Saturday September 11 at 11 a.m. Come Dance with a Clown

$5 for kids, $7 adults and grandparents free!! Available at the door.

Yes, it’s grandparents day! Kids invite your grandma and grandpa to enjoy a delightful performance featuring clowns, puppets, music and more. Clowns Shmurple, Mambo and Bowtie visit some pesky puppets, including The Encyclopoodle (the dog who knows everything), the Ductionary (the duck who knows every word in the English language), and Taco Caramba, the most ferocious pirate parrot to fly the seven seas! Join them as they struggle to find out what a “compromise” is, brave the Big Dark Scary Cave and Dance With a Clown!

This project is supported in part by a grant from the Cultural Council of Northern Berkshire, a local agency which is supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency.

Stage Combat, Unarmed Violence for Stage & Screen

Slaps, punches, kicks and more taught with the “safety first” technique used on stage & screen. Get on your feet and learn the illusion of violence and how to stage it in your next show. Participants will learn the primary safety aspects of combat and the core unarmed moves they will most likely come across in their scene work: identifying when combat is needed and how to be smart, safe actors when dealing with violence. Plus, the physical ensemble work will promote team building, listening skills and a heightened awareness of one’s surroundings. All skill levels and body types welcome.

Physical Comedy – Extreme Actor/Audience Techniques

Let them laugh at you… it’s your JOB! Learn a hybrid of straight comic acting, physical comedy and quick witted improv to engage and mesmerize your audience. Tune up your own comedic timing and inject that into your character work. Find out the magic of repetition, how to make the simple hilariously difficult, and much more. Participants will develop a stronger sense of the clown in their character work and how to incorporate the audience in everything they do. Focus is also put on being vulnerable in front of an audience and reaping the benefits from the honesty in your comic work. All skill levels welcome.

The instructor, Christopher Beaulieu, is an Actor/Director/Fight Choreographer/Teacher with over 15 years experience teaching and directing students in various areas of theater. Co-founder of the physical theatre company, Creatively Independent, LLC, Chris tours 250+ days/year performing and teaching the performing arts. He has taught internationally in Germany and Canada, as well as nationally. Chris has founded theater companies in Massachusetts and Germany. He has trained and taught with the internationally recognized Shakespeare & Co. education program. Chris is an accredited Advanced Actor/Combatant in 7 weapons with the Society of American Fight Directors. He recently finished the prestigious Physical Theatre Program at Dell Arte International School of Physical Theatre. This intensive training focuses on the actor-creator and the development of devised work for the theatre including stage movement, mask construction & performance, commedia, melodrama, clown and improv. Beyond the stage, Chris teaches at multiple conferences: Florida State Thespians, North Carolina State Thespians, Florida Assoc. of Theatre Educators and the prestigious Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival (SE Region), as well as clown/performance skills under the Big Top for Circus Smirkus, a well established youth based circus school. Recently, Chris was asst. director to Dell’Arte’s Artistic Director, Michael Fields on the original production of The Hunting of the Snark. Chris is happy to announce his recent invitation to join the select list of teaching artists working for ISTA (International Schools Theatre Association). ISTA reaches students across the globe and is responsible for the IB Theatre curriculum. Recently, Chris directed Continental Theatre’s premiere of “The Diminticato Family Circus” at Montreal’s highly acclaimed Segal Centre.

To register for this class please call Main Street Stage at 413-663-3240 or reserve online here. Space is limited.

For more information on Creatively Independent visit: creativelyindependent.net

Saturday May 30th and Friday August 7, The Musical Hat.

Saturday June 6 and July 18, Pirates!

All shows are at 11 a.m. Tickets are $5 for children and $7 for Adults. No reservations, first come first serve.

