| INAUGURATING THE NEXT THEATRE COMPANY BLOG!
by Jason Loewith on 11/01/2006 01:18:00 PM
After a year and a half of planning, I am happy to open the Next Theatre Company Blog!
We designed this blog as an online forum for ideas - not just mine, but yours: the audience, the Board, the staff, the artistic associates... anyone who visits the arts to reflect on life, culture, and the world beyond us. Our blog is a natural outgrowth of the desire of the company to energize the civic space, to put debate onstage in entertaining and provocative ways, and to create a safe place for exploring issues important to our community. As I write this, we are seven days before the midterm elections, and our civic space has become cluttered with vitriol - ideology posing as debate. So the need for real conversations on topics of substance is more crucial than ever. Hopefully this online forum allows various constituencies of the Next an opportunity to do just that.
I have lately been reading the work of computer-programmer-turned-internet-critic Ellen Ullman, who claims the internet has worked to close down the civic space. (You can order her fascinating book, Close the Machine, here). We can sit in our quiet rooms before the glow of a computer and insert ourselves into online communities where we only meet people with whom we already agree. How different from the civic space of a theater! A theater is a crucible of community, where we gather together to explore one issue or idea - and we may be surrounded by people with whom we disagree. At Next, we hope to explore those disagreements through the art onstage, from a place of mutual respect.
We are not only seven days from the midterm elections, we are two weeks into rehearsal for the delightful new play from Christopher Durang, Miss Witherspoon. I will tell you more about that in our next post, but in the meantime, here are some photos from first rehearsal.
Actors Linda Kimbrough, Anita Chandwaney and Joseph Wycoff peer into the set model.
Set designer Brian Sidney Bembridge builds a quarter-inch scale model of the theatre and set from which the carpenters, scenic painters, director and actors work.
Actors read through the script together for the first time, and it is already hilarious!
If you want to see how Durang himself is heating up the blogosphere, check out his recent article on The Huffington Post, where he is a frequent contributor. (Ariana Huffington even gets a mention in the play, so he knows where his bread is buttered!).
In future posts, we will be discussing all kinds of things - shows we have seen at other theaters, thoughts about the Chicago critical community, the national and international theater scene, and a fair dose of local and national politics, community issues, and the other lively arts. Some likely topics in the future include:
*What is the balance in theater between entertainment and art?
*Does theater really make a difference in the world anymore?
*The Chicago theater scene - adventurous or not?
*What architecture can teach us about theater
I hope you will want to join in.
Here is how it works. At present, new topics can only be created by Next Theatre staff and artistic associates. Anyone can respond to an active post below it, either anonymously or in attributed form. Posts will be moderated, so they may be edited for content.
If you would like to suggest a topic for discussion, or would like to become a regular contributor to our blog, email me at Jason@nexttheatre.org. As always, I would love to know what you think.
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Good work, Jason. I look forward to reading!
kudos to Next for getting such a great blog up! can't WAIT to see the show. can't wait to keep reading about all the great stuff happening.
good work, y'all.
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