Friday, July 30, 2010

This weekend at SPT: Secret in the Wings!

It's the 5th of 9 weekends of free theater in a row on the shores of Green Lake! This weekend, as an added bonus, we've got free improv - and free ice cream!

This weekend, our High School Ensemble presents Secret in the Wings!

Friday (tonight!) 7/30 - 7pm (followed by Ka-Chick Improv! at 9pm)
Saturday 7/31 - 2pm and 7pm

All shows are FREE! Donations to the scholarship fund are gratefully accepted. Tickets are first-come, first-served in person at the theater beginning 30 minutes before showtime.

But wait! There's more! This Saturday afternoon, after the 2pm performance of Secret in the Wings, Peaks Frozen Custard is sponsoring a free ice cream social! Come build community, enjoy delicious frozen custard, and support the Seattle Public Theater youth program! The ice cream is free, but any donations you give will go directly to support the youth program.

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Spotlight On: Ka-Chick Improv!

This week, we are spotlighting a special event happening this Friday night after the 7pm performance of Secret in the Wings – Ka-Chick Improv! Ka-Chick is a group of high school students (mostly participants in the SPT youth program) who come together every summer to provide free improv entertainment. Their first show of 2010 is this Friday at 9pm at the Bathhouse.

Spearheaded by student Asher Jordan, the group was started in 2009. “I was going to be the captain of my high school improv team, and basically I wanted a chance to practice beforehand,” says Jordan. He organized the group, scheduled rehearsals (90 minutes twice a week), and asked SPT for a handful of late-night performance slots at the Bathhouse. The group had a wildly successful debut in the summer of 2009, and is back again for more.

Improv, for the uninitiated, is improvised theater – the actors make it up on the spot! Using suggestions from the audience, and a variety of games or story frameworks, improv actors create scenes and characters from scratch. Because of that, no two shows are the same – so don’t miss this one, because you’ll never get a chance to see it again!

Catch Ka-Chick impro this Friday, July 30th at 9pm – directly following the 7pm performance of Secret in the Wings. Ka-Chick’s improv shows are completely FREE!

Friday, July 23, 2010

This weekend at SPT: Secret in the Wings!

It's the 4th of 9 weekends of free theater in a row on the shores of Green Lake!

This weekend, our High School Ensemble presents Secret in the Wings!

Friday (tonight!) 7/23 - Opening Night - 7pm
Saturday 7/17 - 7pm
Sunday 7/18 - 2pm

All shows are FREE! Donations to the scholarship fund are gratefully accepted. Tickets are first-come, first-served in person at the theater beginning 30 minutes before showtime.

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Spotlight On: Secret in the Wings

For the next two weekends, Seattle Public Theater’s High School Ensemble will be presenting Mary Zimmerman’s Secret in the Wings. This is not the first piece by Zimmerman, a member of Chicago’s Lookingglass Theatre Company, that SPT’s Youth Program has produced. The high school ensemble has previously tackled her adaptation of Arabian Nights, and her Tony Award-winning version of Metamorphoses. But neither of those proved as complex a challenge as Secret in the Wings has given our students this summer. Erica Hansen, student stage manager for the show, calls it crazy. “There’s too much stuff! But we have an awesome team, and a million props people, so we’re having fun with it.”

Why is the show so complicated? You’ll have to wait and see. The play intertwines a number of different fairy tales, with a definite edge, and both actors and audience get “completely swept up” into the fantasy world. Noelle McCabe, an actor in the show, describes Secret’s ensemble nature: “There are several individual stories, but you see the same actors in every story, and the audience feels a part of it too. There aren’t really any leads, and we’re all playing a bunch of different parts.” The show also incorporates significant amounts of music, some from the original Chicago production, so much so that cast members describe it as “almost half a musical,” a departure from the high school ensemble’s typical shows.

Despite its complexity, Aviva Wynn, who is acting in the show, says that the cast “feels very prepared.” She adds that, “it feels like this rehearsal process has flown by, even though it’s a hard show to do.” Aviva was one of the students that pushed for this show to be done, partially because she was not allowed to see Seattle Repertory Theater’s 2005 production. Her parents brought home a poster, and she has wanted to do the show ever since.

Now she has gotten her chance, and is loving every minute of it. Aviva says that she feels very close to her castmates in this show, in part because “there are a lot of shared lines, so we need to feel connected.” Noelle concurs, saying “I feel closer to the new people in the cast than I ever have, because we all have to rely on each other to make sure we get to where we need to be, in the right costume, with the right props.”

Secret in the Wings plays for two weekends, July 23rd-31st. More information at www.seattlepublictheater.org.

Friday, July 16, 2010

This weekend at SPT: The Little Big Broadcast!

We're back again! It's the 3rd of 9 weekends of free theater in a row on the shores of Green Lake!

This weekend, our Middle School Ensemble presents The Little Big Broadcast!

Friday (tonight!) 7/16 - Opening Night - 7pm
Saturday 7/17 - 2pm and 7pm
Sunday 7/18 - Closing - 2pm

All shows are FREE! Donations to the scholarship fund are gratefully accepted. Tickets are first-come, first-served in person at the theater beginning 30 minutes before showtime.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Spotlight On: The Little Big Broadcast

Now that our SPT seniors have closed Fuddy Meers and fully graduated from our Youth Drama Program, the theater is completely turned over to the rest of the Youth Program participants, for the third week of free theater on Greenlake.

