The Mysterious Affair at Styles (In Motion)

Before the proliferation of smart phones (after which time everyone became a cinematographer) capturing random moments on video was a bit more rudimentary. As I have been recalling the ten years since my play adaptation of The Mysterious Affair at Styles premiered, certain video "memories" have popped up on social media.


Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Opening Night
Alcazar Hotel, Cleveland Heights
Producer Daniel Hahn whipped out his flip-phone to record a record turnout for the Great Lakes Theater outreach tour (above). Over one hundred and twenty people attended opening night at the Alcazar Ballrooom. I promise, this is due to the enduring popularity of Agatha Christie, and not my reputation.

The first image is that of director Lisa Ortenzi, who did such a marvelous job getting this show on the road.

 

Thursday, March 1, 2012
Nordonia Hills Branch of the Akron Public Library

Ten years ago I had not yet acquired a smart phone, but I did have a laptop and used that to create this time-lapse document (above) of how our company of five brought in and put up the quite impressive and heavy set. 

Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Lorain County Community College

The second night of performance, Daniel brought his family camcorder and recorded the entire performance at LCCC. It's handheld, so of course it's a little shaky. In this clip, Captain Hastings bids farewell the his audience. Don't worry, no spoilers, and we do get to see the entire company emerge for curtain call.

“The Mysterious Affair at Styles” adapted by David Hansen from the novel by Agatha Christie is available from Playscripts, Inc.

On the Dark Side of Twilight: Akron Public Library, Northwest Branch

Ten years ago, Great Lakes Theater produced my first outreach tour "On the Dark Side of Twilight."

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Final public performance today at the Akron Public Library Northwest Branch. Always a great mix there.

It is usually a 1 PM performance and there are traditionally a number of seniors, members of reading groups, and maybe fifty or so high school students from Firestone who can't attend the performance we do at their school. That performance is tomorrow, that is our last performance of On the Dark Side of Twilight, period.

Today was good. There were odd things happening, my voice cracked at one point, Emily fell down backstage, and Dusten's Eddie just keeps getting dumber.

A woman came up to me after the performance and told me she doesn't like vampires, she doesn't know anything about vampires, but she liked the Chekhov plays last year so much that when she heard I was in this she just had to come. That made my afternoon ... and my afternoon needed making because I had a sinus headache sending a spike into my left eye.

One more performance, tomorrow. It's been an incredible run.

On the Dark Side of Twilight: Akron Public Library - Nordonia Hills Branch

Ten years ago, Great Lakes Theater produced my first outreach tour "On the Dark Side of Twilight."

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Dusten broke the decanter.

The Akron Public Library in Nordonia has been a stop for the GLTF Outreach Tour in long-standing. Always a great, supportive turnout; a small space, but they always serve coffee, lemonade and cookies.

We had a pretty full room. Charlie came to see us! So did Tamara, and she brought her daughter and her friends. A great mix from young to old in the house this evening.

Have I mentioned yet how much I enjoy working with Emily and Dusten? I am grateful for all of the humor and high spirits, it makes schlepping big heavy set pieces much more enjoyable.

Oh, and we got a new table, to replace the one Dusten broke.

On the Dark Side of Twilight: Akron Main Public Library

Ten years ago, Great Lakes Theater produced my first outreach tour "On the Dark Side of Twilight."

Sunday, February 28, 2010

Fantastic afternoon in Akron, yo. Marked improvement over when we drew 6 people for the 2008 tour. Okay eight - but two walked out. A great crowd; girls from Elms who dragged their parents in to check us out, students from Tallmadge High who have created their own adaptation of Dracula for the stage (Vlad Dracul) and even an author who has written bout John Polidori!

We were welcomed with open arms and a really big, red dolly to move things into the awesomely awesome hall at Akron Main Public Library, only this guy put our already seriously abused but otherwise charming little table onto the dolly, just letting it wobble there until we hit a ramp and it went crashing into a rail. Snapped a leg right off and damaged the drawer.

It's an important table. We keep props in it that are used throughout the show, and I have to put Dusten's face into it. The library staff worked feverishly with wood glue and a great clamp -- it's great because it looks old and you can barely see it. We will get that back to you, promise!

The post-show discussion was super (thanks in large part to our author) going over aspects of the show which haven't been brought up much since we began. Never yet, for example, has the term "Terrorist Chic" entered the conversation. And this was the first time someone asked if I had a rationale for why Porlock ages.

Double Heart: Akron Main Public Library

Another great Sunday afternoon performance, today at the main branch of the Akron-Summit Public Library. Attendance was very good for that space, over 90 people were in attendance, many children and teenagers, adults and seniors. Some "fans" of the tour, familiar faces we see every year. Post-show discussion was spirited, largely inquiring as to how we do all this. Daniel invited all the kids (and also several enthusiastic adults) to come up onto the stage to check out the props and costumes.

... and swords!

One guest of honor was Michael G., former GLT actor-teacher from the School Residency Program, as well as two previous outreach tours, The Brute (2009) and The Mysterious Affair at Styles (2012).

