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For the prurient, and the insane.
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A producer earlier this year gave me the following guidelines: --
120-capacity theatre (presumably places like The Edge), 4 week run, 5 shows per week, 40% full each night, $25 per ticket: $24,000
Less 30% (unspecified for what; presumably for theatre rental): $7200
Raw takings: $16,800
Expenses:
Performing rights (amateur): $2400
Publicist (presumably someone like Watchdog Communications): $1900
Director: $2000
Stage manager: $800
Printing: $800
Costumes: $200
Rehearsal space hire (this sounds far too cheap to me): $125
Postage, photocopying, misc: $200
Advertising in SMH (4 weeks): $1200
Advertising (weeklies): $345
TOTAL: $10,770
Net takings: $6030 (to be split between actors, producer, etc)
The producer also noted that the fourth week is the best week. She attributed it mainly to word-of-mouth, although I think there's also factors like: people procrastinating, and putting it off till the last second; and people thinking that the production is better in its final week.
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Moira Buffini earlier this year sent around a cost breakdown (in the course of asking for donations): --
Venue hire: Stables Theatre and rehearsal space: $11,000
Production: set, props, costume, lighting and sound: $5000
Marketing: flyers, posters, publicist and SMH listing: $5000
Royalties to the writer: $3000
Ticketing costs (selling a third of tickets): $3000
Administration and insurance: $3000
Total: $30,000
And note that this doesn't include paying cast and crew.
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Sydney University Drama Society has a budget of $350 for most of its Cellar productions.
For its "major" productions (which usually run for around a week at Seymour Downstairs), I think it's something like $2500 or $5000 (and, oftentimes, additional funds/freebies are garnered from local businesses). They do have a special relationship with the Centre though.
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Someone once gave me a figure for the Genesian Theatre. Wish I could remember it now.
$20,000 or $30,000 seems about right.
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If anyone has more information, please post it here!
No idea what STC costs, for instance, and it presumably varies a lot between plays. You might get some sort of ballpark if you check out the box office revenue for David Williamson (although I think I read somewhere that, somewhat atypically, Williamson plays actually make a profit -- whereas, for a short period, even with government grants and other donations, I think the STC was running at a loss).
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September 26th 2007 23:15
September 26th 2007 23:14
Cultural_philistine dragged Google_fanboy to the Seymour Centre, then harrassed him for feedback. Here are the search results.
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Would you recommend it to anyone?
Sure.
If I told you tickets cost $34, would you still recommend it to anyone?
Um, yeah.
Would you watch it again?
Having seen it already? Probably not, I don't think I'd get much out of it the second time round, but I don't regret watching it.
Describe what the play's about.
The play is about three characters who... don't really interact with each other... at different points in their lives. One is a young guy trying to get laid before he goes off to fight a war. Another is a businessman who cheated on his partner and seems to be regretting it. And the other is... I think... a weirdo who... well I'm not sure if they were married... whose partner has just died and who seems to be living on a farm where the cattle was recently slaughtered because it was suspected they might have a disease.
Three interlocking monologues, and set in London somewhere... I don't know where the farm lady is... and set against the background of some war or other. Were you bored?
No, it was quite amusing. Some bits with the lady got a bit boring.
Could you follow what was going on with her?
Um... vaguely.
Something about stripping herself naked and pouring lighter fluid on herself.
I think she was suicidal because her lover died.
Did you like the intercutting?
I don't think the stories really reflected on each other, but obviously the intercut sort of led on one story from another...
Is that clever, or is that a wank?
I think it keeps it interesting.
Do you think there were any common denominators? For instance, I think they were all stories of... redemption, or something like that?
I'm not sure about that.
What did you like in particular about the play, if anything?
The English guy trying to get screwed before he goes to war.
Yeah, I think that was the most entertaining story. I mean, personally I thought the old lady's story was... a bit indulgent. And a bit cliche.
Yeah, absolutely. I thought the other story, with the guy who...
The weird guy on the train who wanted to blow up everyone with a grenade?
Yeah, that guy. I thought that story was fairly interesting, not as interesting as the guy who wanted to get laid.
Was that overdone, do you reckon? So he cheated on his girlfriend, his girlfriend dumped him, and he wanted to take out everyone on the train, basically.
I don't see that he wanted to take out everyone on the train.
