This Sunday, Jan. 25, the Island Theatre Workshop, Inc. is holding tryouts for two programs of one-act plays to run at the end of March. Artistic director Lee Fierro and board member Kevin Ryan will be joined by Leslie J. Stark to direct the five plays. The tryouts will be held from 2 to 5 p.m. at the Katharine Cornell Theatre. For details, call 508-693-5290.
Sitting down for a lunch break at a windowside table at Waterside Market in Vineyard Haven, Ricardo Khan leaned in comfortably and said with a laugh, “You’ll have to do the talking, I’ve got to eat!” His eyes brim with good humor; this is a man at ease with himself and the world around him. Small personal tales spill easily into the conversation, unsurprising for a playwright and director who has dedicated his life to the art of gathering individual stories and weaving them into narratives that speak to an audience from the stage.
IMP now offers classes and performance opportunities for all types of young actors. Whether they like to play with a script or without, actors ages 7 to 18 are invited to become a part of IMP’s company.
Actors who love to work with scripts can check out the new class Let’s Put on a Show! which will produce a new version of Bears Beware, Goldilocks Is in Your Town.
Actors who like the freedom of no scripts are a good fit for the Story Theater Touring Ensemble and/or IMP improv classes.
The man in black, from his boots to bejewelled beret, was impeccably groomed on Tuesday as he stroked he neatly trimmed white beard and lamented how he’d been type-cast. He is usually the guy who gets beaten up — “the biker, the trucker, the redneck,” in his words. This experience in taking fake fisticuffs was what Broadway combat choreographer David Brimmer was passing on to an enthusiastic group of Vineyard students.
The New England Choreographers Project brings together two artists for one show on Sunday at 7 p.m. at the Yard in Chilmark: the theatrical, idiosyncratic and profoundly musical Lise Brody and Nicole Pierce.
Ms. Pierce brings her multi-media dance/theatre company EgoArt to share her ongoing exploration of Mozart’s Requiem, and performs her solo, Bunny, to electronic music. Lise Brody frolics through the Inquisition in Dances About Witches and mines the intricate music of Peter Schickele with her intergenerational dance company, Screech to a Stop.
The Vineyard Playhouse will audition for its summer Shakespeare performance — this year it will be The Taming of the Shrew — on Saturday, May 16, from noon to 4 p.m. at the playhouse on Church street in Vineyard Haven. It will be directed by Johanna McKeon.
Actors may arrive at the audition any time during the scheduled hours and sign up for an appointment that day. Everyone who comes to the audition will be seen. Actors should come prepared to perform a short (under two minutes) Shakespearean monologue from any play.
A love story with mythological heroes, shipwrecked kings, queens, witches, a drunken sailor and a famous death scene plays this weekend at the Yard in the form of Dido and Aeneas, a 50-minute opera sung in English. There will be dancing, action sequences and a string quintet.
And of course there will be its famous aria, Dido’s lament, When I Am Laid in Earth, which has been performed by artists as far from opera as Klaus Nomi, Jeff Buckley and even (as a Trance mix) Armin van Buuren.
Calling all actors, directors and technicians. Your moment to shine, or at least strut your stuff, has arrived. This Sunday, Sept. 19 from 1 to 4 p.m. the Island Theatre Workshop is holding an open casting call for its October 21 Pick of the Crop play festival.
Whether you lean toward laughing or crying is just fine because parts are available in both comedic and dramatic plays. Just make sure you are between the ages of twenty-five and sixty.
IMP is looking for many young actors for a new musical, Sugar Rush, The Short and Sweet Adventures of the Gingerbread Boy.
Auditions are open to anyone in grades three and up with a desire to perform and a willingness to commit. Actors do not need to prepare anything for the audition and every attempt is made to make the audition fun and painless. Auditions are open on Tuesday, Nov. 30 and Wednesday, Dec. 1 from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. at the Edgartown School instrumental room
There’s a place on the Vineyard where the boundaries are constantly changing and forms of artistic expression take on new meanings and challenges. It’s a bracing environment where the creative process is valued over the end result, where audiences regularly give standing ovations, not because they are easy critics but because they appreciate the hard work and dedication that goes into this work.
