A blog on theater (and other stuff) from the fine folks at Apple Core Theater Company
Long time, no see!
Look at you! You look great. Have you lost weight? I love what you’ve done with your hair.
Seriously. It’s so good to see you.
I know. I know. We haven’t posted in a bit.
Because we’re bums. Like these guys.
But real quick, here’s an update.
We concluded our successful run of Mel Nieves’ By the Dawn’s Early Light last August, and we were floored by the generosity and kindness of our friends. You see, it wasn’t enough that we raised over $750 during the run for the Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation — that would have been amazing enough.
But in addition, we received the very bad news that our last weekend would be cut short by Hurricane Irene. Because the public transportation was shut down for safety measures, that meant Broadway as a whole shut down too, along with Theatre Row.
As a side note, while Hurricane Irene did quite a lot of horrible damage in the Northeast, its impact in New York City was pretty much this:
So yeah. It was wet. …
Nevertheless, the loss of the revenue we could have earned during that last weekend was quite substantial. However, when we told our sob story to our friends and family, what did they do? They opened up their wallets AGAIN (!) and basically saved our theater company from tailspinning into astronomical debt.
No really. Without the generosity of our friends and family, we wouldn’t be writing this blog post because we would still be sobbing seven months later.
For those of you out there reading this — you know who you are — from the bottom of our hearts, thank you.
In the meantime, we read some plays, we made some plans, we joined A.R.T./New York and took some classes there, and BOY did we write some grants! I mean, grant writing is just really thrilling, seriously! I know people disparage it, but it’s really a great exercise, almost like trying to figure out how the puzzle pieces fit together, because you know, it’s like what do they want to fund? what do you want to say? And it makes you think about your production and who you are and what your necessity is in the New York City cultural landscape and…
What? You don’t want to hear about grant writing?
Oh. You want to hear about the new show.
So. The new show.
We’ll be producing A Modest Suggestion by Ken Kaissar at Theatre Row, May 10 - 27.
And we’ll tell you more about it soon.
Not in 7 months. In like a couple of days. Don’t worry. So stay tuned.
“And the clock begins to wind down.”
It’s so hard to believe that we’re already in our last week of By the Dawn’s Early Light! While we will surely have more blog posts as we wrap up our run, our playwright Mel turned in his final, very contemplative, very heartwarming post last night. (Sigh.)
And the clock begins to wind down.
How is it possible that as I write this, we as a company are about to embark on our final week of performances? Six more shows and the theatre will go dark. Costumes and make-up removed for the final time. Props placed in a box for some other times, others given as remembrance of a joyous creative experience, and others discarded like so many unwanted toys.
It’s going to be tough, no doubt. It has been some ride for me. The journey from first phone call, to table read, run through and first performance – first laugh being heard from the audience, as well as the sniffle of a tear, will be always remembered.
As Arturo Castro said: “Dude, we’re on f**king Theatre Row, bro!” – Yes we were, and we done good.
I have sat in the back of the theatre on many a night marveling as I watch Walter, our director, hunched over the control panel, intensely watching the performance, smiling, shaking his head, cheering, wipe a tear away and still continue to take notes as if it were the first day of rehearsals.
I watch Kevin move deeper and deeper into Freddie’s journey with the ease of a great painter who knows just what strokes are needed to fill in the colors of his canvas.
I still find myself welling up when Karen says: “Victor, when you leave it’s going to be quiet. I don’t like that kind of quiet.”
This has been a truly rewarding collaboration. I have made new friends and have enriched others. The seeds of future collaborations have been planted with the work that we have done as a company.
How did we all get here? Hard work and trust are often good starts to any collaborative endeavor and this one was no exception to that rule, but I think there were other factors involved as well – factors that perhaps in a month or so, when I find myself at a quiet moment, glass of wine in hand, it will come to me. But for now this will have to do: The Lebanese American artist, poet, and writer Kahlil Gibran once wrote, “You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.”
To the ensemble cast: Kevin, Arturo, Gordon, Alicia, Wynn, Camilo, Karen, Mark, Gustavo, Flor, Damian and Jorge – thank you for truly giving of yourself and to your art to brings these stories so beautifully to life.
To Walter and Allison, you remind one constantly of why we do what we do with this life of ours in the theatre and the both of you do it inspirationally.
Yeah, I will be saying the same words as Angie does to Victor once the final curtain comes down on Sunday – “I don’t like that kind of quiet too.”
… “Midnight Mass”!
Here are Joey Castillo’s photos of our second half of By the Dawn’s Early Light.
Remember: we’re only running through Sunday August 28th, and it’s only a 55-seat theater… so get your tickets soon at www.telecharge.com.
We hope to see you at Theatre Row!
Our wonderful photographer Joey Castillo took these great photos of “Los Embrujados” in By the Dawn’s Early Light. And of course, he also took photos of…
Hurray! We opened By the Dawn’s Early Light last night! And to a sold-out house no less. Thank you to the wonderful audience who came out to see the show. (And for those of you who haven’t gotten their tickets yet, be forewarned: it’s a 55-seat house and fills up FAST. So get your tickets soon!)
