and her camera is very quiet. She’ll be all over the stage; just pretend she’s not there. She’s the same photographer that took the stunning publicity photos of some of our leads a few weeks ago.

She’ll also take the official cast photo. The best time to stage this is between Act II and Act III, immediately after the wedding. You’ll all have on your wedding finery, so immediately after exiting backstage, troop right on through the backstage area and re-enter from SL.  I’d like both ladders in the picture to give us some levels, plus all the chairs from the wedding will be there.  (Picture includes tech crew!)

It’s important for everyone to be serious about the photograph. There’s just no time for clowning around and silliness.

Our sound design and board operator Jean will not be here tonight; Tracy will be running sound, so there may be some missed cues. Please be patient!

Wednesday

Straight run through tonight. I’d recommend that you do all costume changes tonight, particularly if you’re concerned about making everything work.

Robert, who will be going back to college at Baylor in Waco, needs to move back into his dorm today in order to prepare for classes beginning again. That’s a 3 or 4 hour drive, one way. I don’t want him doing that all in one day PLUS moving, so he won’t be at rehearsal tonight. In his absence, Doug, could you read Robert’s lines tonight? You needn’t do all his blocking, just have your script handy and stand on stage.

  

Thursday

This is Family and Friend night. If you have family or friends who have already purchased tickets, they may come and see tonight’s show. You’re ready for an audience!  We need to run through the entire show without stopping, from opening to bows.

We're almost there, folks. I'm so proud of all of you! See you on Monday.