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This weekend was EMACT Festival weekend. EMACT is the Eastern Massachusetts Association of Community Theatres. So from Friday night to Sunday afternoon I saw LOTS of theatre. I saw eleven shows from the audience, listened to a twelfth from backstage and missed one because I was hyperventilating in the green room.
So thoughts and impressions of the pieces I saw:
Frday night began with an original piece called "Dorothy Parker Revived" which was a mess of "skits one-liners and poems by Dorothy Parker." Some of it was funny, but it did not hang together well, and there was no through-line to carry it off. Several of the actors are fine actors, but this was too broad, too obviously "hey aren't we witty?" to really be entertaining. The set was a backdrop of New York City (which would place this in New Jersey across the river from New York, but I didn't quibble) and several small seating areas - table with chairs, chaise lounge, bar height chair with cocktail table. I gave it a solid D. The direction didn't make sense for some of it, and the only reason it didn't fail outright was due to the efforts of several of the actors.
Up second was a production of a cutting of "Waiting in the Wings" - a Noel Coward play - supposedly British, so there was all sorts of bad accents going around, and it took place at a charity home for elderly actresses. So the stage was awash in women trying to act older than they really are. Only a few of them succeeded. The company that brought this piece did the full version for their regular season, and I am glad I missed out on two hours of that. Because you don't have to try very hard to make Noel Coward funny. And they just couldn't find the funny. C-
We finished the evening with a cutting of "How I Learned to Drive" by Paula Vogel. Now I saw this a few months ago when the group did the whole thing as part of their regular season. It was very good then, and it was even better in this tightened, shorter, just-as-powerful version. I didn't miss the third of it they had to cut away to get it in under the sixty-minute time constraint. A difficult play to watch, the central theme is incest and pedophilia. A+
Session Two: Saturday Afternoon
First up was an original play called "Dinner for Several." I am not sure if it was written as a one-act, or a full length play cut into a one-act (although I suspect it was a full length play and just cut down). It definitely had some problems, but on the whole it was pretty funny. They brought in a "box set" which means the set had walls and doors and was a complete living space, enclosing the area completely. It was the apartment home of Carter and Jim, roommates in their late twenties/early thrities. Carter has made dinner for a prospective girlfriend, Liz, his roommate (Jim) and a girl brought along for the roommate (Celine). Unexpectedly, Carter's ex-girlfriend, Karen, and Liz's ex-boyfriend, Paul, show up. Conversations of love and relationships and cell phones ensue. Celine thinks Jim is closeted (he's not, he's just odd). No one but Celine knows Paul is Liz's ex, and Liz really wants Karen to get back together with Carter, because they obviously love each other. Into it all an Irish grandmother-type who lives in the building enters to give wise advice on love and loving someone for a long time. Entertaining, but hardly amazing theatre with a new perspective, I give it a B.
Next we saw a cutting from "House of Yes" - which was all kinds of bizarre. Can we say strange? Odd? A dysfunctional family to end all dysfunctional families. Yeah. Dealing with love, murder, madness, and (tw)incest. A man returns to the family home with a fiance. His mother and sister do not approve, and his brother wants to diddle the fiance. His sister is insane (taking medication, spent months at an asylum, insane) and believes he belongs to her. Difficult and dark themes throughout, a lot of the directing did not make sense, and a lot of the time I was wondering "what the hell?" C+
Third, was another original piece. It was called "Anatomically Correct" and was a series of very funny unrelated skits written by the gentleman who directed it. He has a keen ear for language, and the way people speak and relate to each other. The lighting was done very well, and was creatively used. The actors were terrific. I give it points off for the pieces chosen having nothing to do whatsoever to each other. B+/A-
Session Three: Saturday Evening
"The Mistress Cycle" was up first. A musical (almost operatic), cut from a longer piece, it was visually stunning. Accompanied by only a piano, the story is about Tess, a modern career woman, who becomes the mistress of a married man, and learns from other great mistresses through time. Ching, a fourteen year old Chinese girl, likely sometime several hundred years ago (I can't remember if they specify her time period) who became a concubine for an elderly man who wanted a son, First Wife and Second Wife had not produced an heir for him. She is sold into it by her impoverished family. Diane de Poitiers (1500s), mistress of King Henri II of France. She was the King's Favorite, and his mistress, even though she was twenty years his senior. Anais Nin, whose works of erotica were shocking for the time she lived in. And Lulu White, a famous New Orleans Madam (turn of the twentieth century). I have some problems with the way the piece plays out. It would be much more interesting, for instance, if the modern woman chooses to break the cycle of becoming "the other woman" and learns from her fore-sisters, instead of choosing the path they had no choice to take. I found an online review of it when it ran for a couple of weeks in 2005 as part of the New York Musical Theatre Festival and the reviewer had many of the same issues with it I had. A solid B effort.
