It all started in 3rd grade. I played the part of Casper the Ghost in the school play. A few years later, I was Dick Martin in “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In.” After a short respite to play flag football and flirt with the cheerleaders, I had two choices of high school - one that was just down the street, complete with all my pocket protector buddies and straight leg flood pants. The other high, clear across town, held tremendous promise. Know one knew me. I didn’t have to fulfill my longstanding roll of resident dipstick. I could be whatever I wanted to be.

In my freshman year, something possessed me, and I tried out for the school musical, “Carnival,” and was given the lead of Jaquot, the Puppeteer. From there, I played Cornelius Hackl in “Matchmaker,” the non-musical version of “Hello Dolly.” That Summer I did a couple of bit parts in Lil’ Abner, and later played the Scarecrow in “Wizard of Oz” and Sir Harry in “Once Upon a Mattress.” I played Harold Hill in the “Music Man’ and El Gallo in the a “Fantastiks.” My first community theatre was in a production of “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” where I happily played the spoiled caninie, Snoopy.

In the back of my mind, I had always wanted to find the right time to re-enter the theater fray. And what better venue to do so than with C-STOCK! My first show was “1940’s Radio Hour.” What a truly gifted ensemble we had for that show. It was the perfect choice to bring me back into the fold.

Shortly thereafter, I was asked to participate as a Board Member, a role and responsibility that I take very seriously.

Additional roles thus far has been fairly small, but loads of fun. I was the Coach in “Footloose” and a mentally challlenged stage hand, and the Baseball Commissioner in “Damn Yankees!” I especially enjoy “Damn Yankees” because both of my youngest boys were in the cast as well. We all shared some very meaningful male bonding during rehearsals!

If you’ve never participated in Community Theater, I would implore you to do so. It’s any amazingly rich and satisfying experience, and the people are truly great to work with.

So whether actor, singer, set design, musician, costumes,, etc.. there’s just the perfect place for you!

I am just wondering if you have a favorite role that you haven’t had an opportunity to play yet. I have been lucky enough to have played characters that became ‘dream roles’ after I started rehearsing for the production and I’ve had a few roles that I was dying to do luckily earned the opportunity to perform BUT there’s still a handful of roles I’m dying to do!

Kate in ‘Kiss Me Kate’,

Corrine or Hesione in ‘Triumph of Love’ 

Margaret Johnson in ‘ The Light in the Piazza’,

Miss Peretti in ‘25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee’

Mrs. Lovett in ‘Sweeney Todd.’

How about you??? What’s on your short list?

Putting on a show is difficult. Yes, it’s fun but it’s still work and it costs money. It’s also difficult to find good directors, choreographers, music directors and musicians, designers, stage managers and crew who are willing to put in months of effort and not receive a lot of money (or no money in some cases!).

So with that in mind, CSTOCK has been selecting productions based on directors submitting a show to the board. You may wonder why you’ve never seen ‘Cats’ or ‘Phantom’ done there. Well, it takes a director who is willing to do the show, submit the show and have a full staff ready to do it. It takes a lot of effort behind the scenes to get that production ready to go. By the time you, the actor, have auditioned that group has been working on the show for almost a year in some cases.

After a submission is made, the board has to decide if

• they like the show
• can they afford the show
• does it fit our mission statement
• will our patrons like the show
• is the director (and their staff) qualified and trustworthy
• will it work in our facility and with our current resources?

So…it’s not easy to figure out what shows to do. The theatre has a huge responsibility to create a great season that the patrons, actors and musicians will like as well as one that is ‘doable’ in our facility.

I hope this explains and de-mystefies some of the process for you. It’s fun to pick the shows but it’s very hard work too!

Our current production of “Play On!” is in its 2nd week of performances. I was House Manager last night which affords me the opportunity to see the show and get feedback from our patrons.

As a Board, we made a decision a short while back to expand our theatrical offerings to include at least one ‘non-musical’ production in our season. After watching last night’s performance, that’s one decision that I’m thrilled we made!

What a wonderfully funny and engaging show! If you’re not familiar with the storyline, here is a brief overview:

“This is the hilarious story of a theater group trying desperately to put on a play in spite of maddening interference from a haughty authoress who keeps revising the script. Act I is a rehearsal of the dreadful show, Act II is the near disastrous dress rehearsal, and the final act is the actual performance in which anything that can go wrong does. When the authoress decides to give a speech on the state of the modern theatre during the curtain calls, the audience is treated to a madcap climax to a thoroughly hilarious romp. Even the sound effects reap their share of laughter. “

Rana Tan plays the part of the overbearing, flip-flopping playwright to perfection. Friedrich Schlott, in the role of Doctor Forbes, does an amazing job of intentionally ‘over-acting!’ As much as I enjoy the ‘full-blown’ experience of musicals, with large casts and orchestra, it’s a nice change of pace to watch a smaller, more intimate cast such as this. Comedies like “Play On!” require skilled timing and an ability for the actors to effectively jump back and forth between their stage persona and their ‘real-life’ characters. I especially enjoyed the ending. It will have you leaving the theater with a wonderfully satisfied smile on your face!