This week's show is The Little Big Broadcast, a collection of classic radio broadcasts such as the comedy routine Who's on first?, Zorro Rides Again, and The Shadow Knows, among other favorites. Directed by SPT regular Carmel Baird, these broadcasts are brought to life by our ensemble of 9-13 year olds.

For this week's Spotlight feature, SPT Marketing Intern Katie Dolan talked to several of the students involved:


After getting some feedback from the actors involved in the show, it sounds like the creative process for this show has been a challenging and enjoyable one. One actress is playing a total of four roles including Jughead from Archie Andrews, Gerald from The Strange Doctor Weird, Tom (Mr. Moonlight) from Mrs. Moonlight, and Costello from Who's on First? She noted that Costello was her favorite role to play. She added, “This is my first year at the Seattle Public Theater but, I hope to keep being in it.”

Many actors in the play must transform to portray very different kinds of characters. One actress, also playing four roles, remarked that one of the challenges with the show is “changing your voice to make the feelings more apparent and entertaining.”

Several actors expressed that their favorite part of the show is the romance broadcast entitled, “Mrs. Moonlight.” Casey Bouldin, stage manager for the show, explained to me that, “Mrs. Moonlight is about a love that transcends time (literally).” In this broadcast Sarah Moonlight is given a "magic" necklace, which grants her wish to not grow older. She then runs away from her husband and infant child, and the rest of the story is about her returning to her family after 17 years, and then again 30 years after that.

The actors involved relayed to me that rehearsals have been productive and entertaining. One actress declared, “Rehearsals have been very fun and very straightforward, I definitely think the show will come together great and be a big hit!”



To come watch and listen to this upcoming big hit, join us at the Bathhouse Theater this weekend!

Friday, July 9, 2010

This weekend at SPT: Fuddy Meers!

This summer, we've got 9 weekends of free theater in a row on the shores of Green Lake! Here comes week 2!

This weekend, our Senior Ensemble closes David Lindsay-Abaire's Fuddy Meers. Don't miss their final performances with the SPT youth program!

Friday 7/9 - 7pm
Saturday 7/10 - 2pm and 7pm

All shows are FREE! Donations to the scholarship fund are gratefully accepted. Tickets are first-come, first-served in person at the theater beginning 30 minutes before showtime.

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Spotlight On: Teaching Artists

The youth program here at Seattle Public Theater is nothing if not extensive. It runs year-round, with camps for young children, school residencies, acting workshops for all ages, and full productions for our middle school and high school students. And it explodes during the summer, when we have 10 straight weeks of youth theatre, morning until night, including three middle school productions, two high school productions, and our annual Senior Show!

None of this would be possible without our legion of talented and committed teaching artists. Led by Artistic and Education Director Shana Bestock, Seattle Public Theater has a team of some of the best teaching artists in the Seattle area. For this week’s Spotlight feature, we interviewed Kaya Wynn, one of our newest teaching artists and an alumni of the youth program. Here are some excerpts from that interview.

Backstage at SPT: How did you get started in acting?
Kaya: When I was really little my sister and I used to put on plays for my parents, but my real reason for wanting to act comes from my grandmother, Peggy Webber. She started acting when she was very young. While she is primarily a voice actress, she has also been in films and on the stage. When I was growing up I would listen to the radio plays she both acted in and produced and my mom would tell my sisters and me stories about the different plays she my grandmother was in. I started doing drama camps when I was very little, and musicals in elementary and middle school. In 8th grade, I did my first show at SPT, All in the Timing, and I’ve been here ever since.

Backstage: How did you get started as a teaching artist?
Kaya: One summer, I was performing in Midsummer Night’s Dream with the youth program. I babysat the 6-year old playing the Changeling Child. Shana suggested that I assist teaching artists with camps,- During my senior year, she asked me to do some short workshops at Seattle Children’s Museum. I loved leading my own classes so much that I asked to teach my own camp. I started out with two, taught three last year, and am now teaching five this summer.


Backstage: Is being a teaching artist your primary career path?
Kaya: I will be attending New York University starting this fall to study Educational Theatre. I have come to appreciate how little theater and the arts are recognized in schools, which is incredibly unfortunate. Children are losing their imaginations because they are being pushed to sit at a desk, and to get ready to for the next step in their education. Many kids don’t realize that learning can be fun and that they don’t need to leave their creativity at the door when they enter a school. My dream is to found my own school where the arts and education go hand-in-hand. I always want to teach.

Backstage: What is one of your favorite memories of teaching at SPT?
Kaya: One aspect of my camps that I am very proud of is the script that I write with my students. We take the stories we’re reading and we come up with a story and characters that they want to play. That evening I write the kids a script using all of their ideas and characters. One little girl loved this experience so much that she has started writing her own plays.

Thanks Kaya! And thank you to all of our brilliant teaching artists. We couldn’t do it without you!

Friday, July 2, 2010

This weekend at SPT: Fuddy Meers!

The youth program has taken over the theater for the summer, and our first performances are already here.

It's the first of 9 weekends of free theater in a row on the shores of Green Lake!

This weekend, our Senior Ensemble presents David Lindsay-Abaire's Fuddy Meers!

Friday (tonight!) 7/2 - Opening Night - 7pm
Saturday 7/3 - 7pm
Sunday 7/4 - 2pm

All shows are FREE! Donations to the scholarship fund are gratefully accepted. Tickets are first-come, first-served in person at the theater beginning 30 minutes before showtime.