In honor of this momentous occasion, we thought we’d share with you a few of the photos that the remarkable Joey Castillo took during tech rehearsals, and a blog entry that Mel wrote after attending a tech rehearsal this week.
Waking up this morning I could not help, but feel it was going to be a special day.
I had several early morning appointments with various school representatives for possible positions as a theatre instructor this coming September, and along with my teaching credentials and artistic resumes I handed each school representative a postcard for my play, By the Dawn’s Early Light. They were rightfully impressed with the artwork by the gifted Katherine Miles Jones and with the subject matter that I was tackling. But most of all, they were impressed by the fact that the plays were being performed on Theatre Row, that cool block on mid-town Manhattan.
After I finished with my meet-and-greets I was to my other job of the moment and that is playwright for Apple Core Theatre Company. As I walked uptown from East Broadway (Yeah, I did say walk. I’m a big fan of walking.), and as I eventually turned the corner and headed to the stage door entrance, it suddenly dawned on me that I was in Theatre Row… but not as a theatre goer, but for lack of a better word, a “theatre-maker.”
As I entered the theatre space our crew — lighting designer, Jordan Acosta; set designer, Adam Kaynan; along with Allison (Producer), Barbra (Associate Producer)Walter (Director) and Farin (Stage manager) — were busy with setting things up on stage. It was really happening. Theatre was being created.
After a while as the actors started to come in they all had the same “this is cool” smile on their faces; I must tell you that as an actor in New York City I have performed in spaces that were barely more than a black box with three chairs in the middle of some block on the far reaches of the earth where even our beloved city rodents wouldn’t be caught hanging out in. Thus is the journey of the New York City actor, but every so often you get the chance to perform in a space that can truly be called nothing else but a “THEATRE,” and Theatre Row is such a space. You can feel the energy in the air. The pride in the actors as they take in their surroundings and what will be their “HOME” for the next three weeks.
It’s an awesome tribute to all the hard work that Walter and Allison and Barbara (the Apple Core Theatre Company Crew) have put into this production. The actors feel it, and I most certainly do.
Interview: Farin Rebecca Loeb
Thank goodness we have an awesome stage manager for By the Dawn’s Early Light. With twelve actors and two plays (and eight scenes in the second play), keeping track of what-props-were-supposed-to-be-where — and keeping our [wonderful] actors in line — was much too much for us to handle.
Please meet the wonder that is Farin Rebecca Loeb, who has a surprisingly varied background — from the performance side to the technical side, and from opera to theater.
Why did you decide to pursue stage managing?
Well, my education was actually in opera performance. I wanted to be an opera singer when I was about 7, and even got a specialized high school degree, then a BM and MM.
And then, when I had a vocal health problem, I noticed all the other stuff I’d been doing the whole time: coaching (working on non-technique things with singers, like acting choices), assistant directing, supertitles (translating operas and projecting the translations), stage managing, and so on. So I started doing more of that! I starting stage managing at a few small theaters where I was living, and eventually started directing opera.
And it’s funny how things work out, because I’m much better suited to what I do now. My experience as a singer and actor allows me to connect with the folks on stage in a really useful way, and I can add way more to the arts of theater and opera by telling lots of performers what to do at once, or as an SM, supporting a really positive, effective, awesome environment, and technically excellent and fluid environment!
Was there a performance/play/actor who made you want to go into this business? Why?
I guess I’ll finally admit it. For all my love of Mozart and Verdi, it was The Phantom of the Opera that made me decide to be a singer when I was little. I know.
Of course I also worshiped people like Kiri Te Kanawa, Kurt Moll, and Sir Thomas Allen (let’s pretend I totally kept my composure when I met the latter). As for what I do now, David McVicar really inspired me, as well as Francesca Zembello, and singers like John Relyea Gerald Finley- two of the greatest actors and singers working today, and some of the kindest people I’ve met. And singers like Nicholas Tamagna who made it clear to me that this was the type of work where I added the most to a production. And there are so many SMs, directors, and actors who have given me personal ideals of how to do things right!
How does working with the cast members of By the Dawn’s Early Light inform your process and performance?
We’ve really lucked out with an amazing group of talented folks and fabulous personalities. Having such creativity and lively but respectful attitudes makes my job way easier than it sometimes is, and allows us to creatively go that much farther.
Are there any other fields within theater/the arts in which you work?
I’m also really a director, as I’ve said. And I spend a lot of time and energy working on supertitles- one of my biggest passions since I was a teenager. I’m absolutely dedicated to accurate, well-timed translations, and will always fight for choices that make a big, if hopefully-not-consciously-noticed, difference. I also have done a lot of work with fight choreography and weapons.
Do you any great passions separate from theater/the arts?
The rest of my energy is generally consumed by fencing, social justice, and swing, blues, and tango dancing!
Today we load our production of By the Dawn’s Early Light into Theatre Row! In honor of this momentous occasion — in which we will be painting platforms, focusing lights, and building set pieces from 9 AM to 11:30 PM — we thought we’d bring you a little taste of the technical theater process. Here, our producer Allison writes about creating the perfect, in-all-likelihood-unused prop.
People outside theater sometimes ask me what a producer does. My answer varies, depending upon the day, but often it means being a problem solver.
