Silk Road Theatre Project

The thing about theatre being a “live” art is that you never really know what’s going to happen.  Most of the time this sense of the unexpected comes from variables in the performance; you can never tell when  lines may be forgotten, entrances may be  missed, or costumes may malfunction.  But sometimes the unexpected comes from the audience – not the actors – and keeps the front of house staff on their toes!

Take, for example, this story from one of last week’s shows.  I was minding my own business in the production office when the stage manager came in, shut the door, and, gesturing toward the lobby, stated, “there’s a baby out there.”

“Yeah?” I replied, missing her point.

“There’s a baby out there that is shortly going to be in the house, watching the show,” she clarified.

Then I got it.  Upon further investigation it turned out that the baby belonged to a patron who had seen several shows in the past, and the mom said she’d received permission “from the artistic director” to bring the child into the performance (We later learned this was untrue.).  The baby went in, and lasted less than one scene before it was causing a distraction for everyone around it, including the actors.  I sent the house manager to pull the child out of the house, assuming that the mother would come with it.  Much to my surprise, a few moments later it was announced on headset that the baby was contained in the box office while mom continued to watch the show!!!  Various courageous souls baby-sat for the rest of the performance.

You can’t really blame a baby for causing trouble at the theatre, though.  The baby didn’t know any better, and its actions were surely not meant as a commentary on the situation of settlers in the West Bank.  Adults’ actions are another story.  Such was the case of the patron who showed up to the show 30 minutes late and still wanted to be seated.  We honored the request at the time, but later had to pull the patron out of the house after the house manager caught her talking on a cell phone inside the house doors (patrons please note: the curtains around the seating block light, not sound).  Other cell phone related incidents from last year have prompted us to include “please do not text message” as part of the curtain speech, which seems to crack the audience up every night.

But by far the most entertaining and most-often quoted incident from the run so far has been the patron who leaned over to the next person and stage whispered so loudly that the tech booth monitor picked it up, “Herschel is the DOG.”  For those of us who heard it, it was all we could do to keep from breaking down laughing.

On April 10th’s Dueling Critics segment on WBEZ’s (NPR) 848 show, critics Kelly Kleiman and Jonathan Abarbanel discuss Curtains. 

http://www.wbez.org/Content.aspx?audioID=33429

At the end of the discussion Kleiman’s ‘Pick of the Week’ is Pangs of the Messiah.

We are thrilled to announce that The American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA) has awarded Yussef El Guindi its 2009 M. Elizabeth Osborn New Play Award for an emerging playwright. The award will be presented April 4 at the Humana Festival of New American Plays in Louisville,Ky.

The award recognizes El Guindi’s play, Our Enemies: Lively Scenes of Love and Combat, which we premiered in March 2008.

For more information, visit www.americantheatrecritics.org.

It’s been a while since the last post and it feels a little disorienting to be back after such a break.  Thinking back on where we’ve been I’m reminded of  that wonderful glossary that helped bring us into the language of the play, the stories from Carol about her favorite thrift stores, Kurt’s model photos, and Rob’s riff on tone – all critical elements being developed to help us feel and see the world that our characters are feeling and seeing.   But, as I knew would be inevitable, the need to create actual representations of the things we were dreaming finally became the priority and we took off to handle tech, previews and opening night.

Here’s a picture of one of the tech tables, computers at the ready.  We had two 6′ers set up – Rob and Mike on one side, Becca, Alex and Michelle on the other, with space in between for Jen, our fearless director, to come up and chat with them, watch and listen.  Dry tech, which coincidentally occurred on a fantastically rainy night, was held at Elephant and Castle, much to the delight of all involved.

One of the best things about everything coming together is the arrival of the show crew.  For a few blissful, chaotic, intense days we have not only all the designers, but all the actors,  backstage hands AND front of house crew running around.  It seemed like every time I opened a door I was walking into someone, like Laura here, who’s hauling shoes from the costume storage to the dressing room.

Then, at the height of intensity, we suddenly realized that it was “no more changes” day – the last chance for making corrections and adjustments to the design before we had to be satisfied and let the actors settle in what we had created.  There was a collective deep breath, held until the curtain fell on Satuday night.  And then we had  a party.

It was a lovely party, well, two parties – the first at our partner restaurant, Trattoria #10 (look on the back of your ticket stub for a 20% discount from them!) , and the second at the home of a friend of the playwright.

And now that the parties are done?  I just got the performance schedule reminder, sent by the stage manager to the cast and crew to keep us on track.  I’m making photocopies for tonight’s Theatre Thursday reception.  There’s a line through for the actors, and an understudy rehearsal, and 2 post-show discussions… basically, no shortage of things to keep us busy and in good spirits and we head into the run.