Dan Bauer is the Director of Public and Community Relations at McCarter Theatre. In addition to coordinating all of McCarter’s press (preview articles, reviews, general-interest stories, etc.), Dan also works to build up McCarter’s audience base, collaborating with churches, community groups, and other cultural institutions to inform potential patrons about McCarter events. In his 20th season, Dan is also McCarter’s unofficial historian (not to be confused with Bill Lockwood, McCarter’s official historian). I asked him 7 questions:

What’s your hometown?

I grew up in Amherst, a suburb of Buffalo, New York.

What do you like most about being the Director of Public Relations?

Every day is a new challege. It’s never the same because the projects are constantly changing. The range of projects and artists that I get to work with is mind-boggling. In the 20 years that I have been doing this job at McCarter the list of artists that I have had the priviledge of working include the greatest performers, musicians, actors, directors and playwrights in the world! And, yes, after all this time, I still get star-struck!!

What’s on your iPod (or CD player, etc.)?

I have an eclectic taste in music. One of my favorites of the past year is Gospel and soul legend Mavis Staples’ We’ll Never Turn Back. This CD is a collection of songs made popular during the Civil Rights Era and they remain as powerful and inspirational today as they were back in the 60’s. Also, Amy Winehouse’s Back to Black, Lily Allen’s Alright, Still, Mark Ronson’s Version. Other Favorites: Stevie Wonder, Cesaria Evora, Ben Harper, Kanye West, Oliver Mtukudzi, Michael Franti, Talib Kweli and the list goes on. Do yourself a HUGE favor and purchase tickets to experience the AMAZING Angelique Kidjo coming to McCarter on May 15. She will rock your world!!

What do you love about Princeton?

The tight-knit community. I love being able to walk down Nassau Street, go to the Princeton Public Library, hang out at Small World Coffee, and always see someone I know. It’s a nice feeling. I also appreciate having everything within walking distance and New York City is only a train ride away. Also, Dillon Gym. To have a gym a stone’s throw from my office is amazing! In addition to being the Director of Public Relations, I’m also a certified Spinning Instructor - maybe I’ll see you in one of my classes!

If you were trapped on a desert island, and could only take one book, what would it be and why?

My first thought, as always, was food. A cookbook. Perhaps The Joy of Cooking, something with tasty Raw Food recipes, or the Gilligan’s Island Cookbook. But there is one book that would guarantee that I wouldn’t be lonely and would make me feel guilty for being trapped on a desert island to begin with. The title? You Never Call! You Never Write! A History of the Jewish Mother.

What was the first play you ever saw?

The first professional production that I saw was Gershwin’s Funny Face at Studio Arena Theatre in Buffalo when I was 10-years-old. My first Broadway show was Pippin three years later and I’ll never forget how uncomfortable my parents were! It was considered risque at the time and they must have thought the orgy scene was too much for young, impressionable minds. Needless to say, they wanted to leave at intermission and I was so enthralled that I insisted we had to stay. The next night…My Fair Lady!

What is your favorite thing about working at McCarter?

The people. The people that I get to work with everyday. The people who work behind the scenes making everything on stage seem so seamless and the people in the audience. There are some nights when I am not only in awe of what’s happening on stage but what’s happening in the audience. To hear uproarious laughter, see people dancing in the aisles and witness an audience leap to their feet in a standing ovation — makes it all worthwhile.

Posted by Adam Immerwahr, Producing Associate at McCarter Theatre.

At a meeting last week, Managing Director Jeff Woodward (who has recently announced that he is leaving McCarter to assume a position at Syracuse Stage) asked me to write a blog entry about some award for which McCarter’s ticket office was nominated. That sounded like a lot of work, so instead I did an “instant message” interview Annie Gribbins, Director of Ticketing Services.

Adam: Yo.

Annie: Hey.

Adam: Jeff tells me I have to write about some award.

Annie: God bless him. He is a big supporter of the Ticket Office.

