Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Rehearsals for Christmas Carol'd begin!

Hello all!

I'm Helena, one of the shiny new apprentices here at Performance Network. As I'm the production assistant for the Network's next creation 'Christmas Carol'd' I'll be keeping you all updated on the progress of rehearsals and design.

Our playwright, Joseph Zettelmaier has adapted this Dickens classic and given the story's dialogue a good ol' nudge straight into the 21st century, while still remaining true to the original story.

This production has a small cast of five, giving our actors great scope to illustrate their multifarious ranges. The cast consists of John Seibert as Scrooge alongside Chelsea Sadler, Terry Heck, BJ Love and Kevin Young who all play various roles throughout the play. At this time, the actors are working from the script, developing the many characters they are required to portray and also familiarising themselves with the set our designer Monika Essen has envisioned.

It has been decided that all sound effects throughout the show will be created organically rather than with recording. So we are currently searching for props and materials to make the sound effects we require. I think this will make the experience for the audience quite authentic.

Over the coming weeks Janine Woods, our technical director will begin making Monika's design a reality. I'm really excited to see this set come to life.

Helena

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

The BLONDE, BRUNETTE Experience

Due to rave critic and audience reviews that have resulted in sold out shows, we're extending our season opener, Robert Hewett's The Blonde, the Brunette and the Vengeful Redhead. You now have until October 25th to see Suzi Regan knock it out of the park with chameleon-like skills and ability to transform into quite the collection of characters.

I just wanted to take a moment to touch on the experience that a viewer has while watching this show. The structure of the play is great for "manipulating" the audience, for lack of a better word (well, "engaging" might actually BE that better word...). Because the story unfolds through a series of monologues, it starts to become a guessing game about who we'll see next and what the REAL story is. You see, as we hear each person's perspective, we are with them, in the moment, lapping up every morsel they have to tell us -- until the next person comes along and the previous character is suddenly old news.

The last time that I watched a performance, it was so interesting to hear pockets of conversation* all over the theatre, between scenes, with people hedging their bets on who the next shadowed character behind the screen will be, and what bomb they're going to drop.

If you've seen the show, leave a comment and share your experience. We'd love to hear from you.

*Performance Network does not encourage or condone conversation during a live show...but sometimes you just gotta do it.