Craig and I are taking some time off from the Blog. Like….. the month of July. Hey, it’s summer time. You don’t really want us locked up in the office do you while the sun shines?

Hmmmm, don’t answer that.

We know that a little brain break, along with some rest and relaxation, will have us primed and pumped for more continuous blog posts. We’re pretty pleased that we’ve been able to keep this up and we’re already looking forward to August. See you then!

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Transcript

Hi! Welcome to this week’s Spread the Love. This week we are talking about Mmmbeth. Mmmbeth. Not the other thing that it is called, because we don’t do that, we call it ‘The Scottish Play’ or Mmmbeth which of course this is an adaptation of The Scottish Play by Allison Williams our intrepid Shakespeare adaptor and we just so happen to have her here, isn’t that funny, here at the Florida State Thespian Festival.

Hi there! We’re in Florida. It’s really hot and humid.

We like it though because we’re from Canada and it is very cold . I am from Canada. Actually you’re from Canada.

I am from Canada. I still hate the humidity.

Mmmbeth is in our catalogue, first of all because it turns Shakespeare on it’s ear which we love. And also, because it really retains the darkness of the original. This is why I love the play, because it is funny -

I’ve never heard this, this is cool.

Yeah, you’ve got to come and you’ve got to learn these things, this is why you’re in this catalogue. This play is in this catalogue because it is sharp, it is funny and yet retains the darkness of the original and I love that. I love that it combines all of those elements into this tiny little lovely package. And since we have the author here, tell us what you love about this play.

Well, at the time I wrote it, I was directing a production of The Scottish Play and it was at that time the forth production of The Scottish Play that I had directed and man so much crap happens to me every time I direct The Scottish Play. It really does. And for me it is not so much a play of great tragic bad happenings, it is a play of constant small bad happenings. My plane gets fogged in. I lose my wallet in Arkansas. You know, I accidentally curse in front of a whole room full of very conservative students and have to send an apology letter home. And it’s those things that happen to me when I direct this play. So I wanted to write a play that was about all the superstitions and all the bad things that happen to you when you do The Scottish Play. And I like that even though it’s a comedy it still has all the death of the original in it. The floor is just covered in blood. It’s awesome.

Ok we’re putting that next time, we’re going to put that on the back – ‘The floor is covered in blood.’ It’s all good. Ok. And I have to tell you, she is not kidding because I remember when we were working on this play and the number of minute tragic things that were usually associated with The Scottish Play were happening almost daily, on a daily basis of trying to get this play out there. But now it’s good and now it’s happy and we love it.

And it’s full of donuts!

That’s it for Spread the Love!

Spread the donuts!

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Yesterday, a student just happened to over hear my name and came running over to the table – he had directed a production of Emotional Baggage and his concept was so cool I had to share it……

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But for some reason, my video does not want to download and be shared with the world. I suspect it realizes how hot it is and would rather stay inside the camera.

If I can figure out the issue, I’ll post the video, but here’s the gist.

I had a great conversation today with students from Blaine High School, who this year performed my play Pressure. It was a thrill to talk to them and they really seemed to enjoy the script. That means a lot to me.

The play is thirteen years old. That’s a lot of years, the students who were in the first production of the play are nearing 30 now. In the initial version, two characters exchanged ‘a tape.’  It means a lot that words, dialogue, scenarios and characters who resonated over a decade ago, still resonate today.

There’s no greater gift you can give a playwright, than to tell them that their words still mater all these years later.

Here’s hoping I can coax my little video out tomorrow….

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This is our sixth year and this time I’m going it alone. Craig is in the middle of rehearsals for a show so it’s all me. It’s a bit scary, not a lot since it’s mostly old hat. But keeping track of everything can get hairy and I’m also teaching a full set of workshops….. it could get intense. You’ll be the first to know as I’m going to blog every day about what happens here.

Today I traveled and started the set up.

This is how our table always looks at the very beginning. There’s always a moment during set up where everything is overwhelming and Agh, and how will we make it all pretty. What are we going to dooooooooooo.

But it all comes together. It always does. And it’s always nicer to set up the day before a conference starts, as there’s no immediate deadline. I didn’t get finished, but I made decent headway.

There’s also always a moment during set up where you fantasize (or create nightmares, I’ve always been a cup half empty kind of gal) about how the conference is going to go.

Will it be good? Bad? How will the economy situation affect things?

Only the shadow knows until tomorrow….

Boy for a girl who’s always so negative, that’s a pretty happy smile. Isn’t our latest catalogue pretty? Hmmmm, if I had taken a better picture you’d see how pretty it is. Something to do in my spare time this week….

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Transcript

Welcome to this week’s Spread the Love. This week we are talking about moving into the future, moving into the 21^st century and we have two very unique programs that do just that here at Theatrefolk. The first is our PDF program and that means you can go on our website and you can download a PDF of the play that you’re looking at, right then right there.

The second program is our photocopy license. And that means that if you are doing a play you can photocopy the scripts that you need for your cast.

Craig tell us all about PDFs and the photocopy license.

Well what’s great about the PDF downloads is that we’d get a situation where a customer would give us a call and they would absolutely have to have a script overnight. And it became really silly because they’d be buying a script for $5.95 but it would cost us and unfortunately them forty dollars to get it to them overnight. So the PDF download lets you get it straight away and just for the cost of the book.

And the other great thing is the photocopy license. And again, what was happening with the photocopy license is that we would get a call from a customer who was producing one of our plays and needed a set of cast scripts and the royalties and all that good stuff and we’d ask when the production is and they’d say ‘oh it’s tomorrow night.’ Well that became silly too because we’d have to pack up these scripts and send it to them when we know and they know that they’ve already photocopied it.

So, the photocopy license and the PDF download, it works for us and it works for you and that’s what we really love about it.

That’s it for Spread the Love. Bye bye!

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As an actor, it’s probably my least-favorite part of the entire theatrical process.

The best production photos I have been in were taken by a photographer in the house during an actual run of the show. The shots tend to be way more interesting and real. But often, we must take photos for the press long before we make it to the stage. It’s a familiar scene: The general manager gets a call from a newspaper who wants to do a story on the show, but would REALLY like a photo to go along with it. I can’t blame them – people love photos: they’re the first thing to catch the eye. I’ve also heard that a picture can tell a thousand words, so it really must cut down on ink expenses, too.

I’m in rehearsals for a play and was in this exact situation yesterday. We quickly devised a ruse for our four characters to all be somewhere in the frame and the director snapped away. I think I would have preferred being a test target for taser practice.

Thanks to the magic of digital photography we were able to have a look at the photos. I didn’t look like I was in abject pain and I didn’t look too fat. I can’t really ask much more than that.

So, anyway, this brings me to the subject of this post – a site I recently learned about called “…in a production of…” in which a sadistic anonymous person posts the worst theatrical production/promo photos he can find.

It’s my new guilty pleasure.

Enjoy! There’s a link on the main page to submit shots of your own. I’ve got to rummage through my archives. I have a few dozen shots that will fit right in.

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