The second offering was a cutting from "A Lesson Before Dying" which could have been wonderful. I felt only the man playing Paul was really committed through out the show, everyone else's performance was uneven. And while I know this took place in Mississippi, I had trouble understanding the actors, almost all of them. You can have a southern drawl *and* enunciate. Diction is your friend. Production wise, there was a lot of issues with the scene changes. For one thing they were unnecessarily long. And the stage crew pulled focus off the actors. C+/B-
Third up was "Work in Progress" - which is not something I am familiar with, but it has been described as "City of Angels, the non-musical version" which seems to be quite accurate. A writer is beset by his creation (a film noir detective/murder mystery). He is confronted by his detective, the female villain, and the detective's trusty sidekick. So it was charming, and funny. But they didn't utilize their set well, and set dressing was just dressing. Might have been better if they had made the space smaller and more intimate. Brought it forward. The lighting was uninspired - and did not use it well. B-
Fourth Session: Sunday Afternoon
"When Shakespeare's Ladies Meet" was the show before ours, so I was backstage trying to keep my stomach in place and not to hyperventilate into fainting. Okay, so I wasn't quite that bad, but I hadn't slept much the night before, and wasn't feeling well. The adjudicators seemed to like it quite a lot. And the costumes were certainly perfect for each character. But other than that, I have no earthly idea.
Our "Varicose Vanities" was well received by the audience (brought my mom to tears). The festival MC told many of us that he had been lost in the desert for three days, and our show was his first gulp of water. A great compliment! Playing to a theatre savvy crowd when you have a show that deals with the theatre is always rewarding. And from soup to nuts, the concept was well executed. I can't judge our show, since I had been so intimately involved, but I think it was a highlight of the festival.
"Godspell" followed us - a rockin' good time. I didn't agree with some of the choices, and I think some of it could have been better conceived and executed, but for pure entertainment value this was pretty good theatre. They cut it a whole lot to get it into the sixty minutes. And it felt a little too preachy with the way they cut it (having only ever seen a full production once many many many years ago). The best bit was John the Baptist baptizing people with purple plastic spray bottles of water. Spritz - you're saved! B+/A-
The last show of the festival was "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged)." I laughed the entire hour. It was brilliant and funny and clever. The ad-libbing was priceless. Apart from some unneeded sloppiness, a terrific show. I wish the set had been more clever, and the "hidden" bits utilized more. The two "stone" seats on the set were hidden storage compartments that were first used nearly halfway through... they could have been used far earlier. The three actors who took on all the roles were exhausted and sweating profusely at the end. It must have seemed like running a marathon with all the back and forth running to and fro, dressing, undressing, stage fighting, etc. Good times! A solid A.
"How I Learned to Drive" swept the top spots - Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director, Best Production. Well deserved! Also got Best Set Design.
We earned nominations but no wins for Actor, actress, and makeup design. Our sound designer was not eligible to win because he was also a festival stage manager.
