So….

Apologies first:  I’m ashamed to recognize my last entry was written in the tropical heat of my Mexican paradise.  Those glorious days in Vallarta seem like the distant past as I try to grab a few minutes, collect a few thoughts and get back to regularly keeping you up to date with what’s been happening at Triad Stage.

The day after I returned to NC, I was back in the rehearsal hall working on THE GLASS MENAGERIE.  Seldom has a play proved as challenging, exciting and compelling as MENAGERIE.  All of us who were working on the show felt as if we were exploring new frontiers, calling on all our resources as creative artists to bring to life the hidden heart of this masterpiece too often hidden behind the trappings of 1940’s realism.  It was exhausting but inspiring work.  And it was work that gave me a serious case of writer’s block.  Whether it was the exhaustion at the end of the day or some sort of Karmic retribution for highlighting a very non-literary metaphor for Tom’s creative process, I found myself incapable of writing much more than an occasional Facebook post. Writing projects stacked up as I explored a much more visual means of recording memory.  Add that to the beginning of a new school year and a move to a new home after five years of collecting useless items, and I hope I can ask for forgiveness for too long a lapse in the blog.

Happy 10^th Anniversary season Triad Stage!

We’re celebrating.  It’s tempting to make our celebration a look back at what we have accomplished in ten seasons but such nostalgia is too sentimental.  So, I allowed myself a few minutes of pride in what we’ve accomplished and then turned my celebration to dreaming about the future.  After all what we’re really celebrating is the potential of our next ten seasons.

I think MENAGERIE was a part of that celebration.  We didn’t set out to do something different.  We only set out to do the play, but the way we make plays here at Triad Stage involves a bold vision of a theater that seeks to question, provoke, challenge and probe a play to find a production that illuminates the text in surprising ways.  I know that Menagerie has created quite a dialogue in our community.  I’ve heard my fair share of praise and criticism about the production, but nothing pleased me more than those people who came up to me in the theater and said they were hearing the play in a new way, as if for the first time.

And dialogue, pro and con is exactly what I hope our work will create.  I’m not so foolish as to believe we can please our entire audience.  I know that for everyone who loves the work that Laurelyn and I do together there is someone else who hates all the allegory and Appalachian gothic.  And that’s the way it should be.  We make art at Triad Stage and in doing so we’re bound to upset some people along the way.  Healthy, constructive critical dialogue is good for us and good for our community.  I’m always delighted when I hear that people have been talking about us.

I have to confess I have always been intimidated by MENAGERIE, so tackling the play was an unexpected journey for me.  As much as I love Williams, I’ve always been intimidated by the perplexing role of Tom as a narrator.  I found working with the actors and designers to be enormously liberating as we probed the text to solve the riddle of Tom.  The reviews were glorious, the audience response outstanding and we just found out that we’re going to be featured in American Theater.  All in all, a great start to our 10^th anniversary celebration.

We also have re-opened the UpStage Cabaret.  The first production was Matt Carlson (Tom in THE GLASS MENAGERIE) in his own song cycle, WE OUTRAN THE SUN.  Matt’s work is a great evening of music celebrating the ties that bind us, an exploration through song of friendship that is filled with both humor and true emotion.  I hope we will find many more opportunities to see actors from the mainstage performing UpStage in brand new ways. Williams’ AUTO DE FE and Durang’s FOR WHOM THE SOUTHERN BELLE TOLLS opened last week and continues through October 9^th.  The two extraordinary casts under the direction of two of my UNCG MFA directing third years, Kate Muchmore and JB Brady, provide good theater, great laughs and two radically different takes on the world of Tennessee Williams.  We call the evening AN EVENING OF SOUTHERN DISCOMFORT and I encourage you to check it out.

EDUCATING RITA started rehearsals a little over a week ago and I can’t wait to share this show with our audience.  I first saw RITA at the Barter Theater when I was growing up in Boone.  I’ve loved it ever since.  I’m particularly pleased that Willy Russell is getting a second look from so many theaters in England and the US.  Success can sometimes turn the critics against a writer and few writers have had the kind of success Russell found in RITA, SHIRLEY VALENTINE and BLOOD BROTHERS.  But I think Russell is much more than a commercial writer.  Coming out of Liverpool in the 80’s, his works capture a time, a place and a political protest against  the greed that would dominate the last years of the 20^th century, plunging us into these cycles of recession in the 21^st.  RITA is not only a brilliant play and a delicious comedy, but it has a heart full of wisdom about education, learning and the value of literature in a world that prefers monetary measurements and standardized testing.

And in the midst of all of this comes the surprise announcement that the American Theatre Wing (the people behind the Tony Awards) has selected Triad Stage for one of their first National Theatre Company Grants, recognizing the 10 most promising theaters to have emerged in the US in the past 15 years.

Wow.

And just like a 10^th anniversary, we could celebrate this honor with nostalgia, looking back on our past.  But Rich and I believe that this is an honor that comes with a challenge.  We’re thrilled to be promising.  But now comes the hard work- we celebrate our 10^th Anniversary and our National Theatre Company Grant by challenging ourselves, our company, our audience and our community to fulfill the promise and make Triad Stage a home for artists that will be recognized as a bold, daring leader for our national theater community.

Committing ourselves to a courageous pursuit of artistic excellence is the real celebration this theater and this community deserve.  Let’s talk more about that and what all that means in the weeks to come.