Posted for the heck of it, .

Welcome to Maidens, Mothers and Crones, the first production in our new series, Voices From The Midwest.

Voices From The Midwest is a 3-season project exploring life in this part of the world. This brand-new production explores the lives of women in the Midwest, and the next two productions will explore the lives of both men and families.

It’s important to us here at Williamston Theatre to occasionally hold a mirror up to our lives and see what’s there – this series of brand new productions is one of our attempts to do that. It’s an experiment for us, and it’s an experiment that we’re excited about spending our time, resources and energy on. The project began by sending out questionnaires to various parts of the American Midwest asking women if they’d be interested in sharing their stories with us… stories about living here, growing up here. And wow, did we get stories! Stories about their lives, their dreams, and their hair! Stories that made us laugh, made us cry, and inspired us to look at our lives in a different way. Then we took those stories, and incorporated a tremendous amount of them into the dialogue, songs and moments you’ll see onstage. Lots of the text in the play was taken directly from the submissions: You’ll be hearing, literally, the Voices of the Midwest. We’ll be using a similar recipe to build the next two productions in this series, as well.

Some folks asked, “Why do a production like this?” and my answer was simple: Because we should. We should take the time and look around us, and see what there is to see. Can we, in 90 minutes, represent every aspect of life in the Midwest? Of course not. Nor should we try – to cram in every topic and lifestyle would not do justice to the play, those lifestyles or those topics. Instead, we can explore some of the common threads that are woven through all of our lives – the little things that make up our days, that exist in all our lives here in the Midwest and elsewhere in the world – that both unite us and define us as individuals. And that’s the goal: To see ourselves and the people we know reflected onstage, and come away looking at ourselves and each other with a greater sense of understanding, a greater sense of humor, and a greater sense of belonging. I believe that’s what good theatre does, and I hope it’s what this series of plays does.

So, what you’ll see onstage today is a slice of life in this part of the world… and that’s one of the things I find most wonderful about it: it truly is only a slice of what’s out there in this world of ours. Thanks for being here to explore it with us.

Sincerely,
Tony Caselli
Artistic Director

Also, why is this Pittsburgh Pirates bobble-head giving people the finger?

And the Detroit Tigers are now 12-15 which, while not good, is much better than they were two weeks ago! And they’re only 3 games out of first in the AL Central, so there’s still hope!

I keep rewatching the video of President Bush at the Pope’s White House speech… I can’t help it, it’s horrifying but mesmerizing – the President of the United States responded to a beautiful speech by THE POPE by saying… “Awesome speech.” Jon Stewart at the Daily Show had a hilarious take on the whole thing. Here’s a link to it, and although the vid is a bit long, it’s hilarious and worth every second!!

Since my kids watch Hannah Montana I’ve watching with amusement the little flap the press is trying to create over her photos in Vanity Fair. Apparently a couple are a little “risque” artsy. Bare back, covered with sheet, looking a little sexier than most folks want a 15 year old to look. Are they completely appropriate? Probably not… but it also feels like something being stirred up by a lot of folks who live poke sticks at hornet’s nests.

Several good shows going on in the area that I need to get out and see. As soon as my schedule relaxes, of course, which is… yeah, I’m not sure when that will be.