Rich Jacobson

We would like to thank all of our patrons for their patience as we work out the bugs with bringing our box office in-house. We appreciate that the mall was able to help us sell tickets for so many years, but are so excited for the new opportunities that his unexpected change will bring! Our amazing web designer, Mark Flanders, is typing his fingers to the bone as he researches options for us to utilize on-line ticket sales in time for our summer show, “Pirates of Penzance.”

In the mean time, you get to listen to my dulcet tones on our voice mail. I am also the volunteer checking the voice mail and returning calls. I’ve been trying to do this mostly on Thursdays and Fridays, then regularly throughout the weekend. Since this can be done remotely, I would be thrilled to get one or two other volunteers to help me.

We also could really use your feedback! How did this process work for you? Were you aware of it? Do you have suggestions? Would you like us to have regular box office hours? If so, would you be willing to volunteer?

We want to give the people what they want, so what is that? Thanks, in advance, for your valuable feedback!

Danielle Aldana Priest

Auditions were held for this summer’s kids production ’The Pirates of Penzance’ over the weekend. We had a terrific turnout of 80 young people between the ages of 8 and 21 and just over half the group of auditioning young people were new to CSTOCK. Wow! The talent was absolutely amazing and we are all waiting with anticipation for director Dan Estes & music director Bob Forman to announce their cast by Wednesday, April 30th.

While I know not everyone will get cast I just wanted to say how talented and brave these kids are! Each kid had to learn a song and sing it by themselves. I’m really proud of everyone who tried out!

This past weekend saw the opening of C-STOCK’s latest production, “Play On!,” the side-splitting story of a theater group frantically attempting to put together a show at the last minute, in spite of the crazed playwright who keeps changing the script!

The early buzz has been extremely positive. Hardcore thespian and regular C-STOCK contributor, Charles Platten, had this to say after Sunday’s performance:

“Holy Cow!!!!! I laughed so hard, I had a headache afterwards. I was exhausted. Talk about an incredibly funny show. What a great show!!!”

Even local Kitsap Sun Entertainment critic, Michael Moore, who is typically rather harsh and negative towards C-STOCK, had ’some’ positive things to say:

“Play On is a Trifle, but a Funny One!”

(so, according to Mr. Moore, even though “Play On!” is something of little value or importance, at least it’s funny!)

Historically, C-STOCK has a longstanding tradition of producing only musical shows. “Play On!” is our second attempt to expand our theatrical horizons by including at least one ‘non-musical’ show in our season line-up. This will hopefully help us to attract a wider audience, and allow the ‘non-singing’ members of our community the opportunity of participating in our productions.

Support our local arts and have a ’side-splitting’ night of fun at “Play On!” (Now showing May 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11, 16, 17, 18)

We hope that you have come to enjoy the shows that we present at CSTOCK. Did you know that our non-profit organization is run entirely by volunteers? Besides those talented actors you see, our organization requires another army to make those shows happen. Yes, I’m proud to be a CSTOCK militia woman!

There are so many amazing opportunities to give back to our community, our theater, even if you don’t want the pressure of being on stage. We need people to make the costumes, move the sets, run the lights, serve refreshments, sell tickets, share their amazing ideas on committees, and even help us with administrative tasks.

One of my favorite “unseen” roles over the years has been challenging myself in assisting with props and sets at CSTOCK. I also love doing period research for make-up and hairstyles.

Some of you may have seen me on stage, the chubby perky blond who enjoys playing bimbos and other lovable character chicks.

But, when not angling for that brilliant and adored spotlight, I am thrilled to do research and stretch my creative wings in new and exciting ways! Perhaps, the little girl I keep bottled inside is still looking to play dress up. I have to do something to appease her (I never let her have Twinkies any more!) Adding those historically accurate touches really make or break a show for the audience.

In my last show, “Thoroughly Modern Millie” I hope that the audience appreciated the accurately reproduced spray guns, along with the great ’shwooshing’ sound effect! My husband did a brilliant job building them - and he really isn’t into theater. It is a great way for us both to be involved, and he never had to leave his garage! I also had great fun working with the other girls in the cast learning that the Roaring 20s was the birth of cosmetics - and therefore not all that much variety was available. I think our cast looked fantastic in their accurate shades of pink, red and orange.

We all have so many talents that we dismiss regularly as being uninteresting. Let us try to use and abuse you! We have so many opportunities to give back, I’d like to personally challenge each and every one of you to give SOMETHING a try. After all, we offer free admission to our current show in exchange for your volunteerism, so who could it hurt! You only stand to be entertained…

Danielle Aldana Priest

Wow! Is this cool or what? We’ve finally been able to get our new C-STOCK website up and running (a HUGE thanks to Mark Flanders of Olympic Northwest Mortgage).

One of the primary features of our new site is the C’s Talk blogging platform. This will allow us the opportunity to engage our patrons and the greater community-at-large in meaningful conversation about everything relating to local community theater.

As an avid blogger, both nationally and locally, I have come to appreciate the value of interactive dialogue that blogging offers. It makes the world a smaller, more intimate place to live. It connects us all and unites us in a common purpose.

We’ll be adding several veteran authors, as well as a few budding writers to our mix here. Needless to say, we’ll give you plenty of excuses to come back regularly for your fix on informative and entertaining articles from the world of C-STOCK.

Welcome again to C’s Talk - the CSTOCK Community Theater Blog!