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Old Town Playhouse |
Last Year's Memories Gala auction Packages
The Black and White Gala planning committee jumped into the New Year, meeting on January 3rd to begin preparations for the Saturday, June 17, 2000 event to be held at Frog Pond Village in Interlochen.
This year's Gala Chairperson's are Cindy and Dean Robb and the Honorable James Brickley and Joyce Braithwaite. Returning as committee chairs include Jill Beauchamp and Ann Machelski (decorations), Kris Hains and Chris Wendel (publicity), Steve Morse (technical), June Neal (entertainment), Larry Hains (set- up and clean-up), George Beeby (legal), Nancy Korbel (finance), Dore Shaw (Treasure Chest), John Hoffman and Mike Carney (beverages), Tracey Towner (food), Matt McCormick (graphic design). Megan Barnes, last year's auction chair, will be assisting Steve Morse with technical and Alyssa Johnson, event co-chair '99, will be co-chairing auction items. New to their chair positions this year are Kelly Curtis and Michelle Perez (food service).
Raffle Prizes Announced
The Black and White Gala committee is pleased to announce the raffle prizes for this
year's Gala. Raffle tickets are $100 each and only 300 will be sold. Tickets will be available through the Old Town Playhouse business office. Retail
outlets to be announced at a later date.
First Prize: Theatre trip to London for two; 6 days/5 nights, includes
round trip airfare from Traverse City, lodging at a first class hotel, airport transfers and two theatre tickets to two shows.
Second Prize: Theatre trip to New York for two; 4 days/3 nights, includes
round trip airfare from Traverse City, lodging at a first class hotel, airport transfers and two theatre tickets to a Broadway show.
Third Prize: Two nights for two in Toronto. Travel, round trip, by train
from Sarnia to Toronto, includes two nights at a first class hotel, two theatre tickets and $200 cash.
Raffle #R57859 All prizes based on availability, some
restrictions may apply.
Meet the Entertainment for the
Gala!
Director Gary Garrison was a resident of Traverse City for only a year, back in 1979. Yet for many of the past twenty years he has called Traverse City "home" ...
| Nancy Brick (Traverse City)......After taking an extended leave of absence from the theatre to drive her four kids... | Marcy McGuigan (New York, NY) has performed numerous times in Traverse City including "RSVP Jerome Kern,"... |
| Mary Lou Iauco Bewley (Traverse City) studied with Lucille Evans and Walter Cassel at Indiana University School of Music, and later appeared as soloist ... | Kerry Price Secrist (Traverse City) is a recognized actress andentertainer. She has enjoyed performances in many musical productions including... |
| Bev Attwood (Traverse City) has a long history with the Old Town Playhouse. Her first involvement came in 1971... | Judy Harrison (Traverse City) has performed throughout the midwest, most recently promoting her country CD, "A Satisfied Me."... |
| Jeremy John Evans (Traverse City) recently returned from a tour of Forever Plaid with the Springer Opera House, the state theater of Georgia. An OTP veteran.... | Nancy Sundstrom (Traverse City) By day Nancy is the marketing Director for the Downtown Development Authority/Downtown Traverse City Association... |
Gary Garrison is the Artistic Director and a member of the full-time faculty of the Dramatic Writing Program at
NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. He has produced the last 14 Festival of New Works for NYU, working with over a 200
playwrights, 75 directors, and hundreds of actors. At NYU, he annually produces the Marathon Festival of One-Act Plays,
The Ten-Minute Play Festival, the Graduate Reading Series, the Festival of New Plays and The DWP Screenwriting Festival.
Garrison's plays include We Make A Wall (Empty Space Theatre),
The Big Fat Naked Truth (Brooklyn Playworks,
Circle Rep Lab, Pulse Floor, Second Generation Theatre Company, The Miranda Theatre)
Scream With Laughter
(Expanded Arts, Pulse Ensemble Theatre, Sienna Festival), Smoothness With Cool (Expanded Arts)
Empty Rooms (Miranda Theatre, Sienna Theatre), Does Anybody Want A Miss Cow
Bayou? (New York Rep), and When A Diva Dreams (Miranda Theatre, Hedgerow Theatre Company, MetroStage, African
Globe Theatre Works).
His newest play, Cherry Reds, will be produced June through July at the Fourth Unity Theatre in New York City. Scenes
and monologues from We Make A Wall and When A Diva Dreams are included in the Best Men's Monologues of 1997,
Best Women's Monologues of 1997, and Best Stage Scenes of 1997 (Smith & Krauss, Inc.)
