January 2007 Highlights - Play Helps in St. Bernard, Louisianna; National Atomic Museum, Las Vegas

Greetings from Winter Park, FL,

If it's February, it must be crunch time. At least, that's the way it turned out this year, when our schedule shifted from its usual pattern, and we ended up opening two new productions at the beginning of the year, instead of in May, as we normally do (if there's anything really normal about theatre). We premiered our multicultural folktale production, "Quizzical Quests" in January in Las Vegas--where we attended a performance by Penn and Teller, and where Zephyr took a backstage tour at "Star Trek: the Experience", being sworn to secrecy not to reveal any of the special effects tricks.

And now, we're just a few days away from opening "Shakespeare Shazam", an introduction to The Bard's work that is designed especially for middle school and junior high school students. The new production opens Feb. 15th in Florida. That's right, we've driven all the way across the country in the past couple of weeks (not the fastest we've ever made the trip), adjusting to a three-hour time differential and stopping to rehearse along the way wherever we could.

Hopefully, we didn't turn too many heads or send anyone scampering to call Homeland Security by staging swordfights in parking lots. We also--or more specifically, Kimberly--has been laboring away fiercely to get the costumes ready while Dennis did the driving (which is also a switch--not that Dennis ever sews, but Kimberly usually drives). The costumes are important, because while "Shakespeare Shazam" is intended to make The Bard's work fun and accessible to young contemporary audiences (How many Shakespeare productions incorporate an electric guitar?), it also is designed to teach them a thing or two about the historical and cultural context. (Shhh! Don't tell!) It features excerpts from such popular works as "Romeo and Juliet", "Macbeth", "The Tragedy of Julius Caesar", "King Lear" and "A midsummer Night's Dream".

During our cross-country trek, we made some interesting stops along the way, including the National Atomic Museum in Albuquerque--which we found to be too heavy on the warfare exhibits. And we visited New Orleans for the first time since Katrina. We even spent a couple of days volunteering with Habitat for Humanity, which is rebuilding St. Bernard Parish (a "parish" is basically what they call a county in Louisiana) which is just south of the city, and which was hit particularly hard. In fact, we were astounded by the devastation still in evidence 16 months later--it appeared as if the disaster had struck

only last week. The water has receded, but homes and businesses are still gutted, boarded up and in shambles; many areas of several blocks still look like a ghost town. Many people are living in trailers supplied by FEMA, in encampments on the parking lots of abandoned shopping centers or even on the grounds of schools. We'd expected to be picking up hammers and saws and helping out in the carpentry trade-isn't that what Habitat for Humanity does? But through a fluke, we were hooked up with a retired gentleman named Danny (also a fulltime RV'er) who was working with a program called Play Helps, which was initiated by the Children's Museum of Manhattan (yes, in New York). The general idea was to use the arts as therapy for children affected by the catastrophe. So we ended up going to Andrew Jackson Elementary School to...well, to do pretty much what we usually do. We didn't perform shows, but we did conduct workshops, or perhaps "playshops" would be more appropriate. This time, however, our particular topic was music rather than theatre or writing or ASL. (Other people were conducting sessions in writing and art projects.) This was right up the alley of Zephyr and Dennis; Dennis used a lap harp and his flute and even a bottle partially filled with water to illustrate the principles of pitch. Zephyr wowed them with his electric guitar, his electric bass, and an acoustic guitar provided by the school. Danny demonstrated a Native American flute and a Tibetan singing bowl. And we all (including the regular teacher) guided the students in creating their own rhythm effects with various percussion instruments.

We spent two days at this school, and also one evening at which we created a theatre game for a special family night event, before we had to head out to our next gig. And we feel confident that we helped demonstrate once more a point that we've often stressed over the years: that the arts help heal, inspire and motivate as few other things can.

Day-by-Day details: January 2007