Much of “Midnight Mass” takes place in a church, and when the set designer Adam and director Walter and I sat down to talk about the design scheme for the show, there was never any question that candles would have to be involved somehow. But if you know anything about fire code laws here in New York City (and probably elsewhere), you know that lit flames in theaters is strictly prohibited without going through a series of nightmarish hoops. Not unlike these.
(SIDE NOTE: If you want me to talk at you in a solid 45 minute rant, you should buy me a drink and ask me about flame retardant curtains.)
But Adam, Walter, and our associate producer Barbara kept saying, “Oh don’t worry, we’ll get electric candles!” Yeah, electric candles! … What? You mean like the ones in the windows at Christmas time? Or on the menorah? What do you mean, electric candles? I had no idea what they were talking about, but had a lot of contracts to process and money to raise, so I put it on the back burner. (Those are also not allowed in NYC theaters.)
But then one day, I was in a 99 cent store (yes, producers shop in these to find props for their productions), and lo and behold, there were these strange little lavender candles, made out of real wax and with a little plastic wick at its core. There was a button on the bottom of each candle that made the little plastic wick light up. And flicker. And it looked really, really cool. ELECTRIC CANDLES! WHO KNEW? (Everyone but me.)
But it didn’t look very realistic because, well, the wax wasn’t melting.
And so, as you can see in the photograph, I spent a solid half hour at rehearsal shaving down the candles to make them look like the wax had melted. You can see the shavings in my cup (and all over the table… sorry, MTC!), as well as a before-candle, an “unlit” candle that had been shaved down, and the final “lit” candle after it had been shaved.
The best part is, I don’t even think that we’re going to use these candles. The color doesn’t really go with the design scheme, and we have much nicer red candles that we can use. Luckily, in a moment wherein I thought I broke one of the purple candles, I discovered that the base containing the plastic wick and button can come out of the wax. Thus, we’ll take that piece out of the purple candles and wedge them into the red ones.
As I was saying: producing is problem-solving.
We finished up our last rehearsal at MTC yesterday for By the Dawn’s Early Light, before we pack up everything we own and move it on into the theater. Mel took a moment to write down some observations about one of the last rehearsals.
The final rehearsals at MTC prior to our landing at Theatre Row have been fascinating their up and down nature.
Little things are starting to take shape. Nerves are popping here and there. You can feel the actors staking out their little areas of real estate as each tries to focus on the task at hand. At a recent rehearsal there was much buzzing going around and the space was filled with much activity. Farin Rebecca Loeb, our lovely stage manager, is as focused as ever, and Walter our director is on his knees measuring the stage dimensions. Our costume designer, David L. Zwiers has come with a truly wonderful bag of goodies and the actor’s behavior brings a smile to my face. They each remind me of a child visiting FAO Schwartz for the first time as they try on their costumes, play and become familiar with their props.
I sit there with an amused look on my face as I watch the actors walk around in costume, running lines with each other, or in a corner going over their scripts and suddenly for a brief moment I forget that I’m watching a group of wonderful, hard working actors, who have become my friends, but I no longer see them.
Who do I see? I see Richard talking with David. I see Nadia listening to Arturo and I see Victor teasing Angie and finally I see Freddie brooding. Yeah, what I’m seeing is the characters that I have created walking around and doing their thing in front of my eyes. Some glance at me and smile as if saying: “Yeah, here I am. What’s up?”
It’s quite a surreal feeling, but it’s also a wonderful feeling to see actors fully engaged in the work that you’ve created and I am humble by their compassion and commitment. T
he fantasy of seeing my characters come to life is broken by the sound of Farin’s voice commanding the troops to “Listen up people!” and as the actors stand at attention, Farin walks among them breaking down the “rules of the game.” Meaning, “This is YOUR prop table. These are YOUR props and YOU are RESPONSIBLE for them” speech. My brain suddenly begins to drift and I get visions of Lee Marvin addressing his “Dirty Dozen” crew.
As you can probably guess that at this point in the rehearsal process I am a watcher, an audience member, an encourager, a living playwright sitting behind a desk listening carefully to make sure his words (and ONLY his words) are being spoken… and finally and most importantly, a cheerleader and supportive voice, an arm around a shoulder for my actors, my director, stage manager, and finally to my dramaturgy/Producer.
It’s been a heck-of-journey. It’s going be tough to say goodbye to the rehearsal space at Manhattan Theatre Club, it’s been like another home, but our real home awaits us on Theatre Row, and there we shall be and there we shall shine. I have been reminded from time to time watching and listening to actors recite their lines, bringing these characters and their individual worlds to life, of a quote from Stella Adler, the legendary actor teacher and Group Theatre member: “The Theatre Is A Spiritual And Social X-Ray Of Its Time.”
I believe with our production of By The Dawn’s Early Light we are fulfilling Ms. Adler’s decree.
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Apple Core Theater Company produces emotional, entertaining plays by American writers. Valuing the immediacy and intimacy of theater, we strive to present plays that cut down to the core and go straight to the heart. Believing that theater should be accessible to all people, we are committed to providing affordable theater to New York City.
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