Steven Rausch

i really want to get back to blogging, so i’m moving away from the monthly emails and doing just that. a lot’s happened since the last update. lemme fill you in.

we opened shipwrecked! february 5 and closed it on the 28. we had a great run. for those of you who may not recall, i was cast as a foley artist. i helped to provide sound effects and the musical score for the production. the whole show was very theatre-of-the-mind meets warner brothers saturday morning cartoons. people really enjoyed it. and the cast was out of this world. rick mcmillan played louis de rougemont, the story’s protagonist; and melody butiu and eric bondoc played the rest of the characters — probably more than 25 between the two of them.

i was also the rehearsal assistant for ameriville, a new show by universes, directed by chay yew. it was the first show that opened this year’s humana festival. it’s a hip hop theatre piece that examines the state of the union through the lens of hurricane katrina. it was truly electrifying to be in the room with universes. to see their process, the way they write, the way they critique each other. hip hop theatre is something that i’d love to get into. it was great to have that kind of behind the scenes access into what the creation of it can look like.

the anthology writers also came back into town! we had a lot of work to do on brink! scripts were finalized, and we got down to business. we worked all day, and then, in true apprentice style, we partied all night. looking back, it feels like we’d been rehearsing brink! for months, but, i guess that’s kinda true. i mean, we did start working on anthology way back in october when the writers first came to town. at any rate, we’ve been rehearsing for a while and last night we opened. we opened to a PACKED house. the show was sold, then so many empty seat passes were requested that they stopped giving them out and just told people to stand. and there were standers. everywhere. there were even people watching from the grid 35 feet above the stage because there was no more standing room. and we rocked the house. we held for so much laughter and applause that we added 30+ minutes to the show. last night was by far the greatest performance experience of my life. a true highlight of my time here. i’ll never forget it.