New York Fringe Festival...I'm all spermed out...

Hello all, this will be my final blog entry for my internship Spermalot: The Musical. It has been a decently long road this summer, full of new experiences, new friends, new contacts, some ups and downs, and great experiences all together. New York was a great experience all around. Two hundred and one shows were chosen to perform at the New York Fringe Festival this year, so it was quite an honor for us to perform there. One of the downers to the trip was that our show was somewhat of an underdog in the festival. It is always easy to get the word out about your show when the festival is local for your production. So basically, it was kind of hard to get word out and around about our show. We did as much as we could, what with handing out flyers and verbally intriguing local New York residents.

There was one thing that got me a little confused during this festival. I kind of went into this festival blind folded, not knowing what to expect and thinking that since it was New York that most of the shows would be amazingly done. Ironically there were multiple shows that were either horribly written, the acting was not up to par, or a combination of both. One show (I'll be nice and not give the title) was basically a softcore porn; i.e. they they had full frontal nudity, softcore sex scenes, etc. Hell, they even put plastic on the floor at one point in the play, spread baby oil all around, and then asked if any audience members would care to come up on stage and join them. The catch was that any audience member who decided to take a part in this had to be fully nude, just as they were (you can't make this stuff up folks). Sadly no audience members joined them, at least during the show I saw. Now this may sound fun to some, but the show was basically like a train wreck in the fact of it was so bad you couldn't look away. Now I'm telling you all this because this particular show had multiple sold out performances. So hey, I guess sex really does sell. The group I was with were not the only ones with this opinion, considering more than half the audience left at intermission.

Something else that was kind of off was the fact that for most of our performances there always seemed to be someone in the audience taking notes. Now this is very normal because most of the time the people taking notes would usually go home and write a review of your play/musical saying whether or not they enjoyed it. The thing was that we ended up only getting one or two reviews and they were towards the end of our time in New York. Oh well i guess.

There were six of us that ended up staying in the Brooklyn/Bronx area for the week. Unfortunately the venue we performed at was over in the Manhattan area which ended up being something like a little less than an hour to get there using the subway. This was our main source of transportation throughout the entire week. We had two SUV's, but please believe me when I say that you never want to get into rush hour traffic in New York. It seems as though, overall, New York is basically one gigantic tourist attraction. One must keep this in mind if ever thinking of moving to such a place.

I really enjoyed the overall New York experience because it help me realize what it would feel like if I ever decided to move out to there to pursue any dreams I may or may not have. In conclusion, I would say that I had a pretty wonderful summer doing this show. Starting off my first fringe festival experience in Minnesota and ending in New York was great. I had a few doubts after getting a part in the musical because it was actually my first musical that I had ever been apart of. I am glad to say I was apart of it. Thank you Comedy Co-Operative and Theatre...for a Change for allowing me to be apart of this production. I have nothing but helpful experiences and great memories to take out of this internship.

Twelfth Night Auditions

ISU Theatre will be holding auditions for TWELFTH NIGHT by William Shakespeare Aug. 31st and Sep. 1st.
Here is all the vital info:
TWELFTH NIGHT, OR WHAT YOU WILL
By William Shakespeare
Directed by Adam Heffernan
Seeking 10 men, 5 women (also seeking 2 Musicians)
Auditions are Aug. 31 & Sept. 1,
Callbacks September 26pm at Fisher Theatre
Rehearsals begin October 5th,
Performances Dec 4-13

Sign-up for an audition slot in The Theatre Office, Pearson, 2130.
Audition scenes & scripts will be available.
You will have two options for auditioning:
1. Prepare a classical monologue of your own choosing.
2. Prepare a scene from the play (sides available in the office).
A reader will be available for those auditioning solo.

My best advice to you is to read and reread the play. And then read it again.
It's quite funny and brilliant.
online versions here: http://etext.virginia.edu/shakespeare

Musicians should contact me directly. I'm looking for a cellist and a violinist
proficiency on the piano is a plus.

Questions? Contact Adam Heffernan via E-Mail at adamheff@iastate.edu

Closing the season with Don Giovanni

http://brkbrg.blogspot.com/

Minnesota Fringe Festival

Hello all, the past two weekends we performed our Spermalot the Musical at the Minnesota Fringe Festival (Thursday - Saturday). This was actually my first fringe festival experience that I have ever been apart of. For those of you who have never been to or been apart of a "fringe festival," it basically involves tons of originally shows performed at various performance venues. The festival is basically a competition between shows to see who can get the most audience members, but also is a great chance to see some decently done shows by some pretty good actors (and of course vise versa).

Sadly our show was not the "top" show for our particular venue. But having said that, I still had a great time seeing shows, meeting new people, learning some new things about how a fringe festival works, etc. I am still taking pride in the fact that most of the people who came to see our show enjoyed it greatly. Of course there were those who may not have enjoyed the show to much, may have not understood some sexual jokes, or were just not as open minded as others. And to those people I wish to say one thing: "the name of our show is Spermalot: The Musical. If you are the type of person who doesn't enjoy sexual humor and/or you are not open minded, what did you think our musical was about? The name kind of says it all."

We will be leaving this Wednesday to head to the New York Fringe Festival. Although the fact of performing in New York has made me very, very happy and hella excited, getting there will be a bitch. We will be driving there. FUN!!! (not really). But hey, it's definitely worth it. Who knows, maybe it'll be such a great time that I won't come back to Iowa. Please stay tuned for the next blog and I guess we'll see...