Just everyone in the office.
Yeah, just everyone in the office.
I suppose we can all sympathize with that. Okay, what were the most memorable parts of the play for you?
Probably the guy on the train saying that he was now the weirdo in the carriage because... I think I've felt like that.
More details.
Just when I was working nightshifts.
Did you get much out of watching that play? I mean, you can't remember anything except the dodgy guy on the train.
Well, I can remember other things, I just wouldn't classify them as "memorable".
I've been a little harsh on the play, but... just the way the business guy walks through the ticket barrier, thinks about the train, screws around with his e-mail, thinks about sending a message and doesn't send a message, notes that at the beginning and end of a relationship one pays special attention to the signing off part of e-mails... there's some quite human moments, yeah?
Yeah, I think everyone can relate to those sorts of moments.
Did you sympathize with any of the characters... apart from the dodgy guy on the train?
Well, certainly not the guy off to fight the war.
Come on, he's got a big cock.
Yeah, I guess he needs to use it. But I thought he was a bit of a hypocrite. He said foreigners were like animals but he was a bit of an animal himself. I suppose I sympathize with the woman on the farm.
You were saying earlier you didn't really like her story? You thought it was cliche or something?
I thought it was a bit boring, but I can still sympathize with her.
You "felt her pain", as the play puts it.
Yeah.
You "found the solution".
What was the solution?
To comment on her acting. Any comments on the acting in general?
I don't know if I'm qualified to critique that.
Okay, put it this way, who did you like?
I think probably the business guy who cheated on his spouse ("Stephen", played by Ryan Hayward).
Really? I thought you liked the guy going off to war.
In terms of script, yeah, but I thought the better actor was probably the other guy.
What criteria are you using to judge good acting?
I'm not really sure actually.
Is it like a gut feeling? Were you moved by the performance?
Yeah, it's mainly a gut feeling, I think.
Did you sympathize with him the most?
At some points, yeah.
Was it a matter of how convincingly he played the character?
No, when I think about how convincing the actors were, I'd say that the guy who was about to go to war was probably the most convincing ("Jamie", played by Peter Barry)... particularly the way he... sort of... acted out the bits where he was conflicting with other characters.
Why are you smiling?
Well, the bit where he said there was a foreigner making out with the girl on the dance floor, I thought it was the guy from the kebab shop.
Did you find the play in general to be funny?
Yeah... particularly, of course, the guy who was going to war.
Which were the funny moments with him?
Well, the one that was most recent, towards the end of the play, was when he broke into the church, so I guess that was quite funny. And... yeah, I thought, the entire scene in the club and kebab shop was really well done.
What do you mean by well done?
Um, funny.
Personally, I think that... you could easily visualize it, sitting in the audience. I don't know if it was to do with the writing, or to do with the way the actors used their body language to portray the scene, but...
I think they did really well portraying the scenes considering that there wasn't any set.
Or did the absence of set actually add to the ease with which you could imagine?
Yeah, that's definitely true, but I think the actors did a really good job of letting you use your imagination.
Did you like the accents?
Well, I think the accent was real, right?
No.
It was good.
All three of them?
No, just the guy who was off to war. Well... I guess the other two, were... I didn't really notice any accent.
You didn't notice any accents on the other two?
Not really.
They were definitely trying.
Okay.
What do fire and water have to do with anything?
I suppose they just represented the intensity of the play at different times, I'm not sure.
The intensity?
The... mood.
When were they used?
Well, I noticed that water was used towards the beginning and later returned... I think a couple of times during the play.
The sound of water you mean?
Yeah, and also the lighting, I think there was a blue tint on the lighting.
And there are occasional references to water and fire. For instance, all the animals died in some sort of fire, if I remember that rightly, and there was a suicide... accident... towards the end that was to do with water, and the woman kept talking about a bath.
I don't think the animals died in a fire, I think they got slaughtered, but I definitely noticed that, yeah, the woman was thinking about lighting herself on fire.
And there was some sort of genocidal description at the start? The woman was talking about people being machine-gunned and put in a pyre. Did you follow what the hell was going on?
I didn't get exactly what the hell was going on, but... yep... there was definitely that sort of imagery at the beginning.
And it implies that people are getting machine-gunned in England? Is there some sort of police-state situation?
Yeah, I got that. When she went for a drive she was talking about some sort of fences and that sort of thing.
Unless she wasn't in England at all... but I suppose her accent was supposed to be English.
Google_fanboy, thanks very much for your time.
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Bone is playing at the Seymour Theatre Centre from Wednesday 19 September to Saturday 13 October. It's the third in the Centre's "Best of Independent Theatre" series. Normal tickets are $34, except for tightarse Tuesday ($21).
What does the title mean? Well... not entirely sure. But there's the "bone" of the horny guy, there's cancer in the bones of the business guy, and animals were burnt to the bone (I think) in the farm lady's story. And I suppose some moments are supposed to be "emotionally raw" -- to the bone.
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Written by John Donnelly.
Director -- Tanya Goldberg.
Set design -- Simone Romaniuk (never quite figured out why there was a hanging mesh cutting off half the stage, but at any rate it created an interesting space).
Lighting design -- Verity Hampson (interesting side lighting, creating shadows on the back wall).
Sound design -- Belinda Guinn.
Peter Barry as "Jamie" (guy who needs to get laid).
Vanessa Downing as "Helen".
Ryan Hayward as "Stephen" (business guy).
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Further reading: --
-- Seymour Centre website calls the play "An electric, exquisite parable for living right now." I've noticed the description repeated in various reviews, though, honestly, I don't see that the carpe diem theme has much to do with anything here...
-- Brett Casben, in a review at Australian Stage Online, nicely notes: "Somewhere in the past each of these characters experienced something that for them opened hell’s hole. The play traces each one’s redemption. ‘Hell fire’ is something that Goldberg doesn’t want us to miss, opening the performance with a simulated conflagration. It may be a bit heavy handed". He goes on, though, to compare the play with Beckett, and to suggest that Bone is about existentialism, which I think is strange...
-- In the Sun-Herald (Andrew Taylor, "Career fleshed out of Bone", 9/9/07, S-Diary, p 19) and in the Sydney Morning Herald, it's noted that "When Ryan Hayward graduated from NIDA’s acting course in 2002... acting jobs were so scarce that agents declined to sign any of the 22 graduates from Hayward's class." After three disappointing years, Hayward "gave himself an ultimatum. 'One last push and if there was no change in the level of success I was achieving I'd consider a change in career.' Hayward teamed up with Tanya Goldberg, a fellow member of the class of ’02, to stage 'Bone'... Now 29, Hayward's first attempt at producing paid off -- he has worked steadily for the past year, including roles with the Sydney Theatre Company’s Troupers and The Merchant Of Venice at Belvoir St Downstairs theatre, which has allowed him the freedom to pursue acting full-time."
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September 21st 2007 02:59
Company B's production of Keating!, by Casey Bennetto, is returning for another season at the Seymour Centre from Wednesday 7 November to Thursday 13 December 2007. For further info, check out the Belvoir St Theatre website.
Following are some extracts from the lyrics (from the CD jacket). The soundtrack is available for $30 from the Belvoir box office
[ Click here to read more ]
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September 20th 2007 02:09
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September 18th 2007 23:36
September 18th 2007 23:35
It begins with a character mumbling in the dark, stumbling over the words of the Lord's Prayer, but pushing himself to keep going, while prisoners around him yell at him to shut the fuck up. You soon discover the man's name is Angel Cruz (played by Ryan Johnson), that he's 30-years-old and Puerto Rican, that he tried to save his friend from a religious group, and that he's charged with attempted murder of the preacher ("But I just shot him in the ass
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September 10th 2007 00:57
September 10th 2007 00:55
The carpet's been pulled back to transform Seymour downstairs into a concrete room, and it's bare and it's dirty and it's urban. There are projector screens at the back of the stage, two stand-up microphones, and a small TV resting on the floor, which does occasional duty as a modern-day campfire for the angsty youths to gather around.
The youths deliver a series of monologues about their unpredictable hang-ups (usually discrimination-based) and preoccupations (TV, soccer, drugs, clubbing...). Pretty much all of the characters (it's unclear, incidentally, on a first viewing, how many there are, though one presumes there are six main ones) -- pretty much all the characters are queer, or indigenous, or part of a minority racial group, or some mixture of the above
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Comment by cultural_philistine
on Review of Jesus Hopped the 'A' Train (Belvoir St Theatre)
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