Adam: That’s nice. Enjoy it while it lasts… Do you think he’s leaving because I put the picture you took on the blog? The one of him on Santa’s lap?

Annie: I’m sure that’s it.

Adam: Fascinating. So what’s the deal with this award?

Annie: We were nominated for Outstanding Box Office from the International Ticketing Association. INTIX is a nonprofit trade and professional organization committed to the advancement of the “admissions” (Ticketing) industry and profession. Established in 1979, it represents over 1200 professionals across the Arts, Theater, entertainment, professional sports, and college and university athletics. There were eleven organizations nominated for Outstanding Box Office.

Adam: How’d they determine the nominees? Did they send out undercover customers? With sunglasses and trenchcoats?

Annie: Ok—poke all the fun you want. I won’t be offended. Lisa submitted McCarter to INTIX for consideration, then we had to fulfill a very long questionnaire from the Awards Committee to actually be officially nominated. The great thing that came out of this is that Lisa asked the staff to contribute their answers to these questions and then she compiled them to make our final submission. It was actually a great team building exercise.

Adam: What were some of the questions?

Annie: What specials skills or techniques does this staff utilize that you feel contributes to the success and reputation of this box office? Hold on, there are a couple more… What was the most complex problem that this box office staff had to overcome this year and how was it solved? What is the most current upgrade that this box office has made in customer service and how has it helped to ease the actual ticket transaction and/or generate revenue?

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You may remember the awesome Berkeley Rep Argonautika Trailer I put on this site on November 23rd (as part of my Thanksgiving Holiday Blog Video Fest). Well, I just stumbled across yet another awesome Argonautika trailer, this time from The Shakespeare Theatre of DC. Remember, McCarter’s production of Argonautika is a three-way co-production between ourself, Berkeley Rep and The Shakespeare Theatre. So the production that you see below is the exact same one as you’ll see at McCarter (same cast, same set, etc). In the blog archives, you can read my post about co-productions and why we do them. Enjoy the video below!

Posted by Adam Immerwahr, Producing Associate at McCarter Theatre.

Are you one of the 14,750 people who have seen Me, Myself & I? What did you think? Do you agree with the newspaper reviews, or disagree? Favorite parts of the show? Things that weren’t to your taste? Post a “citizen response” or read what other people are saying by clicking on the “comments” link below. We can’t wait to hear what you think!

If you want to include a picture with your review, email it to me and I’ll make sure it gets attached.

Posted by Adam Immerwahr, Producing Associate at McCarter Theatre.

The interns of McCarter Theatre are, as always, busily working away on a myriad of projects, doing what we can to keep things running from behind the scenes, or deep in the trenches, or inside cozy little offices—depending on whether you prefer to think of things in terms of show-biz lingo, war metaphors, or strict literality.

Casting Intern Michael Rabinowitz was recently struck with a moment of brilliant inspiration in the form of two acrostics about internships. I hope you enjoy them! (Especially since Michael will probably kill me for posting them up on the blog, so I’m putting my life on the line here to share them with you…)

Your Typical Theater Intern:

Ill-treated

No appreciation

Tired of living in the copy room

Extra set of hands

Running to make coffee

Not allowed to share your thoughts/ideas

Slavery!

McCarter Theatre Interns:
Interesting workload and responsibilities
New challenges every day
Training in all areas of theaterExperienced mentors and leaders
Respected by all
Notable seminars and events
Specialize in the area of your dreams!

At the moment, in addition to assorted projects within our various departments, the Terrific Thirteen (as I’ve just now decided to start calling us interns) have also been meeting up in our off-hours to put together an Open House for people interested in applying for next year’s internships. It’s coming up this weekend—Saturday, February 16th, at 11:00 am, in the West Lobby, so if you’re at all interested in McCarter’s amazing internship program, stop by! There will be a chance to meet this year’s interns, ask any questions you may have, and tour the building. Hope to see you there.