All in all, an exhausting weekend. I need a weekend to recover! So while I go through the backlog of email and lj posts (hi there, skip-eleventy-billion!) tell me, what did I miss?
So thoughts and impressions of the pieces I saw:
Frday night began with an original piece called "Dorothy Parker Revived" which was a mess of "skits one-liners and poems by Dorothy Parker." Some of it was funny, but it did not hang together well, and there was no through-line to carry it off. Several of the actors are fine actors, but this was too broad, too obviously "hey aren't we witty?" to really be entertaining. The set was a backdrop of New York City (which would place this in New Jersey across the river from New York, but I didn't quibble) and several small seating areas - table with chairs, chaise lounge, bar height chair with cocktail table. I gave it a solid D. The direction didn't make sense for some of it, and the only reason it didn't fail outright was due to the efforts of several of the actors.
Up second was a production of a cutting of "Waiting in the Wings" - a Noel Coward play - supposedly British, so there was all sorts of bad accents going around, and it took place at a charity home for elderly actresses. So the stage was awash in women trying to act older than they really are. Only a few of them succeeded. The company that brought this piece did the full version for their regular season, and I am glad I missed out on two hours of that. Because you don't have to try very hard to make Noel Coward funny. And they just couldn't find the funny. C-
We finished the evening with a cutting of "How I Learned to Drive" by Paula Vogel. Now I saw this a few months ago when the group did the whole thing as part of their regular season. It was very good then, and it was even better in this tightened, shorter, just-as-powerful version. I didn't miss the third of it they had to cut away to get it in under the sixty-minute time constraint. A difficult play to watch, the central theme is incest and pedophilia. A+
Session Two: Saturday Afternoon
First up was an original play called "Dinner for Several." I am not sure if it was written as a one-act, or a full length play cut into a one-act (although I suspect it was a full length play and just cut down). It definitely had some problems, but on the whole it was pretty funny. They brought in a "box set" which means the set had walls and doors and was a complete living space, enclosing the area completely. It was the apartment home of Carter and Jim, roommates in their late twenties/early thrities. Carter has made dinner for a prospective girlfriend, Liz, his roommate (Jim) and a girl brought along for the roommate (Celine). Unexpectedly, Carter's ex-girlfriend, Karen, and Liz's ex-boyfriend, Paul, show up. Conversations of love and relationships and cell phones ensue. Celine thinks Jim is closeted (he's not, he's just odd). No one but Celine knows Paul is Liz's ex, and Liz really wants Karen to get back together with Carter, because they obviously love each other. Into it all an Irish grandmother-type who lives in the building enters to give wise advice on love and loving someone for a long time. Entertaining, but hardly amazing theatre with a new perspective, I give it a B.
Next we saw a cutting from "House of Yes" - which was all kinds of bizarre. Can we say strange? Odd? A dysfunctional family to end all dysfunctional families. Yeah. Dealing with love, murder, madness, and (tw)incest. A man returns to the family home with a fiance. His mother and sister do not approve, and his brother wants to diddle the fiance. His sister is insane (taking medication, spent months at an asylum, insane) and believes he belongs to her. Difficult and dark themes throughout, a lot of the directing did not make sense, and a lot of the time I was wondering "what the hell?" C+
Third, was another original piece. It was called "Anatomically Correct" and was a series of very funny unrelated skits written by the gentleman who directed it. He has a keen ear for language, and the way people speak and relate to each other. The lighting was done very well, and was creatively used. The actors were terrific. I give it points off for the pieces chosen having nothing to do whatsoever to each other. B+/A-
Session Three: Saturday Evening
"The Mistress Cycle" was up first. A musical (almost operatic), cut from a longer piece, it was visually stunning. Accompanied by only a piano, the story is about Tess, a modern career woman, who becomes the mistress of a married man, and learns from other great mistresses through time. Ching, a fourteen year old Chinese girl, likely sometime several hundred years ago (I can't remember if they specify her time period) who became a concubine for an elderly man who wanted a son, First Wife and Second Wife had not produced an heir for him. She is sold into it by her impoverished family. Diane de Poitiers (1500s), mistress of King Henri II of France. She was the King's Favorite, and his mistress, even though she was twenty years his senior. Anais Nin, whose works of erotica were shocking for the time she lived in. And Lulu White, a famous New Orleans Madam (turn of the twentieth century). I have some problems with the way the piece plays out. It would be much more interesting, for instance, if the modern woman chooses to break the cycle of becoming "the other woman" and learns from her fore-sisters, instead of choosing the path they had no choice to take. I found an online review of it when it ran for a couple of weeks in 2005 as part of the New York Musical Theatre Festival and the reviewer had many of the same issues with it I had. A solid B effort.
