If you read this blog even semi-regularly, you know by now I'm a self-professed geek. Given that that's the case, I found the two videos below irresistably awesome. The students in the video--high school students, mind you--built a working Battlestar Galactica Viper training simulator. (If you haven't seen the SciFi channels BSG series from a few years ago, stop reading and go watch it, if only for Bear McCrary's amazing sound design.)



The project apparently took several months to…

Final day of the voting in the semi-finals! Who will make it one step closer to the prize? You decide!

UPDATE: Congrats to Jason Tollefson and Porsche McGovern, winners of Round 4! 

Jason Tollefson – Rent…

Thursday brings Round Three of the semis! Today's photos are below.

UPDATE: Congrats to Angelina Vyushkova and Paul Green! You're going on to the finals!

Al "The Tumbleweed" Williams - Kempner High School Dance Dept Spring Show…

[Welcome to David J. Loehr, our new blogger on TheatreFace.com! David's a playwright (among many other things, as he explains below) and he'll be here every other Wednesday, sharing the playwriting blog spot with Marisela. I've known David for years -- through his #2amt work, and also because of his writing --…

Day 2 of voting in the semi-finals begins with another six pics for you to choose from. Here are your contestants!

You can vote here. 

Congrats to Amanda Clegg Lyon and Nathaniel Jewett! You won Round 2, and are headed to the finals!…

The first semi-final matchup in the TheatreFace and Rosco Gobo Photo Contest is now live! The pics included are below! Once you've checked them out, go vote! 

UPDATE:

Sorry for the tardiness in posting the winners from Round 1! I announced them on Twitter the other day, but neglected to update this post. The winners from Round 1 were: Michael Diedrich and Ethan Krupp! Congrats you guys! …

In the past few years several of my close theatre friends from various eras in my career have tied the knot - and this past year the number seems to have reached almost epidemic proportions with no less than five good buddies (for some reason this year they've all been friends who are guys). I've had the good fortune not to mention the spare cash, banked time off, and calendar availability, to be a part of some of these weddings, most recently this past weekend. 

One of my oldest…

    Theatre Communications Group released their 2011 snapshot on the status of non-profits in terms of budget and needs in 2011 and their predictions for 2012.  The majority of theatres showed an increase or static motion of income for fiscal year 2011; however, the TCG snapshot does not discuss if these signs of recover are due to significant cuts prior to fiscal year 2011 or if the overall status of the theatre truly…

Thanks to everyone who submitted to the TheatreFace and Rosco Gobo Photo Contest! We had a LOT of submissions – more than we have had before – so we’re going to do the voting a little differently, too, to make sure that none of them get lost in the shuffle.

Voting will now occur in two rounds. This week…

We as Americans love to gamble. We love the long-shot underdog one-in-a-million victory. We love the sports movies with weak teams rallying, the spy movies with one man triumphing over entire armies of bad guys, the American Idol stories of a nobody exploding into a mega-star somebody. America, land of the free, land of opportunity, land of the lottery winners!

Real life functions a little differently. 

Not to say the fantasy doesn't come true, or the…

So, I find myself in a unique position.  I am the Founder of a theater company that, nine years after its birth,  is in the process of acquiring a permanent indoor home- a project that will cost six million dollars when all is said and done.  It’s not a building built by a university for our use, nor is it a shared performing arts center that is being renovated by a third party and we will be sharing with other groups.  It will be our theater and we will be responsible for making it a…

As I mentioned last month (here and
here), our department received a sizable grant this year to purchase automation and control equipment to outfit a nice-sized lab with logic controllers, control software, and a pair of iPads. I've been spending the last week mucking about with Cycling…

“Hello, this is the Gizortenplatz Playhouse.  Please listen to our menu as the choices are constantly changing.  After making a selection, please leave a message at the tone.  Proper elocution is expected.

To Donate Money, please press 1

To Purchase Tickets,…

But wait…haven’t we always been?

What’s all this about? Well, two times last week I came across the “theatre is obsessed with new plays” meme and both times I asked myself, “Really? Are we really that obsessed with new plays?”

The longer I considered this question the more I began to wonder, hasn’t that always been the case? After all, before there was a canon of classics to draw from, those classics were being written. Once upon a time those classics were new plays.

I…

Last weeks post "The Unicorn" was about the shows we covet being a part of... the plays of fable we dream of adding to our resume and portfolio - be it designing, staffing, directing, acting. 

But like every coin,…

Dearest Stage Manager:

I have a confession: I am kind of in love with you. Whether I'm acting or directing, you really complete me (and the production). You're the glue that holds everything together. You're the talent that takes a bunch of really cool individual pieces and pulls it together into an art-making machine. It blows my mind everything you have to do, and how you do it, to make a production happen. And you rarely get the love you deserve, because when you're good,…

Hey, us small communty theatre troupes are trying just as hard to contrbuite to the cultural collective as well.

My particular organization has been in operation for 38 years here in rural Pennsylvania. Our annual budget is as much as some put into one production. Box office is so small that 95% of our productions don't see a profit. We stage three shows a year in a Middle School auditorium so the lighting is basic the curtains are fixed and there is no fly space.…

Last week, I wrote about our epic (and dirty--I'm still coughing up dust!) clean out of our off-site storage space. We're fortunate to have one, and to have one that's as sizable as ours is. This week--in fact, in a couple of hours--we're to meet with various university administrative officers to discuss our warehousing needs. Evidently, the university's ten-year lease on the current warehouse building (which includes storage for any number of university departments and groups--not just…

What are the predictors of accidents?  Can you prevent accidents by curing bad behavior?  Simple things to look for in your company / school’s culture that you can change, and as a result, change the outcome of your risk exposure.

• Lust can take any form such as the lust for…