Posted by Elizabeth Edwards, Literary Intern at McCarter Theatre.

Michael Esper and Colin Donnell, who play OTTO and otto in McCarter Theatre’s production of Me, Myself & I sat down with the Princeton News Network a few weeks ago for an interview about the show, their experiences, and the process of playing twins. You can watch the interview—along with some clips from the show—in the media player below or by clicking on this link. Enjoy!

If you haven’t bought your tickets yet, there are still a few standing room spots available.Posted by Adam Immerwahr, Producing Associate at McCarter Theatre.

Lindsay Barnes is McCarter’s Wardrobe Supervisor. Once the costume shop has finished building a show, Lindsay takes over. She works every performance and supervises the clothing. Typical jobs for Lindsay include ironing clothes, making last-minute repairs, helping actors in and out of difficult costumes and lots and lots of laundry. Lindsay is frequently the last one to leave the theater, waiting until the final load of laundry finishes. She also plans and executes the quick changes, during which an actor must get out of one costume and into the next in a matter of seconds—it requires unflappable calm, prescient planning and fast reflexes. I asked her 7 questions:

What’s your hometown?

I grew up in the same town as my Mom and her parents before her, Hawley Pennsylvania. My folks both work at a resort and so I grew up around performers of all kinds but got into theatre in High School.

What do you like most about being the Wardrobe Supervisor?

I am such a social creature, one of the best things about my job is meeting a whole new group of people every six or eight weeks. I work in such close proximity with the actors I get to make friends and learn new things from whoever comes through. Of course in a month or so I lose that group when the show closes, but there is another show right behind them! The other best part is the technical crew. I am fascinated and educated by every time a new challenge arises, and that happens a lot around here. I am proud to be associated with this crew. So, what I like most about being a Wardrobe Manager is that I get to work in both spheres.

What’s on your iPod (or CD player, etc.)?

Over the Rhine, Indigo Girls, Technochek Collision, but mostly NPR. I work at night most of the time and so I get my news from the radio as I am trying to do the daily errands and stuff during the day.

What do you love about Princeton?

I love that we (the crew) can walk into town on a dinner break, have a nice meal and a laugh and still be back for call! Gotta grab some coffee or ice cream, depending on the time of year, for the walk back, though.

If you were trapped on a desert island, and could only take one book, what would it be and why?

Devlin’s Boat Building: How to build any boat the stitch-and-glue way, by Samual Devlin. But other than that, can I get all of Tom Robbins in a consolidated volume? He is funny and irreverent and political and artistic and has something to say about everything worth pondering. His books would keep my mind busy.

What was the first play you ever saw?

I saw Vegas-style shows a lot at the resort growing up but my folks took my sister and I to Broadway when I was 12. We saw The Phantom of the Opera, I still have the souvenir program. I remember wanting to know how they made the boat in the catacombs look like it was really floating.

What is your favorite thing so far about working at McCarter?

The advantages of working in a theater as opposed to anywhere else I have worked (waitress, fabric store, etc.) are numerous! I get to go to work when most people are driving home so I miss all the traffic, I never have to think about what I am doing with my weekends, I get to iron my clothes after I go to work, etc. But the best part about McCarter itself is this phase I am in right now where I not only work with a group of people I respect, I get to go to work 6 days a week and play with my friends. Who else gets to say that?

Posted by Adam Immerwahr, Producing Associate at McCarter Theatre.

Many parts of creating theater encounter relatively little innovation. While there have been some changes in the way that you can build the deck of a set, the basic principles have stayed the same for a long time. Not so with sound engineering. The technology used to create audio playback in a theater has shifted dramatically over the last several years, just as the technology used in our home and car stereos has shifted as well (from vinyl to cassette to CD player to mp3).