The second offering was a cutting from "A Lesson Before Dying" which could have been wonderful. I felt only the man playing Paul was really committed through out the show, everyone else's performance was uneven. And while I know this took place in Mississippi, I had trouble understanding the actors, almost all of them. You can have a southern drawl *and* enunciate. Diction is your friend. Production wise, there was a lot of issues with the scene changes. For one thing they were unnecessarily long. And the stage crew pulled focus off the actors. C+/B-
Third up was "Work in Progress" - which is not something I am familiar with, but it has been described as "City of Angels, the non-musical version" which seems to be quite accurate. A writer is beset by his creation (a film noir detective/murder mystery). He is confronted by his detective, the female villain, and the detective's trusty sidekick. So it was charming, and funny. But they didn't utilize their set well, and set dressing was just dressing. Might have been better if they had made the space smaller and more intimate. Brought it forward. The lighting was uninspired - and did not use it well. B-
Fourth Session: Sunday Afternoon
"When Shakespeare's Ladies Meet" was the show before ours, so I was backstage trying to keep my stomach in place and not to hyperventilate into fainting. Okay, so I wasn't quite that bad, but I hadn't slept much the night before, and wasn't feeling well. The adjudicators seemed to like it quite a lot. And the costumes were certainly perfect for each character. But other than that, I have no earthly idea.
Our "Varicose Vanities" was well received by the audience (brought my mom to tears). The festival MC told many of us that he had been lost in the desert for three days, and our show was his first gulp of water. A great compliment! Playing to a theatre savvy crowd when you have a show that deals with the theatre is always rewarding. And from soup to nuts, the concept was well executed. I can't judge our show, since I had been so intimately involved, but I think it was a highlight of the festival.
"Godspell" followed us - a rockin' good time. I didn't agree with some of the choices, and I think some of it could have been better conceived and executed, but for pure entertainment value this was pretty good theatre. They cut it a whole lot to get it into the sixty minutes. And it felt a little too preachy with the way they cut it (having only ever seen a full production once many many many years ago). The best bit was John the Baptist baptizing people with purple plastic spray bottles of water. Spritz - you're saved! B+/A-
The last show of the festival was "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged)." I laughed the entire hour. It was brilliant and funny and clever. The ad-libbing was priceless. Apart from some unneeded sloppiness, a terrific show. I wish the set had been more clever, and the "hidden" bits utilized more. The two "stone" seats on the set were hidden storage compartments that were first used nearly halfway through... they could have been used far earlier. The three actors who took on all the roles were exhausted and sweating profusely at the end. It must have seemed like running a marathon with all the back and forth running to and fro, dressing, undressing, stage fighting, etc. Good times! A solid A.
"How I Learned to Drive" swept the top spots - Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director, Best Production. Well deserved! Also got Best Set Design.
We earned nominations but no wins for Actor, actress, and makeup design. Our sound designer was not eligible to win because he was also a festival stage manager.
All in all, an exhausting weekend. I need a weekend to recover! So while I go through the backlog of email and lj posts (hi there, skip-eleventy-billion!) tell me, what did I miss?
