Contributed by Amanda Feldman
In grade school during in the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving, we were taught to make a list of what we are thankful for. I know I have said it before but I am thankful for the downtown theater community – which for me is really an extension of family. Of course, the best part about my Indie Theater family is how inspired and moved I am by the really wonderful plays that they produce.
Personally when I go to the theater, what I’m especially drawn to is really interesting stories told in unique ways. In additional to the shows that I produced, which of course I’m biased to love, the two productions this year that felt did an extraordinary job were The Honeycomb Trilogy by Mac Rogers, produced by Gideon Productions and Pool (no water) by Mark Ravenhill produced by One Year Lease.
On the surface, The Honeycomb Trilogy, which, yes, I know is technically three plays, tells an epic story of an alien invasion. The reason Mac is a genius is not because he was able to craft a fascinating sci-fi story (although he does brilliantly), but because Mac tells a beautiful story about family. The relationships throughout all three pieces of the play are all so vivid, heartbreaking, and real, that they stay with you long after the curtain comes down. I think I mentioned to Sean Williams, one of the producers and an actor in the first play, the only thing I didn’t like about the play is that Mac had to kill off so many characters from play to play that I was sad when the actors didn’t reappear in the next installment of the trilogy. For me this epic adventure, directed flawlessly by Jordana Williams, is everything good theater should be.
One Year Lease’s production of Pool (no water) was exceptional for a very different reason. The story was fairly simple; group of quote/unquote friends get together, there is an accident, and then there is the slow and painful recovery. As often occurs with a group of struggling artist "friends" when one achieves success beyond the others, there is jealously, anger, and resentment. What is so incredible about this production is how it was almost a choreographed dance piece. Using only a few coffee table-like set pieces and the actors’ physicality we were transformed from one location to the next. As the play was told from memory, there was a ton of “he said/she said,” but in part thanks to Ianthe Demos’s incredible direction you were never lost or confused. It was captivating story telling at its best.
To conclude, I am thankful that I got the opportunity to see so much great theatre last year. I am especially thankful to my husband who successfully put my daughter to bed on the nights I was at the theater. And as always I’m looking forward to another wonderful year of theater.
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Amanda Feldman produced The Play About My Dad by Boo Killebrew, Theives by William Yellowrobe, Jr, Lake Water by Troy Deutsch, Prison Light by Austin Flint, HOTEL PLAYS, The Deepest Play Ever: The Catharsis of Pathos by Geoffrey Decas O’Donnell, and Olives And Blood by Michael Bradford. She is the Managing Director of CollaborationTown, A Theatre Company and a Producer with Neighborhood Productions.
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Razor Swallowing, a GPS & Awesome Waffles
Contributed by Doug Strassler
One of the neater finds of the past season was actually a new theatrical locale that emerged in 2011, the Canal Park Playhouse. Situated on the border of the West Village and TriBeCa, and not far from the gorgeous views along the Hudson, CPP is a bit of a trailblazer. Using the proceeds of its bed and breakfast part, CPP produces a variety of shows for kids and adults alike (and makes some pretty awesome waffles as well).
In the last year alone, the Playhouse has presented revivals of such top-notch shows as Frank McGuinness’ Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me and Paula Vogel’s Pulitzer finalist, The Baltimore Waltz. And their kid-friendly fare included weekend afternoon runs of Sarazad and the Monster-King. An ongoing show that the Playhouse runs features a spook show performed by “rock star” magician extraordinaire Cardone, who completes such mid-boggling acts as razor swallowing and strait-jacket escapes. It’s a sweet but scary throwback to the old shows that used to appear in places like Coney Island. I also had the privilege to see Sherri Eden Barber’s comedy Inadmissible, a behind-the-scenes look at the politics decorating the college admission process, directed by D. B. Gilles. Months later, I can still recall being captivated by Kathryn Kates’ exquisite timing and delivery.
So, too, do I still fondly recall The Navigator, which played the WorkShop’s main stage last spring. Eddie Antar’s play about a down-on-his-luck man and his GPS system which knows too much and maybe just enough had already won a pair of IT awards several years back, but it upgraded the show for its new 60-seat berth. Still small-scale but resourceful, the show was terrific, and replicated the feeling that audience members were indeed stuck in the same car as the show’s leads. Stars Joseph Franchini and Kelly Anne Burns (eerily evoking a GPS) were unforgettable. So much so, in fact, that Franchini even earned a Drama Desk nod for Best Actor last year. I hear talk that Navigator might have even more life in store. This is the little show that could. I can’t wait to see what happens to it next.
