recolle | open | for never was a story of more woe

WHO: OPEN to ALL !
WHERE: Recollé Community Center
WHEN: Forward dated to Friday, April 7th thru Sunday, April 9th
WHAT: The Recollé Community Arts Theatre fundraising production of Romeo & Juliet is performed at last! Nothing burns down. Much.
WARNINGS: none, contact me @

catsudon if this needs to be changed!

Opening Performance, Friday, April 7th:

The very first performance goes on without a hitch — if you ignore the entire primary cast is missing. The whole of the opening performance is being given by the Understudies to the primary cast-members, with a sparse chorus and rabble made up entirely of the performers throwing on alternate costumes when not on stage in a named role.

As it turns out, the Director is also missing. He took the entire primary cast out to a pre-show early dinner on his dollar, promising to throw an excellent closing celebration in order to make it up to the cast and crew he couldn't afford to treat this first time around. The main cast will have been treated to an all you can eat freshly made on the spot buffet, herded back together in order to make it back to the Community Center with hours to spare.

What actually ends up happening is more like: while in the buffet, one of the bus tires is stolen. The bus is actually propped up on cinderblocks on the back right. A traffic accident (no fatalities, but blocking all lanes) keeps the next bus from reaching them in time, leaving the cast to decide on walking back to the community center or waiting for the accident to clear up. Those who walk back will make it to the theatre in time for the final act; those who stay waiting for the bus will be treated to a chocobo breaking free from a carriage and running amok eating flowers from the center divider in the road.

For the Understudies, this is their chance to shine! Not only will they be filling in as the primary cast, they're also being asked to help be both chorus and background cast in scenes they're not already starring in. See how often you can spy the same faces in different costumes!

For the primary cast, don't worry! The second show of the night will all be on you to pull off without a hitch. At least your Understudies helped pave the way...?

The Performances on Saturday, April 8th:

Of the three performances offered on Saturday, the cast has been give a tip off that there will be big arts program donators in the audience for the second or third showing, and they're to be on Top Game to hopefully show the merit of engaging the whole community in the arts. At intermissions for both these shows, the actors are encouraged to mingle with the audience in the front lobby area leading into the theatre proper. The biggest challenge? Stay In Character no matter what.

Meaning stay in character even as your friends, family, or even enemies try to troll you into breaking form. The Director will wander around and compliment those who stay in character, giving them organic fortune cookies or peppermint patties or coupons for buy-one-get-one-free at the smoothie shoppe down the street depending on what he pulls out of his hat. Literally.

Cast photographs for the local paper will be taken after the second show, announced last minute as the curtain falls and people head on stage to take a bow. All crewmembers will be asked to cooperate and sign releases for their photographs to be used in the paper and in advertising for the arts program in the future; for some of those who are on Retrospec, however, they may find their phones singing notifications to them in all these lovely songs.

How the heck do you turn off these notifications?! Since when did you need reminders to brush your hamster's teeth?! You don't even have one!!

The Performances on Sunday, April 9th:

The first show of the day ends up having to evacuate halfway through Act One when popcorn burns in the microwave of one of the smaller rooms in the Community Center. (Why is there always that person with the goldarn popcorn?!) Everyone has to stay outside the building until the fire department arrives and checks the building to pronounce it as safe to re-enter: in the meantime, the audience, cast, and crew are all caught out in the basketball courts and parking lot.

The Director has a simple suggestion given to all cast members: ad lib. Ask audience members to locate a Capulet or Montague; get into complicated and ridiculous stage-fights with each other and running over the playground; ask around to find Romeo or Juliet, who are attempting to evade the rest of the cast; get the audience to cheer on actors as they fight In Character, either with prop swords or in sudden WWE-style matches; the show will go on in whatever form until everyone can be back on stage.

The subsequent shows carry on without a hitch, culminating in plenty of applause and an open invitation to cast, crew, and their plus ones to mingle with the arts sponsors at the cast party held out in the attached park, where there's an all you can eat taco truck and open (non-alcoholic) bar for everyone to enjoy. Don't be surprised that while the food's free, everyone's required to recite at least one line from the play before they're fed or watered!

Please also enjoy the photobooth being run by the Director for laughs! Photos won't print, but they will email, and there's a variety of silly props, wigs, stage jewelry, oversized glasses, and an unexplained disco stuffed penguin all on hand for fun photography times with friends — or strangers! Make memories in honour of the Bard, a Good Time, or Now I'm Free Of This Rehearsal Heck. All cast, crew, and associated helpers will go home with at a string of beads that recalls of Mardi Gras past... except that the letters pressed on beads will all spell out a Shakespearean insult.

Congratulations, everyone! You did it! We all made it through!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Rachel dodges... in the most stilted, wooden manner that would leave a cheap kids action show feeling moderately insulted. The way she sort of shuffles to the side is less akin to a swordsman and more like a humanoid crab.

Nevertheless, she holds to her role.]

How can you say you are saving a life?! It is more like you make a mockery of those that are already lost, by wearing their faces and stealing their words!

And what, pray tell, have you been doing to protect our fair city? Letting ruffians and the young run around without a care, doing as they please and harming whoever should stand in their way? No, I wear the faces of those who cannot see peace return. Your insult concerns me little, thus.

[While she's totally fine to continue into a fairly scary set of swings, Alicia holds herself to her role, overextending with the miss and stumbling forward in a controlled fashion as she talks. She's purposely slow to whirl and face Rachel again, leaving a big, open target. ~~Basically, she's slowing herself down by quite a bit and calling that stage-appropriate. It probably isn't.~~]

[Slowed down or not, Rachel is a bit easily overwhelmed, given she's such a novice at this. Still, she manages to "avoid" those swings.]

If you want me to protect this city... I will do just that!

[And she "stabs" forward, taking advantage of the "opening" provided for her.]

[She can't really set the difficulty any lower... sorry, Rachel. The time for talk has clearly passed; while she's aware in her peripheral vision that Rachel is coming in for an attack, her eyes widen in surprise - real or feigned is hard to tell at the moment, but it's there - and she stumbles backward in much less forced fashion, her sword coming up to barely deflect the blow up from her torso. Her hair rustles as the sword briefly catches, then passes through it; her bangs would be gone - along with a small bit of her scalp - were this a real blade. With a shove, she parries the incoming sword upwards and scurries backward a step or two, taking a few deep breaths and hesitating while she plans her next move.]

[Their clash is supremely epic! For all the bad choreography and action on Rachel's part, anyway. At least, it is, until Alicia's upward swipe sends the cardboard sword sailing up and out of her hands, landing a few feet away with an anti-climactic "flop".

Rachel stands there for a moment, dumbfounded, her empty hands positioned like they were still holding something.]

...

Oh no! I'm unarmed!

[In her own mind, Alicia narrowly avoided death here, and Rachel's sword lands some distance away with a dull clatter on the cobble. She carefully doesn't smile when Rachel finally realizes she isn't holding anything, choosing instead to raise her sword once more, not broadcasting lethal intent but looking for all the world like she should be as her prop finds Rachel's throat and rests a few inches away.]

Indeed you are. Yield, and I'll not add another to the list of souls lost to this conflict. Unlike some men of Verona, I know when further bloodshed will solve nothing.

[...despite everything, the crowd is actually getting into this, a certain silence falling over those nearby as they wait to see what happens.]

[Sorry, Alicia, but you're such a good actor, Rachel looks legitimately afraid when you bring your "sword" to her neck. The girl swallows hard, hands balling into fists... is this what they call method acting?

... She owes it to the crowd to give it her all.]

I will yield... when I know your true name! And only then!

open | for never was a story of more woe

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