Gawk will be published in the fall of 2000 in A Grand Entrance: Scenes and Monologues for
Mature Audiences. This past November Heinneman Press published a collection of his critically acclaimed essays on
playwriting under the title The Playwright's Survival Guide: Keeping the Drama in Your Work and Out of Your Life. His
new book by Heinneman, Ten to Right It: Making Sense of the Ten-Minute Play will be published in the fall of 2001.
This year, Garrison was on the National Selection Team for the Kennedy Center's American College Theatre Festival. He
is a sponsor and contributor to the Jane Chambers Playwriting Award and the David Cohen Award in Playwriting. He is a proud member of the Dramatist Guild,
and a very proud alumni of the Old Town Playhouse.
Leslie Giammanco is currently performing as a Swing, covering seven different roles in the Broadway production of
The Phantom of the Opera, having toured the country with it for two years. Opera credits include: Mimi in
La Boheme, Maddalena in Andrea Chenier, Santuzza in Cavalleria
Rusticana, Lucy in The Telephone, Fiordiligi in Cosi Fan Tutte, Mother Abbess in
Suor Angelica, Hanna Glawari in The Merry Widow, and Nedda in Pagliacci. On the
concert stage, Ms. Giammanco made her Carnegie Hall debut with Manhattan Philharmonic performing in the New York
premiere of Dello Joio's Nativity: A Canticle for the Child and Vivaldi's Beatus Vir. Born in Chicago, Illinois, Ms.
Giammanco holds a Master of Music Degree from Northwestern University and a Bachelor of Music Degree
from University of Southern California. Her singing has garnered her top awards as a finalist in several prestigious
opera competitions. Ms. Giammanco has just released her debut solo CD entitled Let My Song Fill Your Heart,
available through Original Cast Records and all record stores. She is a proud alumnus of the Interlochen National
Music Camp and is thrilled to be returning to Traverse City again.
Marcy McGuigan has performed numerous times in Traverse City including
RSVP Jerome Kern, The World Goes Round, and A...My Name is Alice with Michigan
Ensemble Theatre and Little Shop of Horrors, Musical Comedy Murders of 1940 and
Children of a Lesser God with Tempest Productions. Ms. McGuigan recently created the
role of Dr. Wu (a 90 year old Chinese man) in the Off-Broadway farce Shanghai
Moon. Other credits include the original production of Swingtime Canteen, Infinate Cages, Gary Garrison's Gawk, Box Office of the Damned,
and cabaret performances at Sardi's, Town Hall, Catch a Rising Star and Charles Busch's MAC Award winning Cabaret
at the Ballroom. Ms. McGuigan played Dr. Carolyn Ryan on the premier episode of Ghost Stories with Rip Torn. She is
also featured on the cast album of Swingtime Canteen. Ms. McGuigan was first led to Traverse City by way of the
University of Michigan where she received her Master's Degree in Acting.
Mary Lou Iauco Bewley is happy to be returning for her second Gala performance. A mezzo-soprano, she studied
with Lucille Evans and Walter Casel at Indiana University School of Music and later appeared as a soloist with the
Idyllwild Arts Foundation in Handel's Messiah, Faure's
Requiem, Mozart's Regina Coeli, and Vivaldi's Gloria.
While at Indiana, she also worked on the costume and make-up crew of the Opera Theater's Musical Arts Center
and has done additional theater work on special projects with Lucasfilm Limited and the Los Angeles Theater Center.
Her Old Town Playhouse roles have included the Witch (Into the Woods), Sylvia
(The Great American Backstage Musical) and the voice of the plant, Audrey II
(Little Shop of Horrors). Dramatic theater roles have included Hattie in
Laundry and Bourbon and Lola in Dutchman. Other soloist roles have
included frequent performances with the Traverse Symphony Orchestra, Central United Methodist Church
productions of Handel's Messiah, and Starting Here, Starting
Now, a musical revue held by Parts North Productions, Suttons Bay, MI. Ms. Iauco-Bewley can be heard
on compact disk: The Magic Circle. (New World Productions label).
Kerry Price Secrist is a recognized actress and entertainer. She has enjoyed performances in many musical productions
including Michigan Ensemble Theatre's Nunsense (as Mother Superior) and
A...My Name is Alice, as well as
Tempest Productions Evita, Jerry's Girls, and Musical Comedy Murders of 1940. Many will remember her in the
Old Town Playhouse's productions of Company, Lil Abner, She Loves Me and various musical reviews. Ms.
Secrist is a regular with Traverse City's Dixieland jazz band, The Backroom Gang and has performed at Jazz Festivals
throughout the United States, including Bix Biderback Festival and the Sacramento Jubilee.