Of course, afterwards we put him to work tearing down the set. Thanks, Mike!

There are three more public shows. Sigh. Tomorrow night we travel to the always attractive and enchanting Olde Towne Hall Theatre in North Ridgeville. Curtain at 7:00 PM. Please join us.

Double Heart: Akron Public Library - Nordonia Hills Branch

James is about to vomit. No, really.

Two outstanding audiences at Summit County public libraries the past two days. I was disappointed to learn that Akron city schools were closed on Wednesday -- traditionally we would get maybe a dozen seniors to join us for the afternoon performance at the Shatto Avenue library, and about 100 students who walk over from nearby Firestone High. We decided only to put out about 64 seats (8 rows of eight) so the expected audience would look too thin.

However, almost every seat was taken! We had a very strong turnout, not just from seniors, but also high school students who obviously could think of nothing better to do on a day-off than see a play, and also some families with younger children who happened to choose the library as the thing to do that day and heard there was a show going on.

James thinks he had food poisoning, and was on the verge of exonerating during the entire program. His performance was outstanding, and the fastest I have ever heard him go. He even sat through the talkback before excusing himself to meet his little porcelain helper.

I am ... butt hurt.

The Nordonia library in Northfield is one of our smaller venues -- you can't get more than sixty chairs into that room. It remains, however, my favorite stop on the tour. It's not just the cookies (thank you, Friends of the Nordonia Public Library) it is also the fact that we can back the truck right up to the performance space and load-in takes about five minutes. Finally, the audience is always very responsive, they laughed at the low humor, and got all the more sophisticated references.

There was a great mix of young and old -- one family had several small children who must be quite experienced at witnessing live theater and were engrossed in our show from beginning to end. Teenagers brought their parents to see this play, not the other way around. For the post-show discussion Daniel, who normally needs to warm everyone up, just got out of the way as hands shot into the air to ask about every aspect of performance, the writing, the acting, the costumes, the music, everything.

Then we had cookies.

Styles: Akron Public Library - Main

Nice, big auditorium.

Pre-show set-up backstage. Lots of props.

Anne must be commended for her expert tea tray maintenance.

Love this; Michael, Emily and Anne play six characters at once (Michael is dressed as a seventh) providing offstage voices while James, onstage, listens on. Yes, Emily is at the same time changing her costume.

Good show today in Akron. Tomorrow we will be performing in Lakewood, which on any given year attracts a nice-sized house. This year it may be a madhouse. Several actor-teachers said they were coming tomorrow (I did suggest they pick another date but, you know ... kids) and a number of educators have informed us they are sending students to see the show there.

Styles: Akron Public Library - Nordonia Hills Branch

Big boys tie their own bow-ties.
Nordonia is a great stop on our tour. They have one of our most dedicated audiences, and a delightful, helpful staff, but they always provide cookies and coffee after the performances! Thank you, Nordonia!

It is perhaps the most small site we visit. Not as narrow as Workshop Players (we could get the whole set in) but it is a small community room, that traditionally seats about fifty at maximum. Tonight we packed the place with 70 chairs, which included folks peering around corners from the kitchenette, and unfortunately we had to turn some unhappy patrons away. I hope they can join us at Akron Main Library this Sunday.

Big news today; Acorn Media Group has acquired a controlling share of the ownership of most of the Agatha Christie library, which includes novels, short stories, plays and many of the films and television programs managed by Christie's descendants.

However, that would not include The Mysterious Affair at Styles, which is in the public domain in the United States. However, a recent Supreme Court decision opens the door for Acorn or the Christie estate to reclaim copyright on this first novel, which seems very likely as the work is copyrighted in most of the rest of the world and the argument for this decision is based in good part of recognizing foreign agreements. So use of my own adaptation may soon be limited.


The Mysterious Affair at Styles
One-Minute Set-Up
Nordonia Hills Branch - Akron Public Library

Styles: Akron Public Library - Northwest

The Shatto Avenue branch of the Akron Public Library visit is always an interesting one. A mid-afternoon stop, the crowd an eclectic mix of those who have time to enjoy a play in the middle of the afternoon and couple classes of high school students who walk over from nearby Firestone High School. Great crowd, great afternoon.

Following each performance, Daniel likes to ask if they figured the mystery, and then he asks those who did not (which is most of them) who they suspected. Now ... it's difficult to provide any details of these discussions without giving up the game, but I will say audiences responses are key indicators of 1) the kind of performances we have been providing and more importantly 2) how successful my script is.

It doesn't bother me that most can't figure it out, that's good, isn't? That was Christie's game, it appears a clear enough case, as Cavendish puts it, but she does provide a great deal of obfuscation. One student today said he suspected Hastings, but added that that didn't make any sense because he was the narrator. It's a shame Agatha Christie never wrote a Poriot mystery where that happens.

Tomorrow we perform at the Fairview Park Public Library at 7 PM. This performance is free and open to the public, please come and join us.