The Return!

Hey all,

I've returned from Philadelphia to Ames in one piece. I put my final couple of blogs up at my site http://lmallenisu.blogspot.com

I learned a lot and it was a blast! I hope everyone else's summer was just as special! :) See you all when classes start (or hopefully before then)!

-Lindsay Allen

Wrapping Things Up

I'm on the last of my show's 9-week run, then after a few days of setup for the Fame! tour I will be heading back to Ames for classes! Anyhow, last blog post of the summer:

http://funometer.blogspot.com

See you all soon!

"What Time Is It?! Time to Blog..."

It has been quite a while since I blogged about my Performance Internship at The Des Moines Playhouse doing "Disney's High School Musical 2." We are coming to a close of our 20 show run this afternoon with a 2 o'clock matinee and it has been a truly interesting and fun experience.

Doing a run of twenty shows has given me the chance to build stamina and knowledge of myself as a performer. I could now do the show in my sleep, but it still hasn't lost its fun to me and this is a nice feeling considering I will be doing even more shows when I make it into musicals on Broadway. Every performance has been a new learning experience of trying to make each line as real as possible... Considering the script for the show is...interestingly cheesy... it has proven even more difficult than I expected, but needless to say, I have made it this far and done a great job with it in the process. The show has been a lot of fun, and signing autographs for little kids after the show has been one of the best parts, because they adore the show and the characters so much because of the commercialism behind it that they think that I am just as cool, if not cooler (Which I am) than the guy in the movie :)

By doing this show I was given the opportunity to work with several people from different schools and programs, and I feel that it has made me grow more as a professional. It is nice to do a show with people that you don't go to school with so you can get a better look at what you might potentially be facing when you get out into the real world after school. I have enjoyed working with these other performers and crew people but I miss my ISU Theatre family and can't wait to get back to work for a killer 09'-10' Season.

I hope that everyone is enjoying their summer internships having "Fun in the Sun" and all that jazz. I cannot wait to see all of you very soon. Take care =D

Michael Heath (Chad)

Internship in the Northwoods!!!

Hello All! I figured it was about time that I wrote something here about my internship experience with Northern Lights Playhouse in Hazelhurst, WI. I was contracted to act in four shows for their rolling repertory summer season, and one show at the open of their fall season. It has been a tremendous learning experience being here!

My contract required me to be off book for all five shows upon my arrival here on May 21, which became a clear neccessity when we opened our first show, the Secret Garden, five days later! But, in addition to just staging the actors in the show, those five days were also dedicated to building the set and costuming the show! The downside of this is that there is no tech crew here. The actors (there are 8 of us, plus one technical director, and a stage manager) are responsible for ALL aspects of putting up the shows. Within our first 12 days here we had opened two shows, built the sets for three shows, and costumed five shows. All this was possible due to the many many long hours spent at the theatre. A minimum of 9 am to 11 pm each day, seven days a week. This was the norm for the first six weeks of my time here. We were given ONE day off in that time. Since those first six weeks, we have still stayed busy, doing at least one (sometimes two) shows every day.

I should also mention that in addition to not having a tech crew, we also do not have a fly system, a budget (I won't go into specifics, but think less than three digits alotted per show), a sound board (well, we had one for the first two months, but then it broke), or any form of heat (the average temp those first few weeks was 55 degrees). They have provided us with housing, which includes one shower for 8 people, and approximately 5 minutes worth of hot water per day. :) Our company catch phrase? -"Not in the budget"

So, now that I've given you all the doom and gloom for the season I should mention some of the great aspects of this place! Like I said, in addition to acting in 5 shows I now have hands-on experience in set construction, costuming, box-office management/ticket sales, and children's theatre. The other company members are truly wonderful people! Most of them are fairly recent college grads, and two are still in school. And, we are local celebrities! Well, celebrities may be an overstatement, but the townspeople sure like to talk about us!

One of the most interesting and fun things I did this summer was volunteer to be the coordinator for the theatre's "Aurora Borealis Children's Theatre Camp". As coordinator I created different units of study for the campers and then delegated the other actors to teach the units based on their strengths. For example, one of the actors has focused most of her career on movement-based physical theatre, so she taught a unit on character movement and stage combat. The major units were: musical theatre, stage combat, dance, improv, and voice/speech. We also did smaller units on light/sound design, costumes, and stage make-up. In addition to overseeing the units I came up with crafts for the children including making paper plate masks, and creating "gobo's" with flashlights, colored tissue paper, and posterboard. The kids came for three hours a day for two weeks, and at the end of the two weeks we had a showcase for their family and friends to show what they had learned! It was a great learning experience for everyone involved!

Currently, we are closing our rotating repertory season next week, and will open the fall season with "Getting Mama Married" on August 18th. I am in rehearsals for that show, and will have fulfilled my contract on August 30 after running "Getting Mama Married" for two weeks.

So that is just a brief overview of the things I've been doing this summer! I have included the link to our show schedule to give you all a better idea of what the "rotating repertory" schedule is like. Not listed on the schedule is a boat show that we have done every Friday this summer. I will be sure to post more details about individual shows/experiences as I have more time to reflect on them in this last month! Also, we should be getting production photos posted so I can share those too!

Here's the link to the show schedule!
http://nl-playhouse.com/Northern_Lights_Playhouse/Current_Schedule.html

The Rape of Lucretia

http://brkbrg.blogspot.com/