A uketastic day

We have sooooooo much going on at The Playhouse.  I'm so thrilled that Brian Zelinski is directing our production of LOVE, SEX AND THE I.R.S. opening April 29th (you can also join us for a Preview on April 28).  That's the next big show in our Furlan Mainstage Series, and it is going to be ridiculously funny (I'm told that there will also be Farrah Fawcett posters hanging on the wall as an homage to the 1970's setting--pit a pat goes my heart!).

Of the many, many things we have going on at The Playhouse in the coming months, one that is really tickling me is our presentation of FOUNTAIN OF UKE featuring ukulele genius Lil' Rev.  It's kind of cool how this show came into our lineup.  I was having dinner with a friend two years ago who mentioned her new membership in something called the Milwaukee Ukulele Club.  A few weeks later, looking for some entertainment for a fish fry we were hosting, I asked my friend Barb if she and her ukulele pals would come to a "Yum and Strum".  They did, our patrons loved it, and we started to talk about future fun times.  We we started to understand that their four-stringed leader Lil' Rev was interested in doing a show for our SideNotes Cabaret Series, our producer Peggy Peterson Ryan thought it would fit perfectly.

I had the great pleasure of talking with Rev today about the details of his show and another great event at The Playhouse.  This September The Milwaukee Ukulele Festival will take place at The Playhouse on September 24 with a day of workshops throughout our facility and an evening concert featuring national superstars of the uke.  It is going to be an unbelievably fun day.  I had the chance to catch last year's concert, and I was blown away (I also won a beautiful uke in their raffle, which regrettably looks better than it sounds when I play).

We'll share more about Rev's show in the coming days, but he was on my mind today after a really fine meeting of the minds.  Here's a little sample of Rev in action.  I dare you not to sing-a-long.

Jonathan West

Managing Director

How I start my day at The Playhouse

This is me at 8:15am Monday through Friday at The Playhouse. Large coffee, checking the e-mail, taking a picture of myself...you know, normal stuff.

I made my April resolution yesterday to tell you my Playhouse stories more frequently and I thought it might be important to start with my own.

Despite the fact that I now have a title and a business card at The Playhouse, my relationship with this special place started 21 years ago when I was raven haired youth (I'm not lying) who sang and danced his way through a summer musical production of GREASE. I played Roger, The Mooner, and, no, life did not imitate art that summer (much).

From there, I went on to act in quite a few shows at The Playhouse (I loved, loved, loved being Pseudolous in A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM many years ago!) and even somehow convinced my advisor at New York University that I should gain 16 credits of college credits by being an intern at The Playhouse for six months.

My love of The Playhouse has roots, folks. Deep roots. I'm not alone in that. On that first production I performed in during the summer of 1989 I met Playhouse friends like Lee Szczepanski (one of our Board members), Jan Szczepanski (one of our long standing volunteer stage managers), Marty Wallner (lighting guru) and Tommy Lueck (song-and-dance man extraordinaire. It's pretty hard to get The Playhouse out of your system.

I hope to be able to tell you fun stories about all the folks I mention and more of our superb volunteers as we go along. Today, you get me and my cup of coffee. (I purposely set the bar pretty low on this one because I know our volunteers are infinitely more interesting than me).

Hey, also, we decided to start a Voting Club for our Waterstone Bank 90th Anniversary Challenge. We're looking for a group of people who will vote 25, 50, or 100 times a day until April 30th so we have a shot at winning $30,000. If you want to join the Voting Club, please send me an e-mail to jwest@sunsetplayhouse.com.

Thanks much! Now April Showers, hit the road...

Best,

Jonathan West
Managing Director

An April Resolution for all our Sunset Playhouse friends

Take a look at these books. What a mixed bag of thoughts, ideas, and writing styles. If you attach each of these books to a person, bring them together and put them in the same space, you've got a really eclectic gathering.

We have these books at The Playhouse right now because we offered a ticket incentive to our patrons for the final weekend of TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE, the lovely production featuring Don Devona and Stephan Roselin that just closed this week. The books will be donated to the local chapter of REACH OUT AND READ and the Elm Grove Public Library and we can be thankful to our fabulous and eclectic group of patrons who make this contribution.


To me, sharing a book is sharing a bit of your personality and a bit of your history. I have a story in my head about all the books we collected and how they came into the individual lives of the people who were kind enough to pass them on to the next reader who will end up with one of these page turners. It got me thinking about The Playhouse, what we can do for you, and what challenges and opportunities we have for all our friends to participate in during the future.

I'll admit that a lot of my time is filled with facts, figures, spread sheets and donation requests. It sometimes can be daunting to keep the whole picture in perspective, and the way I recharge my batteries and understand the basic goodness of what we do at The Playhouse is to stop into a rehearsal, gab with one of our amazing volunteers when I might instead be adding numbers in a column, or peek in at a set being built onstage. I'll also admit that I've been bad about sharing those little moments when I see them and have had to rely on the kindness of a superb staff and volunteer base to keep putting the good word out about The Playhouse.

