Arcadians Children’s Theatre Auditions
ACT Information for 2023
UPDATE
All positions for 2023 have been filled. Congratulations to all those who auditioned & were successful.
ACT will be holding OPEN AUDITIONS for 2023
THERE ARE LIMITED SPACES AVAILABLE FOR 2023.
INFORMATION NIGHT – Friday 7th October at 6.30pm at the Miners Lamp Theatre. You will need to attend the information night to book an audition.
AUDITIONS – Friday 14th October from 4pm at the Miners Lamp Theatre.
President’s Message – 29 July 2021
A lot has been happening since I last messaged all our members and friends of Arcadians.
After reopening the theatre earlier in the year, we were very hopeful of seeing a normal year of theatre activity at the Miner’s Lamp Theatre. Well, that didn’t happen did it!
“Ladies In Black” under the guidance of Kerrie Hartin were able to almost finish their season! What a great disappointment having to reduce audience size and cancel one show for everyone involved in getting the show finally on stage and particularly the patrons who had booked for the final weekend but missed out because of reduced seating capacity and lockdown.
Our production of “Be More Chill” under the Direction of Justin Clarke was scheduled to go to stage on 4 August. The excellent cast were into rehearsal and looking forward to getting to demonstrate their talents. But that was not to be. Regrettably the production team decided they could not get the production to the quality they wanted in time to open. Thankfully we have been able to re-schedule the production for 2022 to fit in with the cast and production teams existing commitments.
Our ACT production of “Xanadu JR” due to open 17 September has had to be postponed to next year as the production team will not to be able to complete rehearsal requirements in time. There are a few members due to graduate this year and we are hopeful that they will be able to return to complete their graduation in 2022.
The Lamplighters and Minstrels have been similarly affected not being able to rehearse and having to cancel some scheduled performances. And the Monday Maintenance Men having to abide by the rules as well can’t wait to get back into the theatre to keep everything in top condition for the members as soon as they are allowed.
Onto some good news, our friends in the Cotswold Arcadians in Westrop, United Kingdom, completed their season of “The Tempest” this week. After 500 days of darkness for the Group, they reopened to outstanding comments from their patrons. We congratulate them and wish them continued success.
There is no doubt that Arcadians will survive this latest setback. We are all looking forward to the time when our members can do what they love doing at the theatre and when our patrons can again enjoy live theatre in a real theatre.
As our situation is evolving on a weekly basis, we look forward to keeping in touch with you on our way forward. As the Premier would say, “When I know, you’ll know!”
Until next time, stay safe and stay at home.
Steve Sanders
President
A Message from the President – 27 April 2021
Into the Woods JR opens 1 and 2 May – one weekend only.
Arcadians Children’s Theatre (ACT) reopens this weekend after a 12 month recess due to “you-know-what”. “Into the Woods JR“ commenced rehearsals under COVID conditions with the kids having to rehearse socially distanced, singing with masks on with the restriction of only 5 singing at one time. The cast were heroes in doing the right thing to get their show on the stage; never giving up that the show would go on. The number of parents able to attend at any one time were limited. Their dedication and support in keeping everyone safe is acknowledged here.
But they did it! An amazing effort by everyone from cast, production team and parents.
ACT has an impressive history having begun their story in 1986; 35 years without a break in production (pandemics not counted). Over 50 productions have been presented to the public over that time. We have had a wealth of talent directing the kids; 8 Directors in total. They have been supported of course by productions teams and administration staff of excellence – teaching our young thespians the craft of live theatre. Many of our ACT Graduates (at age 16 years) have continued onto adult theatre performance and production as well as becoming parents and sending their kids to Saturday afternoon rehearsals. And with you, the public continuing to support our kids, we expect ACT to continue for many years to come.
ACT boasts 4 Life Members of the Arcadians Theatre Group; two of which were inducted at our AGM this March. Lilian Bates was our first Director in 1985 who established the approach to operating the Group which has basically continued (with minor tweaks) until now. Lilian was inducted as Life Member along with the current ACT Director Janne-Maree McNeice, Director for the past many years.
Now that we can welcome 100% capacity of our public supporters to the Miners Lamp Theatre, we look forward to filling the theatre once again. If you haven’t already purchased your tickets to this weekends season; don’t leave it too late. We look forward to your enthusiastic support.
Steve Sanders
President
Latest news
If you need to get in touch with the Tommy production team email us tommy@arcadians.org.au
The launch for our 2014 season, which is our 50th year, will be on Wednesday 31st of July 7pm for a 7.30pm start.