That was 2012 in Off-Off theatre for me: full of pleasant surprises in hidden places. Actually, pleasant as these shows were, they weren’t a surprise at all.
One of the neater finds of the past season was actually a new theatrical locale that emerged in 2011, the Canal Park Playhouse. Situated on the border of the West Village and TriBeCa, and not far from the gorgeous views along the Hudson, CPP is a bit of a trailblazer. Using the proceeds of its bed and breakfast part, CPP produces a variety of shows for kids and adults alike (and makes some pretty awesome waffles as well).
In the last year alone, the Playhouse has presented revivals of such top-notch shows as Frank McGuinness’ Someone Who’ll Watch Over Me and Paula Vogel’s Pulitzer finalist, The Baltimore Waltz. And their kid-friendly fare included weekend afternoon runs of Sarazad and the Monster-King. An ongoing show that the Playhouse runs features a spook show performed by “rock star” magician extraordinaire Cardone, who completes such mid-boggling acts as razor swallowing and strait-jacket escapes. It’s a sweet but scary throwback to the old shows that used to appear in places like Coney Island. I also had the privilege to see Sherri Eden Barber’s comedy Inadmissible, a behind-the-scenes look at the politics decorating the college admission process, directed by D. B. Gilles. Months later, I can still recall being captivated by Kathryn Kates’ exquisite timing and delivery.
So, too, do I still fondly recall The Navigator, which played the WorkShop’s main stage last spring. Eddie Antar’s play about a down-on-his-luck man and his GPS system which knows too much and maybe just enough had already won a pair of IT awards several years back, but it upgraded the show for its new 60-seat berth. Still small-scale but resourceful, the show was terrific, and replicated the feeling that audience members were indeed stuck in the same car as the show’s leads. Stars Joseph Franchini and Kelly Anne Burns (eerily evoking a GPS) were unforgettable. So much so, in fact, that Franchini even earned a Drama Desk nod for Best Actor last year. I hear talk that Navigator might have even more life in store. This is the little show that could. I can’t wait to see what happens to it next.
That was 2012 in Off-Off theatre for me: full of pleasant surprises in hidden places. Actually, pleasant as these shows were, they weren’t a surprise at all.
Monday, November 19, 2012
My Faves
Contributed by Amy Overman
I was personally involved as an actor, director or producer in 10 productions of varying sizes during the 2011-2012 season. And they were all awesome. But I thought it would be a little inappropriate to write a whole blog talking about the awesome work produced by myself and the artists I was lucky enough to work with (awesome as they were). So here are my favorite shows, which I had nothing to do with, for 2011-2012:
BrainExplode! (Sneaky Snake Productions/Game Play 2011) was hands down my favorite show. And I saw it last July, so the bar was set very high for the year. Awesome concept, script and execution. Ray Pinter (Stephen Heskett), a video game designer in 1987, via a mysterious dart in the neck, becomes a player in his own action adventure game and has one hour to solve a puzzle or his brain will explode. Six volunteers from the audience gave simple commands in the style of an old school text based adventure game. At one point, Ray was standing onstage with a handkerchief belted to his head and his pants in danger of falling down. All that and emotional growth, catharsis and a cast that rolled with the punches thrown at them by the audience seamlessly. Written by Richard Lovejoy, Danny Bowes and Stephen Aubrey and directed by Paige Blansfield – I would love to see this script (hint, hint) as I have no idea how they pulled this off.
Tenderpits, which was created by Nathan Schwartz and Anthony Johnston and performed by Johnston wearing a diaper and a Cosby sweater and featuring a drunken moose and a judgmental parrot. I can’t really describe this show. It would sound bizarre and disturbing, and it was, but Anthony’s performance was so honest and so lovable that at the end of the show you just wanted to hug his sweaty, diapered self.
Batz (created by Erik Bowie & Josh Mertz) A man arrives at work to find his computer broken and starts reading an old Batman comic book. Slowly everyone around him takes on the parts in the action. Remounted from the original production at the Brick and being compacted onto the tiny stage at Joe’s Pub turned out to be a blessing in disguise as the show exploded with energy, literally leaping off the stage and out into the audience. A running gag about no one wanting to play Robin and sets and props, made out of office supplies, growing more and more elaborate with each passing story. Plus, a woman playing Batman (Melissa DeLancey) and a near iconic level performance by Bob Laine as the Penguin.
