Maybe . . . maybe . . .

Here is my current plan . . .

Tomorrow, "42nd Street" closes.  Tomorrow night, we start taking things down.  On Sunday, we finish taking things down and we have the cast party.  After that, my younger son is starting on the summer youth program shows "Annie" and "Cinderella".  My older son and I will be performing in "Henry V" in August, and we need to get off-book for that (rehearsal for that doesn't start until August, so we have some time free).  In September, Viviana is planning on having dance classes to prepare for their fall/winter show, a version of "The Nutcracker".  I plan on attending that, even though I don't plan on being in "The Nutcracker". 

I was poking around some sites for who-manages-the-rights for "Angels in America".  It turns out that for amateur groups, their royalties appear to be very cheap (10%).  But I noticed something: if I will have fewer than 100 people in the audience, do not charge, don't make any money off this, and only perform this on one night, there are no fees at all! 

So, I find myself thinking.  What if I got a group together to do a "staged reading" of "Angels in America, part 1"?  We would rehearse for a week, use minimal sets and no real costuming, and then perform (with scripts in hand) in front of an audience?  If we did this at "Stage One", a weeklong rental would cost around $150.  If I managed a group of, say, ten people, that comes to $15 per person.  This is quite doable! 

What are the complications?

First, "Stage One" requires that I get some sort of liability insurance.  Um . . . how the heck do I do that for this one (not-really-even-a) show?  I sent an e-mail to the people that manage "Stage One" to ask about that. 

Since I don't plan on charging the audience or making money, I don't need to incorporate anything or start a bank account or any of that fun stuff.  If this moves forward and evolves into a company, I would need to do that.  I'll worry about that later.  The moment I start charging an audience, we get the immediate question of "where does that ticket money go?"  I seriously don't want to be bothered!

I will need to put out feelers.  Can I even find ten people that would be interested in a staged reading?  I need to figure out a date with "Stage One".  I need to find out if I can even get a license to perform this play (a community theatre in south Jersey will be performing "Angels in America" in August, so they won't give me a license then!). 

Depending on liability insurance, this seems quite doable. 

I think I would like to first offer Viviana to put this under their banner.  From my end, I suspect Viviana has some sort of liability insurance, so I could latch on to that.  From Viviana's end, this opens a whole new avenue to them.  Essentially, this would allow Viviana to offer an educational opportunity, a smaller version of Hedgerow's acting class.  Because no one needs to be off-book for this and this only requires commitment for a week, and because this will be quite inexpensive, this would provide a nice place for people that want to "try" acting. 

Of course, if Viviana doesn't want to do this, I think I might want to do this myself. 

If this works out, I have a few more plays in mind.  I'm thinking of "Angels in America part 1", but if people are willing we can extend this to two weeks and offer "Angels in America part 1" in one week and "Angels in America part 2" the next week.  This whole thing started with the idea of performing "Laramie Project".  Maybe we can also do "Equus".  "Laramie" and "Equus", however, have fees even for free performances, but we're talking about $75/night for "Laramie" and $100/night for "Equus": it's not going to be so bad. 

Now, as the person organizing this, I need to be generous regarding parts.  In "Angels in America", as much as I might want to play Prior Walter, I will have to step back and let someone else do that role.  This isn't a vanity project for me, after all!  But, if we do "Equus", I don't care . . . I'm playing Dysart!