The Musical Hat
Written and directed by Don Jordan

Shmurple and her fellow clowns sing songs from their Musical Hat, when suddenly they discover that their music has been stolen. Join them in their hilarious adventures as they try to get it back and in the process discover what music is made of. Meet the Snoof, a detective puppet made of eyes, ears, nose, a hand and a mouth. Learn new words from the Ductionary — the duck who knows every word in the English language. Feel what it’s like to dance with a clown!

The performances feature Berkshire County actors Wendy Walraven, Alexia Trainor and Matthew Coviello, with puppets by Clothespin Puppets.

Pirates!
Written and directed by Don Jordan

A swashbuckling adventure featuring bold buccaneers, a mysterious map with a riddle, cursed treasure, a visit to an island that you can’t see, a pirate ghost, and a magical journey to the bottom of the sea. This sea-faring tale features mime, music, masks, and delightful puppets created by Clothespin Puppets.

The performances feature Berkshire County actors Wendy Walraven, Mike Trainor and Matthew Coviello. Together they bring you a family performance brimming with excitement and theatrical innovation.

For more information visit their website at www.nutshellplayhouse.org

Working alongside theatre professionals, these students will see what it takes to create a theatrical production. Their final performance will be held at the theatre and will be open to the public. Tuition is $100.

Monday – Friday, April 20-24th  1pm-4pm

Performance 4pm on Saturday, April 25th

For more information call 413-663-3240.

Main Street Stage is pleased to offer a free two-day Shakespeare acting workshop on Saturday, April 18th, from noon to 4pm and Sunday, April 19th, from 1-5pm. Building upon the success of last year’s free workshop, this program is intended to offer an opportunity for community members to play with Shakespeare’s text and characters. Participants will be led through a Linklater-based vocal and physical warm-up, and participate in status activities and movement exercises. In addition, participating actors will explore text from Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, which Main Street Stage will be producing this summer.

Formal auditions for the summer production will be held on Saturday, May 9th and Sunday, May 10th from 2-5pm at the theater.

Main Street Stage has been dedicated to including the local community in the artistic process. Last year, we literally opened our doors to the rehearsal process, inviting the community to come and watch rehearsals for the production of Romeo & Juliet. This year, we wanted to get the audience involved even earlier in the process.

At this stage in artistic discovery, directors, producers, and designers are reading and rereading the script to consider the various themes, images and interpretations to set the tone for this summer’s production, currently scheduled to open in mid-July. To this end, community members are invited to attend this open reading and offer their own insights and observations of the text, story and characters.

After the reading, audience members and actors alike will be invited to the lobby to complete activities at any or all of the “creation stations.” There will be a station for “Building the World” in which a line of text from the play is drawn from a hat and the participant will create a three-dimensional piece of artwork to represent this line. Another station is “Words about Words,” in which participants draw words and phrases from a hat and use them to create an original poem representative of themes or ideas that struck them during the reading. Additionally, there will be a station for creating paintings and/or drawings of scenes, abstract images evoking emotions or themes, or character renderings based on their impressions of the play. These creations will be considered by the directors and design team as they plan this summer’s production and all participants will be recognized in the program for their input.

The event will be run by Alexia Trainor, Executive Director for Main Street Stage, and Melissa Quirk, director of this summer’s Shakespeare production.

There is no charge for admission to this event.

Main Street Stage in North Adams announces today the renewal of our education program. Due to the success of our spring vacation camp (“The Play’s the Thing”) and its production of Hamlet, a program has been created for summer vacation.

The two-week camp runs Monday through Friday, July 30 through August 11 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. with a performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream on August 10 and 11 at 4 p.m. Tuition is $300. The camp is open to ages 11-14. Download the application form here in Word or PDF:

MSSEdProgramApp2007.doc

MSSEdProgramApp2007.pdf

There will also be a weekly drop-in class called “Just Playin’ Around” open to anyone aged 11-18 with an interest in acting. This class will run on Thursdays only, July 12 through August 30 from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. The cost is $5 per class.

Tuition assistance and work study are available for both programs. Please contact Melissa Quirk at 413-663-3240 for more information and to register.