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That Woman's Child Production History

This short play has been performed once before in an Off Broadway festival, The 2012 Network One Act Festival. The director and stage manager of this production are returning to work on this piece for the Midwinter Madness Festival (part of the Midtown International Theatre Festival) in February 2013. As such, this production team is very familiar with what time, props, pacing, etc. are needed to produce 3 quality shows. We also performed this play as a staged reading for the Classical Theatre of Harlem's, Playwright's Playground in August 2012.

Our biggest challenge is paying for rehearsal space for at least 2 hours, 2-3 days a week for 3 weeks. The cost ranges from $25-48 per hour in certain rental spaces. We cannot afford to be all over the place, so we need this funding to secure/block time at one rental facility for the month of January 2013. However, should we not be able to rent the space due to scheduling conflicts with the facility, we will need this funding to be able to quickly and effortlessly secure another location. Over the past 4 years, I have created a reliable list of rehearsal rental facilities throughout the lower east side of NY and Times Square. My director and stage manager are well familiar with all of these locations and are able to adapt accordingly.

We will not be building an extensive set as this is a minimalist production, however, we must have the proper props/costumes for the setting of a hat shop which includes such things as: scarves, hats, gloves, wig heads, 2 tables, etc. These items must be available at all rehearsals so as to have the cast be quickly familiar with their props, blocking and placement/transitions.

A second big risk is the loss of an actress either voluntarily or involuntarily. We need to be flexible in our access to actresses, so it is imperative that we secure understudies for all four parts. We have had experiences in the past with actors leaving the show before a performance or during a run, and have had to pull in people at the last second, literally. This is unacceptable. So, we must make sure to have not only these understudies in place, but be able to pay them for their time and work. Please note that the festival does not allow the hiring of equity actors for the shows, so the actresses for That Woman's Child will be non-equity. But they are still professionals, and we want to treat them and pay them as such.

A third and very real challenge/risk to this production is the weather. The Midwinter Madness Festival is scheduled for Feb. 4-24, 2013. That means snow in NY. In fact, in Feb. 2010, a blizzard hit NYC the opening night of another one of my plays in a festival. The show went on as not only was my cast and crew well prepared, but the festival coordinators were confident they could still run a great show. However, I was unable to travel to NY to support the cast and crew, and although I was devastated, I had complete confidence in my director, stage manager and cast.

Rarely have these festivals cancelled shows due to weather, but as things are always subject to change with the weather these days, we must be prepared for the festival coordinators to tell us that the shows must be moved to new dates and then communicate that quickly to our supporters. So, we must be prepared to not only have the cast available for new show dates, but our fans as well.

These are my top three challenges/risks to producing That Woman's Child. But I am confident that my team and I can meet these challenges successfully as we have done in the past.