With longer days and Durango’s signature gorgeous weather, summer invites us to recharge, connect with loved ones and savor the unique rhythms of the season. For the theater artists at Merely Players, it’s a welcome pause from the steady pace of back-to-back productions – a chance to reflect, rest and renew before the next creative burst.
With fewer deadlines and more daylight, we can reconnect to our artistry without the usual pressure of performance, filling the proverbial well with travel, inspiration and meaningful experiences that will eventually feed our work. Summer offers both the space to dream and the permission to rest.
I’m not sure how I missed this before, but it was recently brought to my attention that July 2 is the halfway point through the calendar year. That halfway point offers a great chance to dream about how we want the rest of the year to look. With that in mind, we are offering several rich experiences that can help feed those dreams at Merely Underground this summer.
We’ve already held one class on acting Shakespeare and are offering two more before summer’s end. Theater technicans and the tech-curious can explore Charles Ford’s “Lightening Up: A Theatre Lighting Workshop” on July 21. Actors can up-level their craft with Georgi Silverman’s Scene Study Workshop on July 30 and 31. Audition week, July 7 to 11, gives local actors and technicians a chance to show us their stuff, as they audition or interview for tech positions for our first two shows of the season: “Hamlet” and “It’s A Wonderful Life: Radio Play.”
Our popular Studio Series is back, this time featuring the award-winning “Script-Prov,” where actors take scripted scenes from published plays, perform them as they were meant to be seen and then flip the script with an improv actor taking one of the roles. We are excited to host this hilarious team and to bring you some summer laughs at performances on July 18 and 19.
On July 12, we are hosting a fabric sale at Merely Underground from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. If you create with fabric, you can pick up some material and inspiration then and there.
If your dreams include making a change in your life through volunteering, this is also a great time to email us and let us know that you would love to be included on our volunteer list in the upcoming season.
July also sees the eagerly awaited launch of our season ticket sales. In addition to “Hamlet” and “It’s A Wonderful Life: Radio Play,” we will present Lauren Gunderson’s brilliant “Silent Sky” and Stephen Sondheim’s musical fantasy, “Into the Woods.” Subscribers get a host of benefits with our flex passes, and if you are on our email list, you’ll get notice as soon as the subscriber packages drop.
You can get more details about all of our summer events, buy tickets for “ScriptProv” or sign up to get on our email list on our website at www.merelyplayers.org.
However you choose to dream and recharge your creative batteries this summer, we raise a glass of lemonade to you! We hope to see you at Merely Underground soon.
Mona Wood-Patterson is the artistic director of Merely Players.
