Wow, it's been a while since my last entry. Here goes...

The Other Place Theatre Cooperative returned from a sucessful run of our show The Stranger at the Victoria Fringe Festival. It was a great experience to perform 6 shows for audiences in Victoria. Our attendence was good for the most part. We did have one late night performance on Sunday, Aug. 29 that had only 5 people in attendance. Our rule? If the performers outnumber the audience, call the show. Alas, that night, the audience had us beat by 2. Most shows, however, saw 30-60 people in attendance.

We got to meet a lot of people during out time there. The most inspiring bit was meeting other performers and realizing how great it was that they were actually getting their work done. So many folks talk about (or bemoan) not having an outlet for their work. These folks were there -- crazy ideas, concepts, and hair-brained theatre schemes in tow -- performing and receiving feedback. It's one thing to talk about it, and it's an entirely different thing to show up and do it. I admire those folks for that.

It really is an amazing outlet at the fringe fests. I only wish we had such an organized system in the States. Many of the companies we met had been touring the coast-to-coast Canadian Fringe Circuit since June. How's that for experience? These folks aren't pondering. They're doing. Right on!

We came back to Moscow, and performed a hometown show on Saturday, Sept. 11th at the Univ. of Idaho's Hartung Theatre. 215 people came out for the show that night. We were blown away by the local support. More T.O.P. projects are in the works. Look for a show in April. More specifics as we get closer. For now, we've taken a bit of time off from T.O.P. to work on some other projects around the area.

I start rehearsals at Lewis-Clark State College tonight for Rebecca Gilman's play Spinning Into Butter. Talk about a hard hitting play. This one pulls no punches. The play is set on a small campus much like LCSC and deals with how a small college works through the issues of acceptance, diversity, and communication. The cast for this show is a mix of faculty, administration, and students. I'm excited to be working with such a diverse cast. Along with a good group of LCSC students, Nancy Lee-Painter, LCSC's theatre instructor, plays the lead role of Dean Sarah Daniels; Dene Thomas, LCSC's president, plays Dean Catherine Kenny; Tony Fernández, LCSC's Provost, plays Dean Burton Strauss; and Gordon Thomas, Associate Professor of English at U of I, plays Ross Collins.

The rehearsal process for this show is a bit shortened. We start tonight (10/18) and open on November 11th. Spinning Into Butter runs November 11-13 at 7:30p and November 14th at 2:00p at LCSC's Silverthorne Theatre. Tickets are $5 adults, $2 children/students, and free for LCSC students.

More about this show to come...