C1 GALA TONIGHT!

So ladies and Gents,

Tonight is the C1 Gala.

Where else can you see the whole family decked out and ready to party?
I'll be posting pics tomorrow - but the only way to catch Tory (yes, Tory of slamboston MC fame) singing his welcome to all of us - OR - C1 alumni serenading you all night while you under bid on the fantastic silent auction items (check out the items you can bid on here: https://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/AuctionHome.action?auctionId=103141448 ).

So you can either look at the pictures here tomorrow - like the girl not invited to the party - or be featured in them yourself!

See you tonight!

All In One

Hello Ladies and Gents,

It is I, Tory Bullock, here and back in full effect for one last final post. Hold your "awwws" and "please don't go’s" because it is time for me to fade off into the sunset with my ARTiculation crew riding towards our next adventure. Due to the fact that i have fallen behind in a lot of the bloggage (yes i did in fact make up a word) this blog will be the most epic in length blog you will ever see, so brace yourself. I will be breaking down this blog into weeks so you will be brought up to speed on the entire process, and not just reflection. So our story will pick up where we left off: opening week.

OPENING WEEK:
Wow. The day is almost here. We are all set with costumes, the set is done, our dressing rooms are in order, our headshots are already up in the lobby, AND i just found out that i can get a free gift card to Qdoba which happens to be the main outlet for actual food around the theatre so it goes without saying that i am a very happy man. This is the first show that I’m not nervous for. I have done a lot of Theatre in my time - even though my time hasn't been very long, it is still time none the less and i have never not been nervous. This is due, yet again, to the fact that what we are performing has been a part of my life for so long. We have performed this piece in so many different ways that to do it in the same space with the same cast every night is really a relief. But while i am not nervous i am something else that may prove to be a little worse and that is 100% anxious. I say its worse because with my anxiousness comes the questions that actors DREAD: "Will people come?" "will they like it?" "am i going to mess up?" and those questions are currently making the rounds in my head…

OPENING NIGHT into WEEK 2:
I’m at the Theatre early. Call is at 6:30 and i am here at 5. Call it being antsy but i just could not stay home and from the looks of it neither could the rest of my cast. We are all here with the exception of Ms. Terri D. Nik is lying down on the stage doing his "actor thing" while Danny is sitting in the audience chairs going over his lesson plan for his class the next week. Lindsay is cueing lights with Mark and Eliza, Marvelyn is in the dressing room listening to Beyonce and eating mac and cheese, i am watching it all. Like an old man sitting on his porch with a cup of ice cold lemonade on a blistering hot day, i sit on the side of the stage and just watch in complete awe of everyone and everything that is about to happen. I’m still NOT NERVOUS, but there is a new feeling: pride. i am filled with such pride to share the stage with these people. From the core four all the way to the new recruits, we have become a real family and in the wonderful gypsy world of theatre you don't get too many of those – I’m still trying to figure out how i got so lucky. Fast forward two hours and we are at half hour until the show begins. We have already done our group warm ups - you could tell because the back rooms were filled with air, breathe, bellowing diaphragm supported hoots, and insane calls of UNIQUE NEW YORK (its a tongue twister try it sometime. Repeat it over and over UNIQUE NEW YORK). But the time for group warm ups has ended and we all find our own space in our dressing rooms and just get ourselves to a place where we can fully understand what we are about to do. For a lot of us this isn't just a show - this is a belief and a mantra. This show has been there for us when our own family and friends weren’t. It is much more than theatre because it is a piece of all of us. As Eliza comes through the door and gives us the call that all actors gear up for - "Places" - i stand up, look over at Nik and Danny and just say "Lets go". The Show was AMAZING! Wow it was one of those things where you couldn’t anticipate what the reaction would be, but once you got it you knew that everything was going to be ok and it was. It REALLY WAS!

WEEK 2:
So now the real game begins because since we have been chosen to be Company One’s "Page to Stage" educational production, we perform 10am shows with an 8am call - I don’t mind because I love the kids! The shows were really good - the kids get things that the late night crowd doesn’t pick up on sometimes so it was a lot of fun.

CLOSING NIGHT:
Ok so this is the big one. Emotions are running high and everyone is moving a little bit slower. I can see everyone's faces both excited and sad because this is the last time we will do this show in this space. After working on something for so long you miss it soooo much when it suddenly leaves. But we are actors and the job at hand is to put on a show and it is beyond me to not give two of the best last shows of all time.

We are back stage waiting, getting prepared to do it one last time. Before we go on stage I pull Terri, Nik, and Danny to a small section of the back corridor and we get into a huddle. Since I am a private guy (hah!) i will not tell you exactly what was said, but we all gave each other one big hug in acknowledgment of the journey that the four of us have taken as original creators of ARTiculation. Eliza comes through the doors and says "Places." We all walk out, and proceed to leave as much of ourselves as we can on that stage. Hopefully, we entertained some people while doing it.

-Tory

Opening Night!

Its been a while, but I am back and in full effect.

So first off I would like to just say - wow!