Honorable mention to the flying snakes of Flying Snakes in 3D. Because sometimes you just want to throw tiny rubber snakes at the stage and with this show, you could.
Amy Overman is the Artistic Director of the Dysfunctional Theatre Company (www.dysfunctionaltheatre.org); her recent work with them includes directing Of Dice & Men as part of the Brick’s Game Play festival, acting in and producing the serialized play Unlicensed, which ran for 8 months at UNDER St. Marks and performing in the horror comedy Brew of the Dead II: Oktoberflesh,
also at UNDER St. Marks. Outside of Dysfunctional, Amy has acted,
directed and produced all around the indietheatre scene and is a Master
Mason of the Brick. Currently she is working on I Shall Forget You Presently,
an original piece created from the poems of Edna St. Vincent Millay,
which will be presented by Dysfunctional as part of the Tiny Theater
Festival at the Brick (www.bricktheater.com).
I was personally involved as an actor, director or producer in 10 productions of varying sizes during the 2011-2012 season. And they were all awesome. But I thought it would be a little inappropriate to write a whole blog talking about the awesome work produced by myself and the artists I was lucky enough to work with (awesome as they were). So here are my favorite shows, which I had nothing to do with, for 2011-2012:
BrainExplode! (Sneaky Snake Productions/Game Play 2011) was hands down my favorite show. And I saw it last July, so the bar was set very high for the year. Awesome concept, script and execution. Ray Pinter (Stephen Heskett), a video game designer in 1987, via a mysterious dart in the neck, becomes a player in his own action adventure game and has one hour to solve a puzzle or his brain will explode. Six volunteers from the audience gave simple commands in the style of an old school text based adventure game. At one point, Ray was standing onstage with a handkerchief belted to his head and his pants in danger of falling down. All that and emotional growth, catharsis and a cast that rolled with the punches thrown at them by the audience seamlessly. Written by Richard Lovejoy, Danny Bowes and Stephen Aubrey and directed by Paige Blansfield – I would love to see this script (hint, hint) as I have no idea how they pulled this off.
Tenderpits, which was created by Nathan Schwartz and Anthony Johnston and performed by Johnston wearing a diaper and a Cosby sweater and featuring a drunken moose and a judgmental parrot. I can’t really describe this show. It would sound bizarre and disturbing, and it was, but Anthony’s performance was so honest and so lovable that at the end of the show you just wanted to hug his sweaty, diapered self.
Batz (created by Erik Bowie & Josh Mertz) A man arrives at work to find his computer broken and starts reading an old Batman comic book. Slowly everyone around him takes on the parts in the action. Remounted from the original production at the Brick and being compacted onto the tiny stage at Joe’s Pub turned out to be a blessing in disguise as the show exploded with energy, literally leaping off the stage and out into the audience. A running gag about no one wanting to play Robin and sets and props, made out of office supplies, growing more and more elaborate with each passing story. Plus, a woman playing Batman (Melissa DeLancey) and a near iconic level performance by Bob Laine as the Penguin.
Honorable mention to the flying snakes of Flying Snakes in 3D. Because sometimes you just want to throw tiny rubber snakes at the stage and with this show, you could.
----------------------
Thursday, November 15, 2012
The Harsh Realities Served with a Pie in the Face
Contributed by Vincent Marano
In college during the plague years that was the Reagan presidency, my friends and I competed in forensic tournaments where students did excerpts of plays for fun and glory. Called either Single-Interpretation of Drama (one person show) or Duo-Interpretation (for a two hander) the goal was to get the gist of the play across in 10 minutes, in the most entertaining way possible. Most schools would pick one or two edited scenes. Our school pioneered the approach of boiling down the entire work into one scene, beginning with the first line of the play and ending with the last line. The intended effect of editing the drama this way, according to our team captain, was that the character’s should “laugh, laugh, laugh… then they all die.”
Looking at New York plays this and last season; on and off –off Broadway, the stylistic hybrid of low comedy and high tragedy seems to be the norm. From August: Osage County to Detroit, from MotherF**Ker With a Hat to Clyburne Park, playwrights are jamming as many yuks into the torturous lives of their characters as possible.
Whether it’s borderline absurdist-Gran Guingnol of Martin McDonagh or dystopian giggle-fest of the next Anthony Rapp Fable, playwrights (and their directors) find the funny bone in decapitation and the smile in electroshock therapy.
