1. Ellie expects PAC Rats tshirts and stuff to be ready by the end of next week or the week after. I didn't give Besse's a deadline. Lots of people still owe, you can cough up the cash now or when the shirts come in.
Update: Shirts are done and are here. Come and get 'em. A bit of a snafu with 3 shirts, but they will fix. Need time to go fetch. There hasn't been any.
2. Scott's dad finally received the purchase order for the cash register. Dawn and Scott will bring it when it's convenient for them. YAY!
3. Letters from Vern went out to those that weren't cast in Romantic Comedy. To those of you who will be casting for the upcoming season: Don't let this happen to you. Phone calls must be made within 24 of your casting decisions. At auditions, let each person know when they can expect to hear either way and stick to it. Directors must make the "sorry kid" calls. The stagemanager can make the happy calls if you need the help.
4. The royalty rights for The Haunting have been secured and copies of the script are in Ellie's possession. Video taping rights must be pursued separately. If Chuck wants to have the show videotaped by the TV Geeks, you'll have to write the royalty house and ask for permission.
5. Materials for the two summer workshops Vern wants to teach are in the office of community education and have been approved. The schedule for "Speech for Actors" will be Tuesday and Thursday nights from 6 to 9pm and will be held in a regular classroom. Tech Speaking will be Monday and Wednesdays. We still need to find out what the situation with the lights will be before we can set that in stone. Both classes are scheduled to begin sometime in June.
6. We cannot secure the royalty rights for The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged). Apparently some professional company begins an open ended run this month. On to Plan Two: a Michele Vacca script. When I find the box I hid all the Michele scripts in, I will call her and ask for a recommendation for what would work best for an out of doors performance.
Update: There are 6 scripts Ellie has under consideration. They are: Princess and the Pea (3 men, 8 women), Adventures of Tom Sawyer (10 men, 4 women), Sleeping Beauty (5 men, 6 women), Alice In Wonderland (10 men, 7 women), Jack in the Beanstalk (3 men, 4 women, 2 "uinisex"), Excalibur; The Adventures of Young King Arthur (5 men, 3 women). Click here for further information about Ellie's plans for the kiddie show season.
7. The Ancestor was performed on February 25 at 10:30am and 7pm to fairly full houses. Congrats to the cast and crew. Megan and Bethany were lights and sound, Sarah was stagemanagement. We had a few snafus, but overall the show went pretty well.
New Business:
0. The college sponsored the SICA Art Festival, which featured artwork from high school students from our district. Their works have been on display in the various galleries in the art department. Today was the Big Deal Day and we had a couple hundred kids running around the building. Awarded "Best of School" for Thornwood High School was none other than Jennifer Zurawicz. Catcalls, whoops and hollering is appropriate at this time.
1. Sunday is the POPs concert which features Bill DeYoung playing "Rhapsody in Blue" and Barry "The Shill" Zurawicz as the emcee and narrator. Aside from coming to hear Barry narrate and Bill play, we need some help with the popcorn sales for the music kids. I need some suckers to come and show them how this is done. If anyone can help, the concert starts at 4pm. We'll only sell during intermission. I could also use another pair of hands to help schlep risers around during intermission. The show is being videotaped, so the TV Geeks will be on hand. Lots of fun, you guys. Bruce might come, too. Any opportunity to schmooze El Presidente is a good one.
Update: The concert went off pretty well, although Andy said they played some tunes better at their Thursday rehearsal. We had about 200 people in the audience, including Dr. Bruce Aldrich, college prez, who snuck in just seconds after the downbeat. We didn't see him, and he didn't want to "bother us" because we were busy at intermission. Special thanks to Megan Zurawicz for playing stagemanager and piano schlepper, Barry Z for his dulcet narrator tones. And a very, very special thanks to Joey Tassin, Min Rubbens, Lin Andre, Kelly Mitchell and Jen Zurawicz for playing popcorn princesses. None of the student band kids showed up to do the popcorn, and Ellie has expressed her "dissatisfaction" to Andy about this. hehe
2. We need to revise some Guerilla Theatre scenes in the next couple of weeks and get into the classrooms to recruit more Rats. We need to incorporate our new suckers into these scenes. Additionally, Megan was inspired to write not one, not two but THREE monologues from the Indian perspective. Jerry Lewis, the Cultural Diversity Manager also wrote a monologue dealing with the meaning of "politically correct." Wonderful stuff, kids. If Amy is not here, could someone PLEASE call her and ask her what she can do to help organize this?
Update: Amy can't play as she is busily repainting her new house to prepare for an Easter move in. Eric Atkinson has been suckered into coordinating this mini-project as a "warm-up" for his directorial debut in November. He has all the GT scripts (including the new pieces) and should be contacting people in the coming weeks to check on schedules and availability.
3. Duckie and Lydia are going to need some help with lights for Romantic Comedy and will tell you their schedule.
4. Eric has chosen his play! It's called Murder is a Game and it's written by Fred Carmichael. See the synopsis for more info.
5. We have most of the schedule set for The Haunting. Rea from the conference center is working on room schedules and should have that info by the end of the semester. The Haunting will rehearse in classrooms Monday and Wednesday and the Band Room on Fridays until about 2-3 weeks before opening. Chuck has the production meetings fairly well setup.
6. We need to have ONE audition date set for both shows since they will rehearse concurrently. Eric and Ellie need to find time to go through his rehearsal schedule.
7. Open forum / free for all. Ideas were solicited for a fun group thing to do over the summer (aside from the kiddie show). The annual trip to the Bristol Renaissance Faire is a gimme. Other options are:
-- A trip to see Spoon River Anthology at the Chicago Heights Drama Group
-- Taste of Chicago on July 3 to eat like pigs and see the fireworks
-- Venetian Night
-- Seeing plays at DePaul, Columbia or some of the other Off Loop theatres. Places like the Schubert are terrifically expensive (and besides, that's not real theatre).
-- Comedy Clubs (TNT in Lansing sucks, try Second City).
8. Next meeting is Friday, April 9th at 7pm either in PAC lobby or in band room.
Meeting was adjourned at 8:10pm
Minutes are a rehash of the agenda, which was prepared by Ellie.
