Seacoast Repertory Theatre had a bit of a heart-stopper recently. It turned out OK, but it also turned its season on its head - for the ninth time - a true sign of the times, Artistic Director Brandon James says.
The Rep was rehearsing "Hair," 15 actors strong, for an August opening. All was going smoothly until an actor called to say they'd developed a cough.
Long story short, the Rep shut down. The actor was tested, and proved positive for COVID-19.
"When it first happened, we were like 'pack it in," James says. "Great run, but this is it."
It came to a halt, but luckily didn't sink.
Contact tracing discerned the performer contracted Coronavirus after their last time at the theater. There had been no contact with others at the venue since exposure.
Still, the cast and crew were tested twice, all with negative results.
The scare made a few things glaringly clear, James says. First, the Rep's health policy - social distancing, masking, health checks, mandatory notification of symptoms, etc., - worked.
Second, the current way of doing business was dangerous given the times.
"We learned how vulnerable we are having an entire organization run on one production ... at this time," James says. "If we closed, it would be devastating ... to people's health and work."
This led to yet another change in how the Rep conducts business during the pandemic. After research, the venue adopted the "new" office model, currently employed by more traditional businesses.
Some office settings now run three, separate teams that have no contact with one another; only one in-house at a time, James says. The office is deep-cleaned between team rotations.
The Rep has converted this into a "theater model." It has cancelled "Hair" and is replacing it with a trio of small-cast plays performed in repertory.
Each team must stay separate, and, as with the office model, the theater will undergo a deep clean between residencies.
The move makes the theater less vulnerable. But, it also offers a rare opportunity to produce smaller, sweet productions, James says.
"It's an entire genre of plays, ... that don't usually happen at our theater because they're small shows that don't usually sell out our 230-seat theater five times a week for six weeks."
The state has theaters set at 30% capacity, due to the pandemic, which won't cover the costs of a larger show.
"So, here's all these titles we would have loved to tackle that were never options. Now, working with just 30-percent ... they fit," he says. "It's frustrating, the new world, the new normal, pivoting and reinventing. But every time we've done this ... we've finessed our procedures, and feel more stable."
The one drawback is the changes could erode audience trust. Hopefully, he says, they'll stick with them, "and understand, we're in unprecedented times."
The theater is currently waiting on licensing for two of its planned shows. The third is an original that appeared in a recent column.
’Bus Stop’ to be produced at Seacoast Rep
Najee Brown's "Bus Stop" was slated for a short run in the near future in Eliot, Maine, after it was canceled in March. That changed last Sunday when Brown received a call from the Rep asking if he'd be interested in moving it to the Portsmouth venue.
"I'm so excited about this," Brown says. "The (cast) will finally get to perform this for at least 10 shows ... maybe 11, the 'special' number."
Before agreeing, Brown needed to contact "Bus Stop's" five actresses to see if they could synch their schedules. Then he needed approval from the Green Acres Baha i Center, its original producers.
"And so it's all good," Brown says. "Everyone is good, Everything is great. ... Everyone is on board!"
**One of those on board is actress Sandi Clarke, president of the Seacoast African American Cultural Center, and owner and founder of Jukwaa Mazoa Theatre Production, who will grace the Rep stage for the first time in "well over a decade."
Clarke worked for the venue for 13 years before moving on to the Ogunquit Playhouse. During those years, she performed numerous staff roles, as well as ones on stage.
"In these times we're going through right now, I'm grateful to just have the opportunity to do what we do," Clarke says. "I'm also just excited we're able to perform at the Rep, on a stage that I love. It's like going home."
Graves-Fichter working on second book
Gloria Graves-Fichter, author of the autobiography "Life's too Short And so Am I," is finally getting to her second, long-planned book.
Admittedly, she had a tough time jumpstarting. But "Breath and Exhale," book two, is finally humming along.
One might think the 'Rona shutdown a perfect time to plow through and get lots of writing done. Not so, Graves-Frichter says. There was an issue with getting over "Covid- brain" for a period of time, like so many others.
"I feel like I can adjust now. I'm getting more used to this being the norm," Graves-Fichter says.
"I was (writing) in snips before. When I couldn't sleep because a character would jump into my mind, I would dive in and let my creativity run amuck and write things down. ... Now I have a few goals set with the extra time."
Book two marks Graves-Fichter’s first venture into fiction."Breath and Exhale's" protagonist "does what we all wish to do," she says. "One day she wakes up and decides to walk out of her life. We've all wanted to once or twice."
This latest is three-quarters complete. The hope is to have it self-published by year's end, Graves-Fichter says, "seems pretty reasonable."
NHTP plays published
New Hampshire Theatre Project is currently working quietly behind the scenes designing future projects, but still has some fine news to share.
"Leicester Bay Theatricals has just published five of NHTP's Plays for Young Audiences as part of their ’Theatre for Young Audiences Series,’" Founding Executive Director Genevieve Aichele says. "All of these were commissioned and performed by the NHTP Youth Repertory Company."
Among the lot, "Forest Secrets" and "Once Upon a Candlemas in King Arthur's Court," by Aichele, and "Well-Behaved Women" by Jes Marbacher, and "Galileo's Pendulum" and "The Sheriff of Nottingham" by Michael Megliola.
Leicester has published individual children's plays by NHTP for some time. It's currently taking this COVID-quieted period to pull together some of its back-burner projects, among them bundling children's plays.
The new form makes for an easier selection process "rather than buying a bunch of single scripts," Aichele explains. "So that's the first. And he's talking about others."
Aichele is also penning a book for the company. Aichele has decades experience with in-school residencies, working with children, and has created hundreds of scripts and two young adult novels over time.
"I'm writing a book for him, on how to use story theater in the classroom, science, social studies, history- ," she says. "And I'm going to add a chapter on how to do that virtually as well at this point."
"It's kind of cool after all the work of doing it over the years ... I get to share," Aichele said.
Jeanné McCartin keeps her eyes and ears open for gossip at maskmakernh@gmail.com.
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July 31, 2020 at 11:15AM
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