Adventures in Theatre and Crowdfunding

It’s hard to believe that I have only been writing for the theater format for a couple of years. One aspect of theater that took me a while to figure out is factoring an imaginary stage into my writing. You can’t just write a spectacle-driven play without thinking of the practicalities of how it can be performed. Immersive theater experiences are getting increasingly high tech, but that is a high-budget arena I have not reached. For the most part, your early plays are going to be barebones and lo-fi. Like your first film projects, but in theater, your limitations become your strengths.

            The main difference is the imagined space a stage show creates. In a film, you can imply a certain amount, but it is a more visual medium. In theater, as long as you establish the rules of what each location on stage is, you can get away with a lot. For example, my Hollywood Fringe play, Simone, has multiple locations but very minimal set decoration. An MI6 office and a living room are the dominant spaces, with a couple of others mixed in.

The living room is just two armchairs, a table in between, and another table in the corner. If I were making this as a film, I would have to think about what the filming location looks like, how it appears on camera, whether we can afford to shoot there, etc. Making it as a play, you set up how each location is visualized, whether it is with a blank space or one with props, and the audience will buy into it. The actors need to feel comfortable in the space, and they must instinctively know where each location is on stage. While it is objectively restrictive, I find it gives me a strange feeling of freedom to have the ability to explore the possibilities of a blank stage.

            We had our first performance of Simone on Saturday at noon. The experience of waiting for the show to start is simultaneously nerve-wracking and exciting. I arrived a few minutes early and spent much of the buildup time pacing and waiting for the audience to arrive. The day before the show, I was expecting to worry about how the show would flow, what the audience would think of it, where the laughs would be, etc. Instead, on the day I felt an odd sense of acceptance. I knew that everybody involved put in a tremendous amount of work and time to get the show to this point. So, once I stopped pacing and sat down to watch the wonderful actors, Kate Krieger and Pete Gardner, I found myself not worrying about the details as much. I knew that once the show began, whatever happens next is out of my control.

            At this point, the show takes on its own life and evolves. You can guide it along the way, but how it is perceived is not something you can dictate. All you can do is make the best show you can and hope that people enjoy it. Simone has been a fantastic experience, though not without a few bumps along the way. I originally wrote it to be simple and streamlined for the stage. There are only 2 actors on stage the entire time. How difficult could that possibly be? If only I had known in advance, I would have taken steps to simplify the play and make our jobs easier.

            One of the early issues is the transitions from one set of characters to the other. The two actors in Simone play dual characters. Kate plays the reserved Maya and the fictional tough French spy Simone, while Pete plays the curmudgeonly author Everett, and Simone’s made-up dad and MI6 handler, Dalton. Early on, I naively assumed it would be easy to jump between the fantasy scenes and the real ones. How long can it take to put on a costume? Again, I was proven wrong in my assumptions. Getting the costumes on and the timing right so the transitions don’t drag down the pacing proved to be a challenge. Thankfully, I’m not directing this project. The show’s director Alex Garcia, took on the task, and I’m glad he did, because I would be in over my head with this show.

            We also only had around 2 weeks of rehearsals, which is far less than what a play like this needs. One other problem we encountered that I was not expecting was the show’s runtime. Ideally, it had to be 60 minutes or under. You can have longer shows at Hollywood Fringe, but they cost more. So, when we did a run-through of the show a few days before the first performance, we found out it ran closer to 70 minutes. We had to trim it down to under 60 without compromising the story and characters. I was skeptical that we could accomplish that, but Alex and I got together, made the edits overnight, and sent them to the team. Thankfully, the cuts worked. When we had our first performance, the play ran for around 55 minutes. Sometimes, having pressure to fix something fast is the perfect motivation.

            Now imagine doing all that while trying to raise 10K for the show in a crowd fund. I have always been uncomfortable with the idea of asking for money en masse. For me, it feels like an invasive and uncomfortable question, like asking your grandma what kind of underwear she’s wearing. I won’t go into the complicated mechanics of running a crowd-fund with a small team. Frankly, it’s just as tedious to describe as it is to read. It involves posting every day for however long the crowd fund process lasts. You inform people what show they would be donating towards, who’s involved, why they should care, etc. I sometimes feel tacky and gross asking people for money when there are so many world-impacting issues going on and people trying to raise money for far more important causes. Meanwhile, here’s me saying, hey, give me money to stage a silly play. You mustn’t fixate on that, though. Be proud of what you’re making if you want to get it funded.

You amass all the email and social media contacts you can, then you go nuts with sending hundreds of messages. It’s a necessary but frustrating process. You usually work with a template email that you personalize depending on who you’re contacting. If they’re a good friend or family member, then you should probably give it more personal details and make it less sterile. Template emails always run the risk of looking like they were written by a robot. I’m occasionally tempted to add in weird details halfway through the email to see if the reader is paying attention. Perhaps right after describing the show’s synopsis, I add a sentence in German for no reason, or I could intersperse vulgar and disgusting words to maintain the interest of whoever is reading.

All that aside, the Simone crowd fund has 4 days left. I’m adding a link to the page at the bottom here. This is the last time I will post about it here since this is not a platform I want to use for that purpose beyond this. I want to go back to posting reviews, which I will once the show winds down. It would mean a lot if you were able to donate to the crowd fund at the link below. Of course, I totally understand if you aren’t able to. However much we raise, I’m looking forward to moving forward and getting back to putting proper reviews on this site. Many thanks to everyone for continuing to support this site, even with the long post gaps. And thank you to anyone who donates.