Right now, one of the best tools in the sound engineer’s kit is SFX, a piece of software designed by a company called Stage Research. The software, which we use for all McCarter shows, allows you to run sound effects directly off of a computer. Typically, WAV files are saved onto the computer (which is attached to your mixing board, and through that to your speakers) and then are dropped into a “cue list” in the SFX software. Once the cues are in the list, a sound designer can have them overlap, fade in or fade out, auto-follow the previous cues, go to specific speakers, and all sorts of other tricks. More importantly, all these things can happen at the same time. All the sound board operator has to due to execute the cues is click on the big “GO!” button, which then plays the next sequence.

This may sound really simple, but in reality it is quite a complicated job. Still, with experience and training, a sound designer can execute an extraordinarily complicated sequence of cues with only one board operator to run them with only one or two button clicks (for example: on an actor’s cue, a helicopter flies by from the right to left speakers, and when another actor raises his gun we hear gunshots, and then we hear the helicopter stop flying and explode). It takes quite a while to set up the cue list, but once it is all programmed it is much easier to run the show, allowing the board operator to turn his or her attention to the other things they have to do, like mixing live microphones.

Posted by Adam Immerwahr, Producing Associate at McCarter Theatre.

Photo by Frank Wojciechowski

This is the third segment of a six-part interview with Yehuda Hyman, writer and performer of IN-Festival Spotlight Production The Mad 7. Read the second segment here. The play is based on “The Seven Beggars,” a story by Hasidic Rabbi Nachman of Breslov, and follows a character named Elliott as he encounters seven storytellers from various regions of the world. Each one shares a mystical story through music and dance, propelling Elliott on a spiritual journey of self-discovery. The piece will be directed by Mara Isaacs, Producing Director at McCarter Theatre.In the following section, Yehuda discusses the history of past projects which have contributed to the development of this current piece, and the experience of performing the story as a one-man show.

Brian Sostek and others in a production of The Mad Dancers at Mixed Blood Theatre

What has the developmental process of this piece been like since you first became inspired to explore Jewish cultures and spiritual awakening through the “Seven Beggars” story?

Well, I feel like this is a fresh start, this piece. [I have explored the story in several different forms and from several different angles, but] I don’t feel like, “Oh God, I’m hauling this thing out again.” Because it actually is really new for me.

[When I first started working with this material,] I was living in San Francisco. I had given up my career as a choreographer and become a temp, and was writing, and creating performance pieces in little clubs around San Francisco.

At first I was just working ten-minute increments on nights where you could go up and try stuff out. I did that for about a year, and eventually it became a forty-five minute piece—just the first story [out of the seven]. And it seemed clear that there was something of interest to an audience. So that was the beginning.

Then at a certain point I didn’t want to be in it, because it was too big, and I felt that I needed to be outside of it so that I could look. And that impulse eventually culminated in a play for seven actors [called The Mad Dancers]. And that is that play, and that’s a different entity. And I feel good about it.

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On Friday afternoon, the rehearsal room became a temporary film set for our upcoming IN-Festival spotlight production, The Mad 7. Video designer Seth Mellman arrived in the rain with bundles of equipment to be carried into the building and set up for the shoot. We would spend the afternoon filming test versions of the brief video projections to be used in the production.

Our busy playwright - performer - choreographer Yehuda Hyman, having just incorporated significant changes to the text, had not yet had a moment to commit all of the new lines to memory, and planned to hold a script in his hands during the shoot. Seth suggested that we make the conditions of the shoot as similar as possible to the real thing, and that Yehuda should not be looking down to read his lines.”

Maybe we should make you some big cue cards,” I said to Yehuda, joking.”Right!” he laughed, no doubt conjuring up visions of the massive film sets in his hometown of Los Angeles, which couldn’t be more different from our intimate rehearsal process for The Mad 7 here at McCarter.”We’ll also get someone to powder your nose between takes.”

Then, just two minutes later, Seth suggested that “someone really should make him cue cards.”

I knew that, as the assistant director on the production, it would be my responsibility to make the cards. “I’m on it!” I shouted, already half way out the door, on my way to get the job done. (more…)