The Importance of being Earnest

In case this tempers some of your reluctance... Class Act was basically in charge of getting the cast organised. So casting, rehearsing, directorial choices, and acting criticisms fall in their court. Bare Naked Theatre is basically the guy in Busselton who puts up the finances. So budgetary, admin, and marketing decisions mainly fall to him. In fact, to most practical purposes (apart from artistic choices) this should be considered a Bare Naked production based out of Busselton. This is why we did (& are still doing) an extensive tour down south, but were only booked into a Perth theatre for 4 nights to fit in both shows. I agree with you, the 'set' (used for both plays...in fact, recycled from last year's two plays and I think possibly the year's before that?) is painfully rudimentary - simply some garden chairs and a frame with 2 curtains. Touring down south, it made far less of an impression. In several of the venues we performed in (to name just two, the Dwellingup community hall, or the Hopetoun Rec centre, bless em both) the venues were markedly IMPROVED by the addition of our set! The stages themselves were almost too small for 7 actors to manage a curtain call, and the only way to effect any theatrical entrances or exits in the space were by erecting our cheap set. The mistake was to place this on the stage at Subiaco. Framed by the larger stage, focus was drawn toward the set construction, which previously had been less prominent and had drawn better focus toward the actors. In a 'proper' theatre, ours could only come off looking poorer. Others in the cast had put forward the idea of doing it all at Subi with NO set, but given the shape of the venue and the time we had to bump in and consider reblocking, it was decided too problematic to attempt. Unfortunately too, the shape of Subi meant we could no longer enter AROUND the set, but were forced to make all our entrances through curtains which previously had been used far less. This drew attention to how distracting they could be. I personally prefer shows that lean to a minimalist design. They are my favorite shows to act in and to watch, because nothing distracts from the relationship between actor and audience. Nothing gets in the way of the mechanics of telling the story, and the performance is completely versatile. (Of course, the performance is also then completely vulnerable...there's nothing else to blame!). And to counter your point, I often feel that sometimes the quality of some sets and costumes are so GOOD as to be distracting from the overall production..! But in this instance, our set did not come close enough to be considered properly minimalist in this regard, so I can understand your disappointment if you care about such things. I'm a little surprised that you extend this equally to the costumes, because I thought Merri did as well as anyone could on no budget (indeed, as well as several professional companies would have managed on their tight budgets)...but then, I concede that there are some of you out there who have become extremely good at producing effective costumes out of nothing. And for effective simple touring sets, I really miss Lou Westbury! Thanks for your contribution to the discussion. Cheers, Craig ~<8>-/====\---------