The Arcadians Lamplighters and Minstrels proudly present ‘A Song For You’ on Tuesday 6th of August & Sunday 11th of August BOOK TICKETS HERE
Sheerluck Holmes is the next production for the Arcadians Children’s Theatre Season is 20th September – 22nd September BOOK TICKETS HERE
Carousel * Coming Soon *
The Arcadians Theatre Group is introducing a season ticket! One price – three shows $66 – only one booking fee and you get to select your seats a week before they go on sale! BUY IT NOW this offer is available until the 8th of March 2013. The season pass excludes tickets to our concert Men ALOUD which is on Feb 9th & 10th $15 flat price for everyone
Following the spectacular success of the first Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma! (1943), the pair sought to collaborate on another piece, knowing that any resulting work would be compared with Oklahoma!, most likely unfavorably. They were initially reluctant to seek the rights to Liliom; Molnár had refused permission for the work to be adapted in the past, and the original ending was considered too depressing for the musical theatre. After acquiring the rights, the team created a work with lengthy sequences of music and made the ending more hopeful.
The musical required considerable modification during out-of-town tryouts, but once it opened on Broadway on April 19, 1945, it was an immediate hit with both critics and audiences. Carousel initially ran for 890 performances and duplicated its success in the West End in 1950. Though it has never achieved as much commercial success as Oklahoma!, the piece has been repeatedly revived, and has been recorded several times. A production by Nicholas Hytner enjoyed success in 1992 in London, in 1994 in New York and on tour. In 1999, Time magazine named Carousel the best musical of the 20th century.
Company opens on the 15th of June
COMPANY winner of 6 Tony Awards including BEST MUSICAL opens 15th to 30th June.
Company revolves around Bobby (a single man unable to commit fully to a steady relationship, let alone marriage), the five married couples who are his best friends, and his three girlfriends. Company is a musical comedy based on a book by George Furth with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. The original production was nominated for a record-setting fourteen Tony Awards and won six.
Company was shaped into a musical, thanks to the vision of legendary director Harold Prince. At Prince’s suggestion, Furth reworked these one-acts into a libretto examining the pros and cons of marriage, and Stephen Sondheim was brought in to provide the music. To tie all the pieces together, Furth added the character of Robert, a bachelor whose 35th birthday party provides the occasion to bring all of Furth’s characters together at the opening of the play. It seems everyone but Robert is married or getting married, and they are all eager for their bachelor friend to follow in their footsteps, but Robert isn’t quite ready to take the plunge. He’s sure that “Someone Is Waiting”, the perfect girl just for him, and until she makes herself known, he is content to amuse himself with the countless women who come to New York every day.
Meanwhile, Robert has the opportunity to observe the lives of all of his married friends, and what he sees does not exactly fill him with encouragement. They fight, plan affairs, talk of divorce, and take refuge in cigarettes and alcohol. It’s enough to make Robert question whether he ever wants to join the ranks of the married. In the end, however, in spite of all his friends’ failings, he comes to the conclusion that there is no point in “Being Alive” unless one has someone to share it with.
Songs include You Could Drive a Person Crazy, Getting Married Today, The Ladies Who Lunch and Being Alive
Check out the Broadway version as performed at the Tony awards.
Updates Galore!
Divine Divas
Divine Divas was a fundraising concert to celebrate the wonderful women that make up the Arcadians theatre group. What a fabulous weekend – we raised $2,773 towards our termite problem. We had a 147 people attend. Many thanks to Adam Foster, Pat Green and David Gallacher for steering this venture into a great success. Kudos of course to the brilliant women that participated, such a great process, turning up with their songs ready to go. We are so lucky in this group to have so much talent. Thank you to all who attended and participated, hopefully we can do more of these in the future. The feedback from attendees was all positive and our performers were grateful for the opportunity to perform, to do their own thing, t’was lovely.
Community Forum to discuss IPAC show:
Thanks to the members who attended the forum on Sunday 29th May after the concert. We discussed the team that would be leading our venture into IPAC and the process we will go through to select the show and director. We welcome any feedback and/or suggestions but remind our members that committee has the final say and we would appreciate your support in the decisions we make – even if it means you’ve missed out. We would like this to be a unifying experience for the group. So please help out where ever you can.
Do you have Twitter? Follow our Twitter stream @thearcadians for the latest info!
2010 Season
The 2010 season has now been confirmed. In order:
- The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (dir. Linda Corrin)
- State Fair (dir. Wendy Glover)
- Dusty (dir. Chae Rogan)
- Oklahoma (dir. Malcolm White)
Keep your eyes open for confirmation of the season dates.