___
Bev Attwood has a long history with the Old Town Playhouse. Her first involvement came in 1971 when she
was cast as the lead in Mame. She brought her husband Vern along to help with sets and the two quickly became key
players in the early Playhouse. Both were involved in the selection and purchase of what is now the Old Town
Playhouse. Ms. Attwood has been very involved in every aspect of the theater. She has written and directed four
variety shows. She has also served on both of the theater's governing boards. Audiences will remember her for roles
such as Miss Hannigan in Annie and Dolly Levi in Hello, Dolly.
Judy Harrison has performed throughout the mid-west, most recently promoting her first country CD,
A Satisfied
Me. She recently returned from Nashville where she recorded her second CD
The Girl Most Likely. Ms. Harrison is co-owner and President of High Impact Productions,
having produced the entertainment for the American Heart Association in Grand Rapids for the past five years. As a
choreographer, she has a long list of credits including
theater, theme parks and cruise lines. She holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Dance from Indiana University. Local
audiences will remember her as Cassie in the Old Town Playhouse production of
A Chorus Line, as well as roles with Michigan Ensemble Theatre in The World Goes Round
and RSVP Jerome Kern.
Jeremy John Evans (Traverse City) recently returned from a tour of
"Forever Plaid" with the Springer Opera House, the state theater of Georgia. An OTP veteran, Jeremy's career has
taken him all over the country both as a performer and as a music director. Some of his favorite roles have included
Vinnie in "Lucky Stiff", Seymour in "Little Shop of Horrors",
Arpad in "She Loves Me", and as a featured singer and dancer in many music revues. Jeremy graduated from Alma College
and is looking forward to joining the faculty this summer at the Interlochen Center for the Arts.
Nancy Sundstrom is, by day, the Marketing Director for the Downtown Development Authority/Downtown Traverse City
Association. She is also known as a longtime freelance writer and contributor to numerous regional and outstate
publications, including the Traverse City Record Eagle, Northern Express, Michigan Sports & Fitness and the 7&4
Outdoor Guide. Ms. Sundstrom is closing in on 20 years of work with the Old Town Playhouse as a performer
(Chicago, A Streetcar Named Desire, Vanities and Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean, among others) and
as a director for shows including Oliver, Annie, The Secret Garden, and Cat on a Hot Tin
Roof. She and husband David are the proud parents of three great kids-Jordan, Taylor and
Christian and her current community volunteer projects include serving on the boards of the State Theater Project,
Traverse Area Arts Council, Traverse City Children and Teen Theater and Trinity Lutheran Church.
Nancy Brick......After taking an extended leave of absence from the theatre to drive her four kids around to various
activities, Nancy is THRILLED to be working again with her OTP buddies on this very worthwhile event. She has great
memories, though, of being in the ensemble casts of Tempest Production's and Michigan Ensemble Theatre's
productions of "A....My Name is Alice", OTP's production of
"Into the Woods" as the Baker's Wife, and Parts North
Production's "Closer Than Ever" and "Starting Here, Starting
Now". She currently serves on the Traverse Symphony
Orchestra's Board, the G.T. Area Community Living Endowment Board and is on the Development Committee of
the State Theatre Project. Nancy would like to thank all of you for supporting the Arts in Northern Michigan. It makes
the world go round.
| #1... Play it Again, Sam Value: $ 375 Season Tickets for two to the 2000-2001 Old Town Playhouse season. You'll also receive dinner gift certificates from Dills, LaSenorita, Chili's, Applebee's and North Peak, so you can make an evening of it! Plus so you don't miss a thing on the OTP website, you'll receive three months internet service courtesy of Channel Communications. |
#2... Cabaret Value: $1000 Jazz musician Bob James presents his Esprit d' Escalier, an impressionist cafe' scene. Framed by State of the Art and while you enjoy your new artwork you can enjoy the sounds of Bob James and Fourplay with the included CDs. |
#3... Whales in August Value: $200 Enjoy a daytrip to Manitou Island. Package includes round trip for 2 to South Manitou via the Manitou Island Transit Co, framed photo of the island by Mary Frey, lunch for two from Village Cheese Shanty and two sweatshirts and a snack basket from Carp River Trading Company. |
#4.... True West Value: $395 Raymond Weil wristwatch and wallet from Federico's Jewelers. |
#5.. Broadway Bound (via Lansing) Value: $255 Two tickets to any show of the 2000-2001 season at the Boarshead Theater in Lansing. Overnight lodging at the Courtyard Marriott and dinner for two at the Lansing LaSenorita, adjacent to the hotel. Plus you'll enjoy the sounds of entertainers Leslie Giammanco and Judy Harrison as well as an autographed copy of Director Gary Garrison's new book. |