This process will have special meaning for me for a long time. Since it has been a while I will start off from about a week ago. We started to build the set - I haven't done tech work in about four years so it was nice to get a drill and screws back into my hand. From the beginning I knew this was going to be something special but it didn't really hit me until I went to Boston Playwrights' Theatre for the first time and saw the most breathtaking sight i have possibly seen in my life...(dramatic pause)

ARTiculation is on the MARQUEE!!!

Outside of the theatre, we are literally the only thing on the marquee, and in that moment I realized just how big of a deal this is. When you're 18 and you say "this is what I want to do," whether it is college, a job, a career, or in my case a production, and about four years later you are standing in front of your name lit up in lights - it's pretty cool.

Now back to the set. Myself and Nik Walker had an unspoken agreement that our work on ARTiculation doesn't end with the words or rehearsal but it continues into all other areas. That's one of the things that I love about the people involved with this production - it's not about vanity or who has the most lines or who gets paid the most - it's about the family atmosphere. I love the fact that I can leave a 6 hour rehearsal and show up at the theatre an hour later ready to put up lights , sweep floors, and run errands side by side with the same people who I share the stage with. So, long story short, the set has been built and it looks amazing. Like I said in an earlier post, it is a sidewalk playground on steroids filled with poles and grates and just a lot of cool scenery.

We had our first dress rehearsals this week and they felt really good, with the exception of one where I froze and completely forgot MY LINES! I'm pretty positive it was noticeable and I was so down on myself about that because I don't forget lines! But anyway, at one point while I was sitting backstage halfway through the opening where Nik Walker is delivering "Dinner and a Conversion" I realized that we truly have a show on our hands. We have always had a performance, but we have never had a production, and this ladies and gentlemen is a production. It is the absolute best version of ARTiculation and I cannot wait to open officially in about 5 hours!

More post-opening,
Tory

Hello again beautiful people. Tory here back and in full effect.

So we are wrapping up our first full week of rehearsals and WOW we are moving really fast. The week started off last Monday when we began to read through the final draft of the script. After that, we began to do what us Theatre folk call "putting it up on its feet". We played around with a lot of different staging ideas and wordplay, and what developed through the rest of the week was the beginnings of what will be the best ARTiculation show ever!

It's kind of funny because i'm just so excited about every aspect of this process from seeing the new postcards, to seeing pictures of us on the C1 web site, or even taking a glance a our brand spankin' new trailer that you'll all see on YouTube very soon. We also got a little glance at our costumes for the run and all I can say, while keeping it under wraps, is a LOT of color. The set can only be described as an emo playground on steroids - I will be the first to say it: Terri D. will hurt herself on this set. It is written.

In addition to adding a lot of new production elements we are also adding a LOT of music - we have turntables, acoustic guitars, lots of singing, electric bass, and tons of movement. This is definitely taking people out of their comfort zones, but it's also opening us up to things we never even thought about performance-wise. THANK YOU LOIS ROACH!

Ok guys and gals that's it for this time around. Good write, good night.

-Tory

ARTiculation Begins

Hello beautiful people out there in internet world. This is your master of ceremonies, Duke of Linguistics, Commander of Funk, and all around good guy, Tory Bullock. For the duration of these first ever ARTiculation blog entries I will be playing the part of your poetic flight coordinator, weaving you through the ins and outs of the production. While I come with many titles, the one that I am most proud of is "co-founder of ARTiculation". For those of you who don't know, ARTiculation was founded in the steamy hot summer of 2005 by cast members Danny Balel, Terri Deletetsky, Simon Moody, Adobuere Ebiama, Nik Walker, and yours truly. Along the years we have shifted and shaped to form many different variations of which I am as proud of as the one we are currently taking. This is our first mainstage performance run of ARTiculation with four of the original founders performing. Danny, Terri, Nik and I, and new members Mike Cognata, Marvelyn McFarlane, Liz Rimar, and DJ Reazon, will be coming to you guys with 13 powerhouse shows, and we hope you're ready (i.e we hope you all have gone online and purchased your tickets!)

Since I get to talk to you guys well before the show even opens, there will be tons of breaking news (which i will represent by saying *BREAKING NEWS*) about sets, sounds, backstage updates and all of that jazz. Did Nik Walker injure himself in a musical retelling of the grinch that went awry? Did Danny Balel have an unfortunate tongue twister poem accident that resulted in him having to be sidelined for a show or two? These are the juicy gossip details that you will only find here at the C1 blog.

Enough of the small talk - here comes the juicy information that I know you all are dying for. We had our last script / production meeting last Sunday and let me just tell you all how EXCITING it was! We were sitting in our director's apartment, and just looking around the room gave me this intense feeling of "wow, we are really going to have an amazing show." For those of you who are in the dark, this run is, in part, a culmination of four years of tweaking, performing, touring, work-shopping, and testing, so I compare this run to a person who has been training for the Olympics for four years and then finally gets the chance to step onto the world's greatest stage.

That is exactly whatʼs going to happen in January when we set foot on the Boston Playwrights' stage, backed by Bostonʼs most creative and innovative Theatre company, Company One, all the while standing next to great friends who have been building this piece for years. It is going to be amazing, and I look forward to taking everyone through the process with us.

More soon...
Tory