That's all about to change. I love blogs. I really do. And I love that The Playhouse maintains ths Troupes Blog honoring a lovely publication that used to be mailed to our volunteers on a semi-regular basis. I tasking myself with something today, and I need your help to keep me true to my word: today begins a daily process of posting at least one Playhouse experience from my perspective during the busy work week (okay, I've going to give myself the latitude of doing five posts a week sometime between Monday and Sunday because my schedule shifts due to production and sometimes the days can be full).

There's my April resolution for you all. My content. More blog. You'll continue to see fine stories from our volunteers and staff, but it's time for me to throw my voice in, too.

I mentioned opportunities and challenges, and there are many. Opportunities abound, and our biggest task is being specific about how you all can help. Today, I'll mention one of those.

Waterstone Bank is doing a pretty great thing to celebrate their 90th Anniversary. They are giving $90,000 to area nonprofits in a challenge. It's a simple one. You go online to following this link vote for Sunset Playhouse as many times as you possibly can, and if we get the top number of votes we win $30,000. If we're not top dog but in the top four below that, we get $15,000. So vote away, my friends. My fingers have been clicking away.

This opportunity brings up one of our biggest challenges. When you look at the voting for the Waterstone Bank challenge you can learn a lot about a group. I hadn't heard about Sophia's Heart, the top ranking group in this Waterstone Bank Challenge, but when I looked on line and found it was Danny Gokey's charity, I was impressed. He's a cool dude, we all know, and his non-profit aspires to do great thing. Quickly he has done something really great, too--built a community that believes in supporting a worthy cause.

We've built a community, too. But we can do better. It comes down to us all believing in The Playhouse. I guess that's why I think it's important for me to challenge myself to tell you my Playhouse stories many times a week, because I believe abundantly in the goodness that we do here at The Playhouse. We may not have the star power of a Danny Gokey, right now, but we've got something really great to believe in for anyone who loves theatre, meeting friends, and believes in the value of education and volunteerism. Our numbers need to grow, and hopefully story upon story upon story we'll see our community swell in a super swell way. (Warning: I have been accused of superlatives and embrace the accusation with gusto.)

Just have a great day today. And please vote if you're able. It's election time in your neighborhood, and voting makes you thinner, prettier and smarter (I know, I voted already.)

Jonathan West
Managing Director

Opening Weekend Re-Cap

March 14, 2011

TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE opened this weekend at the Sunset Playhouse in Elm Grove, and aside from a few small technical difficulties (who knew that the wheelchair would decide to move of its own accord?!), things went fabulously.

Our backstage crew, Zach and Nina, are pretty much rock stars in disguise. Everything that happens onstage really could not happen without these two. They are responsible for all props, for set pieces appearing and disappearing, and for making sure that the right side of the stage's revolve is showing at the right time--oh, and they do all of this from underneath a five-foot platform that's only about three feet deep and six feet wide. They live under the platform for the duration of the show with various props, a headset to communicate with each other and me, two large chairs, two end tables, a wheelchair, and only a small light to guide their way.

Things in this show wouldn't be possible without the backstage crew, and I think that the way they've worked out how to do things in this show is pretty awesome. I'm hoping to take some photos so you all can see exactly how they maneuver such things as the chairs, the the tables, the revolve, and, of course, the magical appearance of the record player.

So this is a techie appreciation post: thanks, guys! I seriously could not do this show without you.

Posted by Erin Brophy - Stage Manager

Stephan Roselin makes his Playhouse debut as Mitch in TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE

Continuing with our week of lead up excitement to the opening of TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE, The Playhouse is excited to welcome Stephan Roselin into The Sunset Playhouse family. Stephan makes his debut at The Playhouse with this production, and we certainly hope it is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Roselin Stars in TUESDAYS

When Stephan Roselin says he has been an actor “forever,” he isn’t kidding. He was three years old when he first appeared on the air. His parents produced public service announcements and often recruited him for roles.

“I was the baby in the bike safety message,” Roselin said. “I got the acting bug from doing those announcements and kept at it through the years.”

Roselin plays “Mitch” in the Sunset Playhouse production, TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE, March 11 to April 3. Mitch is the former student of Morrie Schwartz, whose wit and wisdom has endeared him to legions of theatergoers.

An internship with the Milwaukee Repertory Theatre brought Roselin to the city in 1991. The New York City area native had completed a master’s degree in Fine Arts at Case Western Reserve University and was looking for an opportunity. He found that Milwaukee had wonderful theatre companies and many other advantages.