While one could argue that this trend just mirrors the general gallows humor that pervades a world in recession (both economic and social). I think that this choice is more one of dramatic expediency. For a play to get noticed it is not enough to be well-crafted, about important ideas, charged with a wealth of human emotion; it has to be brutal and irreverent. Essentially, drama with BO. Our collective tolerance for violence, our collective indulgence of the crude and vulgar, and our collective obsession with art that wallows in “the edgy, the raw, the primordial,” makes the subtle and the cerebral the stuff of the Classics shelf at the Drama Book Shop.
In college during the plague years that was the Reagan presidency, my friends and I competed in forensic tournaments where students did excerpts of plays for fun and glory. Called either Single-Interpretation of Drama (one person show) or Duo-Interpretation (for a two hander) the goal was to get the gist of the play across in 10 minutes, in the most entertaining way possible. Most schools would pick one or two edited scenes. Our school pioneered the approach of boiling down the entire work into one scene, beginning with the first line of the play and ending with the last line. The intended effect of editing the drama this way, according to our team captain, was that the character’s should “laugh, laugh, laugh… then they all die.”
Looking at New York plays this and last season; on and off –off Broadway, the stylistic hybrid of low comedy and high tragedy seems to be the norm. From August: Osage County to Detroit, from MotherF**Ker With a Hat to Clyburne Park, playwrights are jamming as many yuks into the torturous lives of their characters as possible.
Whether it’s borderline absurdist-Gran Guingnol of Martin McDonagh or dystopian giggle-fest of the next Anthony Rapp Fable, playwrights (and their directors) find the funny bone in decapitation and the smile in electroshock therapy.
While one could argue that this trend just mirrors the general gallows humor that pervades a world in recession (both economic and social). I think that this choice is more one of dramatic expediency. For a play to get noticed it is not enough to be well-crafted, about important ideas, charged with a wealth of human emotion; it has to be brutal and irreverent. Essentially, drama with BO. Our collective tolerance for violence, our collective indulgence of the crude and vulgar, and our collective obsession with art that wallows in “the edgy, the raw, the primordial,” makes the subtle and the cerebral the stuff of the Classics shelf at the Drama Book Shop.
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Get Site Specific
Contributed by Hillary Cohen
I recently met a very early-career director who described her area of interest as “site specific” work. That has got to be the biggest trend I noticed amongst the registered shows this year. The New York independent theater community has largely embraced non-traditional performance spaces, but it also produces shows that are “site specific” in the sense of the wry exclamation “Only in New York!”
Even as Jeff Lewonczyk audaciously suggested we take a few years off from Shakespeare, Off-Off-Broadway companies made equally brave runs at re-imaging the Bard and introducing typically Radio City Christmas Spectacular-bound audiences to smaller-budget theater. Downtown Art brought us a two-installment rock musical mash-up of Romeo & Juliet and Gangs of New York called Bowery Wars with age-appropriate casting for the young lovers sprawling over a walking tour of Lower East Side alleys and sidewalks. Theater 2020 produced a family-friendly version of the originally quite bawdy script for Comedy of Errors in domesticated Brooklyn Heights and Brooklyn Bridge Park featuring adorable puppets.
Off-Off-Broadway performed in storefront windows, in an unpartitioned warehouse, and in a butcher shop. If there was a theme uniting any of these very different shows, it certainly wasn’t tone or content, but the daring confidence to “go there”. Poetic Theater opened their production of Goliath with intimate and personal poetry readings by Iraq War veterans very new to the performing arts scene. Harrison Greenbaum (beloved two-time ceremony host and now IT Awards participant) risked heavily incorporating audience participation in his show What Just Happened? and the venerable members of the Talking Band danced naked to illustrate the incisive socio-political critique of Hot Lunch Apostles.
One of my favorite things about the 2012 season was how much of it was unexpected. There was a lot of exciting staging being done…only sometimes on an actual stage.
I recently met a very early-career director who described her area of interest as “site specific” work. That has got to be the biggest trend I noticed amongst the registered shows this year. The New York independent theater community has largely embraced non-traditional performance spaces, but it also produces shows that are “site specific” in the sense of the wry exclamation “Only in New York!”
