Well Dreamers, I am writing this post on returning from the Sunday bump out following the show's 4 night run. It was fantastic to see the team hard at work taking scenery apart and lugging everything out to storage. I wasn't much help, as my legs are feeling the strain of dancing these last 4 nights, and I know now why I really didn't want to do any acting in this show, but just be seated and play guitar and trumpet.
I would like to publicly acknowledge the contribution to the show's future by everyone involved in this first, workshop production. Thankyou for your patience and perseverance, and for the kind and generous gifts! You can all be rightly proud in helping to prove that original musical theatre can be created and performed in this country, and that musicals are an international genre, and not exclusively American or British. CTC had the courage to stage this new work, when no other company would even consider it. And its worthwhile to note too that every show was sold out!
Lessons learned were too many to number, but the stand -out one is this: the value of commitment. It wasn't very long ago that a community theatre could cast a show, and be fairly confident that those cast would actually stay with the show to the end. Since the introduction of social media, it seems obvious to me that that is no longer the case. Now I wouldn't expect all auditionees to actually show up as they said they would, but once somebody has been cast, and used rehearsal time being trained in song and dance and script for weeks and then just leave the production? Well that is a phenomenon that must not, ( and in the interests of community theatre's survival), cannot be allowed to become the norm. In future I would definitely do more investigation into an auditionee's online activities and research their biography for hints of unreliability and deception. As Tarantino wrote: There is a huge difference between being a character and having character. Give me a cast with perseverance and a sense of commitment to see tasks through, over anything else! Here I leave you with this last full cast picture, taken just minutes before opening night. I commend them for their character:
I would like to publicly acknowledge the contribution to the show's future by everyone involved in this first, workshop production. Thankyou for your patience and perseverance, and for the kind and generous gifts! You can all be rightly proud in helping to prove that original musical theatre can be created and performed in this country, and that musicals are an international genre, and not exclusively American or British. CTC had the courage to stage this new work, when no other company would even consider it. And its worthwhile to note too that every show was sold out!
Lessons learned were too many to number, but the stand -out one is this: the value of commitment. It wasn't very long ago that a community theatre could cast a show, and be fairly confident that those cast would actually stay with the show to the end. Since the introduction of social media, it seems obvious to me that that is no longer the case. Now I wouldn't expect all auditionees to actually show up as they said they would, but once somebody has been cast, and used rehearsal time being trained in song and dance and script for weeks and then just leave the production? Well that is a phenomenon that must not, ( and in the interests of community theatre's survival), cannot be allowed to become the norm. In future I would definitely do more investigation into an auditionee's online activities and research their biography for hints of unreliability and deception. As Tarantino wrote: There is a huge difference between being a character and having character. Give me a cast with perseverance and a sense of commitment to see tasks through, over anything else! Here I leave you with this last full cast picture, taken just minutes before opening night. I commend them for their character: