Our Volunteer Ushers are Essential

Essential Theatre seeks two volunteer ushers for each performance. This year's festival run July 5 through August 5, 2012 but those who sign-up early will have their choice of performances.

Simply follow the link to our OvationTix calendar and select USHER and you will be taken to a page to sign-up. Choose one or two $0 tickets. Ushers are asked to please arrive 60 minutes prior to curtain time. Preferred dress is black skirt or slacks and white shirt. After the performance, we ask that you assist in cleaning up inside the theatre space.

Parking is free at Essential Theatre @ Actors Express.  If you have questions, please email: mperloe AT essentialtheatre DOT com.

Take a picture of this neat little photo with your cell phone and it will take you to our calendar page or simply click on this link: https://www.ovationtix.com/trs/cal/31695

The Changing Face of Theatre Criticism

The changing face of theatre criticism in Atlanta has been a subject that fascinated me for some time, having closely observed it for 25 years now. There are a lot of things I miss about the days when you'd get the Friday AJC and one or two theatre reviews would be on the front page, maybe with some more inside. And there are things about those days that I don't miss (the power that one or two reviewers had). But I can't help but see this as part of a much larger picture, how the nature of media has changed over that time (more and more rapidly, it seems). Nowadays, it seems like anybody can start a blog or a website and be a critic, and just about anybody (it takes a little more money) can start a theatre company. There's a lot to be said for this, but we've also lost a lot, and the story is still changing so much that I don't think we can really see where we're at.

What is the relationship of the artist and the critic? What has it been in the past, what is it now, and what should it be? I've been thinking for years now about writing a play or a novel about this subject, but it seems to me like the story is still emerging, and no telling where it will go next.

Peter Hardy

Are you proud to call Atlanta home?

THE LOCAL. Is a collaborative theatre project made of short pieces by different Atlanta artists. All the pieces are set in different Atlanta locations. There are also pieces based on real stories collected from local people. The stage is set f or the many locations through the use of projected photographs.

THE LOCAL is being produced by The Essential Theatre in July, 2012, as part of a three play festival performing in the King Plow Arts Center in Atlanta. The Essential has got the bare bones covered but this project wants to fly. There are playwrights, poets, choreographers, photographers, designers, songwriters, rappers, dancers, and more artists involved, all with wonderful creative ideas that need some financial fertilizing to fully flower.

So we’ve come to Kickstarter. A few thousand dollars will enable this project to be as beautiful as we are inspired to make it. Studio time for musicians, an urban street choreographer, and a specially constructed silk flame/feather dance veil are just three of the elements needed to fulfill our vision.

The show is lot about belonging (and the other face of that -- not belonging). Finding where you belong, how you belong, finding your place. How you shape the place you live, and how it shapes you. It's about where we live, physically and metaphorically.

There’s a long term vision for this project as well. Down the road, we’d like to take the project down the road. Imagine ten or twelve cities across the country doing their own LOCALS, then networking with each other to produce another set of shows composed of pieces drawn from all the cities. Each city would have a different show because each one would choose different scenes.

For instance, one city might choose to do all the Occupy scenes from all the different cities, each colored by the culture and the climate of its location.  Another city might choose to do all the scenes about favorite hangout joints. Or all the Gay Pride scenes. Another might just choose their favorite scenes, no matter what the setting. Performers from the original LOCALs would travel to the other cities to perform their pieces for audiences in other parts of the country and network with artists from all over America.  Each production would speak to both regional essence and the national zeitgeist and help to connect artists and audiences across the nation.

But that's down the road. Right now, we're raising money to make this first show. And we would very much like to have you help it happen with your financial support and to join us on stage by signing our graffiti wall with a personal message. Thanks!

Bat-Hamlet Walk On Role

Win a walk-on role in Jordan Pulliam’s Bat-Hamlet, a comic book re-telling of Shakespeare’s Hamlet!

To Enter:

Simply follow the link to our OvationTix calendar and select BAT-HAMLET WALK ON RAFFLE tickets and you will be taken to a page to sign up. Only 25 raffle tickets are available per performance date, so get yours now! Purchase of a raffle ticket does NOT reserve you a seat in the audience. If you would like to attend a performance, you will need to purchase regularly priced tickets as well.

One week prior to each show date, a winner will be selected and notified via email.

You may enter as many times per performance as there are raffle tickets available, and you may enter for as many or as few performances as you would like. Winners will be notified through the contact information provided at time of raffle ticket purchase, so please be sure to provide your preferred contact information.

Winners:

Winners will be notified via e-mail one week prior to the show date, allowing you time to tell your friends and family when they can come see YOU onstage!

Winners should arrive one hour prior to showtime for costume fitting and rehearsal. A seat will be reserved for the winner to watch the first act of the show. After intermission, the winner will stay backstage in the greenroom and be cued by the Assistant Stage Manager to enter for his/her scene. Each winner will receive an autographed poster from the show as well as a digital picture of themselves with the entire cast.

More Good News For Essential's Alumni

Three of the finalists being considered for the Eugene O'Neill Center's National Playwrights Conference this year are Georgia writers who've had World Premieres produced by the Essential Theatre: Karla Jennings, Gabriel Jason Dean and Lauren Gunderson! Congrats to all three of them (and also to Adam Szymkowicz, whose "Food For Fish" we produced in 2009). The Essential Theatre helps send Georgia playwrights out into the world!  https://sites.google.com/a/theoneill.org/npc-2012-finalists/full-finalist-list