#6 The Days of Wine and Roses Value: $160 V.I.P. wine tasting tour for six, an evening at the Neahtawanta Bed & Breakfast for two, and a $25 gift certificate to Molly Bye Golly's Restaurant. |
| #7... Romance, Romance Value: $595 14 kt. gold Fischer spiral pin by Martinek's Jewelers. |
#8 Chicago Value: $650 A two night stay at the Knickerbocker hotel, $100 dinner gift certificate. Tickets for two to Second City and a Steppenwolf Production. |
#9 Arsenic and Old Lace Value: $ Family Portrait by photographer Tom Kachadurian, photo album by Creative Memories, cigars from Nolan's Tobacconist, three bottles of wine from the Village Wine Shoppe, a purse and rug from Turtle Island Weavers and a gift certificate from Ella's Vintage Clothing. |
| #10... Plaza Suite Value: $405 Amway Grand Hotel in Grand Rapids package featuring a deluxe room for two, a bottle of chilled champagne, dinner for two, evening turndown service, free parking and use of all fitness center facilities (including racquetball and use of heated swimming pool w/adjoining whirlpool.) |
#11... Enter Laughing Value: $110 Four tickets to the Northwestern Michigan College theatre production of "Three Musketeers" a $50 gift certificate to Mico's and dessert and coffee afterwards at the Top of the Park. |
#12... Singin' in the Rain Value: $575 Lynnteriors presents a watercolor by artist James Kazamursky. |
| #13 (we in the theatre are superstitious, so....) |
#14... The Odd Couple Value: $915 Chef Frank Lyon and OTP Board President Tracey Towner present a dinner for six in your home. Lyon (trained at Bowers Harbor Inn and now chef at Old Mission Tavern) and Towner (who introduced Lyon to his wife) will prepare and serve dinner in your home, with meats provided by Burritt's, a selection of local wines and music by Sarah Anderson. |
#15 Grease Value: $_______ Package pending |
| #16... Brighton Beach Memoirs Value: $300 The Traverse City Children and Teen theatre presents a summer package which includes everything you'll need for a day at the beach (beach towel, beach chair, beach toys, disposable camera, suntan lotion, plus goodies from Toy Harbor in Traverse City and much more!) Plus you'll receive four tickets to their Missoula Children's Theatre production and a certificate good for one Summer 2000 drama class for your child. |
#17.. You Can't Take it With You Value: $165 Sterling and Onyx pin by Diane Hubert. |
#18... Camelot Value: $1200 A week's stay at a condo on San Marco Island, featuring three bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, living and kitchen area, hot tub, access to swimming pool in close proximity to beautiful beaches. Guaranteed availability during prime season, courtesy of Cindy and Dean Robb. |
| #19 ...Inherit the Wind Value: $320 Two hour trip for for on the West Wind (formerly the Malabar) and a $200 gift certificate to Windows. |
#20 The Miracle Worker Value: $1115 Chef Rose Hollander presents an ethnic dinner for eight, with harpist Sharon Olson, a selection of local wines and served by some of Old Town Playhouses' finest servers. |
#21 Love Letters Value: ________ package pending |
| #22 ...The Fantastiks Value: $200 Pendant by Bruce Barnett |
#23 ....Black Beauty Value: $300 One night stay for two with breakfast and a complimentary bottle of wine at Blackstar Farms, plus dinner at Hattie's and a movie for two at the Bay Theatre in Suttons Bay. |
#24 |
| #25... Night of the Iguana Value: $2000 A week in Acapulco at a condo (courtesy of Maurie Dennis). Enjoy four bedrooms, four bathrooms, private jacuzzi, complex swimming pool, two wetbars, kitchen, living room, dining room, full maid service, veranda with scenic view. |
#26.... A Chorus Line Value: $475 Classes for two at Dance Arts Academy, a $50 gift certificate to Studio 101, two tickets to the majority of student productions during the 2000-2001 season at Interlochen Arts Academy. Once you've done all that dancing enjoy a $75 gift certificate for yoga with Karen Jennings. |
#27 Art Value: $380 Dinner for four at Tapawingo, Dennos Museum family membership, souvenirs from the musuem gift shop, tickets to six concerts at Michigan Legacy Art Park at Crystal Mountain, and while you're there--golf for four at Crystal Mountain. |
| #28 ...A Midsummer's Night Dream Value: $490 Bower's Harbor Vineyard-Gentleman's Six Pack, $100 gift certificate to the Boathouse Restaurant and two nights at the Best Western Four Seasons Motel (no restrictions), dinner the second night at Red Lobster. |
Volunteers Needed!
The Black and White Gala 2000 committee has already begun meeting and is looking to fill
key volunteer positions. The success of last year's event was due to the great number of volunteers who came forward to make it all happen. Anyone
interested in volunteering to work the Gala should contact the Old Town Playhouse business office at 231-947-2210 or via email to OTP@traverse.com.