After his internship ended, a stint as “Andy,” the host of the Fox Kids Club on WCGV TV, led to promotion and marketing work for local television. As the result of a role with the Shorewood Players in A FEW GOOD MEN, he became a co-founder of the theatre company, Bialystock & Bloom. The group was part of the Milwaukee scene for 11 years, providing a niche for new talent and producing theatre with provocative themes.

“It was a chance to do everything—direct, act, produce—I really became immersed in theatre. It was really fun.”

Acting is a true love, says Roselin. He has played a variety of parts with Next Act Theatre, Renaissance Theatre, First Stage Children’s Theater, and other Milwaukee groups. He also does commercials and voiceovers.

“You find a balance,” said Roselin, who is the Promotions Specialist at Time Warner Cable Media where he develops events and campaigns that support advertising efforts. “I have been able to stay in touch with my artistic side over the years.”

--Kay Tierney

tuesdays with morrie: entering tech week

Yesterday was our first official tech day for MORRIE at Sunset Playhouse, and we managed to cue-to-cue the entire show and run sections of it in a nine-hour period--not bad for a first technical rehearsal!

The set looks incredible--it amazes me how much happens overnight when no one else is around to see it. Michael Desper, our resident set designer, really outdid himself on this set, if you ask me. Everything has this ethereal, dreamy quality to it, and the light design really emphasizes that.

This was the first tech experience I've had where I could spend the entire rehearsal sitting in the lightbooth, watching the process, and it is thanks to Nina, one of our stagehands, that that could happen. She sat backstage on headset and directed actors via myself and Matt Daniels, the show's director, and did so with much goodwill.

This was definitely one of the most fun tech rehearsals I've ever been part of. Not only did we accomplish things, we also made jokes and talked about things outside of the theatrical world, to give us a small break when one of us would become slightly stir-crazy.

The best part of the evening? By far trying to figure out how to differentiate from "Morrie" and "Mitch" in the visual/audio cues for lights to be called in the SM script. In blocking notes, I'd been writing "Mo" and "Mt" (as though they were scientific elements--which, I suppose, actors are, in a way, in the world of a play) but there wasn't enough room in the opposite margin for that as well as the cue number as well as the moment to anticipate the cue. But problems were solved, glow tape was laid down, revolve problems (yes, the stage revolves!) were solved, and today we go into our first tech/dress with fingers crossed.

I think things will go swimmingly--we've already been doing full runs of the show for nearly two weeks. Stephan and Don are just racing along with this show, and so far it's been a fun ride.

-Erin B
Stage Manager
Sunset Playhouse

Don Devona--he was born to play Morrie!

Starting today, we're featuring some profiles of folks working on our production of TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE that runs from March 10-April 3 as part of our Furlan Mainstage Series. We thought you'd enjoy learning a little more about some of the folks creating the work on this really wonderful stage adaptation of Mitch Albom's best-selling book of the same name.

We begin today with a profile on the wonderful actor and charming Sunset Playhouse volunteer Don Devona who plays Morrie in our production. Thanks to Kay Tierney, a superb new addition to our volunteer corps for this insightful profile. Enjoy! (And get your tickets now for TUESDAY WITH MORRIE by clicking this link.)

Don Devona Plays “Morrie”

Actor Don Devona brings some valuable experience to the role of “Morrie” at Sunset Playhouse. He already has played the feisty, ailing college professor in TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE, at Milwaukee’s Soulstice Theatre in 2009.

“I am delighted to have the opportunity to do the play again,” Devona said. “Morrie’s attitude is so positive. He is trying to make people think more about getting along…he is interested in helping people become better.”

Sunset is staging the acclaimed play March 11 to April 3. Based on the best selling autobiographical novel by Mitch Albom, the story centers on the wit and wisdom of Morrie Schwartz. Albom describes a series of weekly visits to his former teacher that became a last class in the meaning of life.

Critics have called the play moving, powerful, and packed with humor and insight. The NY Daily News described it as “a touching, life-affirming deeply emotional drama.”

Devona says the play has an uplifting spirit despite Morrie’s impending death from Lou Gehrig’s Disease. The script is filled with gems such as one of the actor’s favorites: “Love is the only rational act. Without love we are like birds with broken wings.”

Devona has been involved in theatre since he was a teenager. A teacher overseas for many years, he participated in drama groups wherever he was working. He played in “The Foreigner” in Italy, “Our Town” in Germany and in a number of other productions.

When he moved to Milwaukee in 1998, Devona took an acting workshop that led to an offer of two small parts in ROOM SERVICE at Next Act Theatre. He has been in 22 local plays since that time, playing Truman in GIVE 'EM HELL, HARRY, Kris Kringle in MIRACLE ON 34TH STREET, Norman in ON GOLDEN POND, and other roles.

He also has had major singing roles in a number of musicals including JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR, THE KING AND I and MY FAIR LADY.

--Kay Tierney