Even as Jeff Lewonczyk audaciously suggested we take a few years off from Shakespeare, Off-Off-Broadway companies made equally brave runs at re-imaging the Bard and introducing typically Radio City Christmas Spectacular-bound audiences to smaller-budget theater. Downtown Art brought us a two-installment rock musical mash-up of Romeo & Juliet and Gangs of New York called Bowery Wars with age-appropriate casting for the young lovers sprawling over a walking tour of Lower East Side alleys and sidewalks. Theater 2020 produced a family-friendly version of the originally quite bawdy script for Comedy of Errors in domesticated Brooklyn Heights and Brooklyn Bridge Park featuring adorable puppets.
Off-Off-Broadway performed in storefront windows, in an unpartitioned warehouse, and in a butcher shop. If there was a theme uniting any of these very different shows, it certainly wasn’t tone or content, but the daring confidence to “go there”. Poetic Theater opened their production of Goliath with intimate and personal poetry readings by Iraq War veterans very new to the performing arts scene. Harrison Greenbaum (beloved two-time ceremony host and now IT Awards participant) risked heavily incorporating audience participation in his show What Just Happened? and the venerable members of the Talking Band danced naked to illustrate the incisive socio-political critique of Hot Lunch Apostles.
One of my favorite things about the 2012 season was how much of it was unexpected. There was a lot of exciting staging being done…only sometimes on an actual stage.
Tuesday, November 13, 2012
Trends of OOB
Contributed by Amy Overman
More and more I see theater artists taking the things that excite them in other areas of their life, pulling from film, TV and other media and putting it into their art.
More and more I see theater artists taking the things that excite them in other areas of their life, pulling from film, TV and other media and putting it into their art.
- Monthly shows – Variety shows, burlesque, storytelling, musical reviews, talk shows, plays. Shows coming back at the same time every month, building an audience, bringing together a group of people who come back every few weeks to experience theater. These type of shows are also the epitome of the immediacy of theater, because the artists who make them are constantly creating. One of my personal faves is The Skinny with Peter DeGiglio. There’s a different guest from politics or theater (political theater that is) every month, musical performances and at the end, Peter has to answer questions about current events or get a pie in the face. I love that this could be a web series, but it’s not, it’s a live show. Makes the pie in the face much more enjoyable.
- Scifi & Horror – Science fiction theater was everywhere, most notably in Gideon Production’s Honeycomb Trilogy. Blood & horror –Nose Dive’s gore in The Blood Brother’s present Freaks from the Morgue, zombies attacking in my own Dysfunctional Theatre Company’s Brew of the Dead II: Oktoberflesh, and the titular flying snakes of Everywhere Theater Group’s Flying Snakes in 3D.
- Technology/film/etc – Almost every theater I visit now has a projector. I’ve seen video elements used for something as basic as a static image on the back wall - budget set design! The most haunting and beautiful incorporation I saw of video was in Bride of the Monster by DMTheatrics, Dr. Eric Vornoff (Tom O’Connor) admired the portrait of his dead wife, a black and white video projected life sized on the back wall of the Red Room. Seeing him reach out to her face as the image moved ever so slightly was both moving and chilling. Sound designs are becoming more detailed and layered as CueLab and other programs make shows easier to run. Which leads me to…
- Red Cloud Rising (the Fifth Wall, created by Gyda Arber & Aaron Baker) – This wasn’t a trend because there was nothing else like it, but it’s a production could only happen with the increased use of technology in theater. A show where the play took place on the streets of downtown, the line between actor and audience member blurred and most of the lines of dialogue were delivered via voicemail or text message. The audience was a part of the story, but it a way that was totally organic, not just a request for a suggestion or a single member called out to be pulled onstage. Red Cloud is a prime example of how indietheater is evolving, which for me is one of the most exciting things about being a part of it.
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Amy Overman is the Artistic Director of the Dysfunctional Theatre Company (www.dysfunctionaltheatre.org); her recent work with them includes directing Of Dice & Men as part of the Brick’s Game Play festival, acting in and producing the serialized play Unlicensed, which ran for 8 months at UNDER St. Marks and performing in the horror comedy Brew of the Dead II: Oktoberflesh, also at UNDER St. Marks. Outside of Dysfunctional, Amy has acted, directed and produced all around the indietheatre scene and is a Master Mason of the Brick. Currently she is working on I Shall Forget You Presently, an original piece created from the poems of Edna St. Vincent Millay, which will be presented by Dysfunctional as part of the Tiny Theater Festival at the Brick (www.bricktheater.com).
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