Reps Theatre Maasdorp Ave / Sam Nujoma St, Harare, Zimbabwe

Reps Reporter - January 2012

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Best wishes to you all for 2012 – here’s hoping for a great year for you, for Reps and for Zimbabwe! December was an extremely busy month for Reps and the pantomime was very successful at the box office, bringing in a great many people to enjoy the build-up to Christmas. On stage now is the very exciting Boeing Boeing, rated highly by all those who have seen it so far. The rest of the year holds forth great promise and we hope to present some excellent shows, with great variety, between now and the year end.

Zane E Lucas joins the team

Exco has decided the time is right to appoint a Director of Productions, the first since the late Adrian Stanley held the post until his retirement in the mid-2000s. Zane E Lucas has agreed to take on the role and he is already in place, with a commitment to stage a number of productions under his personal direction and to take on the responsibility of helping to further improve standards of Reps productions all round. We welcome Zane to the team and wish him well. He is a highly experienced actor and director and brings with him talent, enthusiasm, energy and a commitment to taking Reps to even greater heights. An official announcement of this development will be made shortly to the public at large.

Boeing Boeing gets rave reviews

Zane’s current production is Boeing Boeing, a revival and update of the classic farce about a man with three air hostess fiancées. It opened to a near full house on New Year’s Eve and completes its run on Saturday January 14. Don’t miss this excellent show, which has been gaining rave reviews. On Saturday night, an additional offering is a First Class experience … in keeping with the theme of the show. Rows K and L have been reserved for First Class passengers, who get pre-show snacks, drinks and entertainment in the Members’ Bar before being ‘boarded’ in the theatre. Have fun and take advantage of this option. Booking for this, and for all remaining performances, is open at The Spotlight. The show stars Ryan lawrence, Paul Shephard, Chido Maunze, Jamie McLaren, Kyla Render and Mike Blackburn.

Harare’s Got Talent 4 ready to roll

More new talent will be platformed at our fourth show in the Harare’s Got Talent series … in which performers of any kind are invited to show off their talent and stage skills. This will be at 7pm on Saturday January 28. Anyone wishing to be in the show, whatever their age, performance skill or experience, can contact the Reps office to find out about the try-out on January 21. Encourage performers to take part and then come along to see them all in action. We already have several singers and dance groups lined up. Proceeds from this show will go to Reps and to the Dance Trust of Zimbabwe. Book at The Spotlight. All tickets are $10 for this show.

Music to make you Shout!

Next up on Main stage is the musical revue Shout! This is a sequel to the February/March shows of the past few years Those Were The Days, Top Of The Pops, Seasons In The Sun and Dream Lover, this year featuring songs from the 60s, 70s and 80s. The cast of more than 30 singers and a dozen or so dancers is already in rehearsal for the show, which runs February 16 (preview night Feb 15) to March 3. Direction is by Stan Higgins, musical direction by Iona Jones and choreography by June Cloete. It will be a great treat of show and everyone’s invited to come along and enjoy some great entertainment and to sing and dance along if they so wish. Booking is now open and early booking is recommended if previous ticket sales of these shows are to be repeated.

2011 Reps Afdis Awards coming up

African Distillers is once again kindly and generously sponsoring the annual Reps awards event, with judges already having met and made their decisions for 2011. The ceremony and show will be on Saturday March 10 and all members are invited to be there to see who wins in the various categories and to honour all those nominated from our selection of productions during the past year. There is no booking for this show, which will be at 7pm that evening. An announcement of nominations is being sent out, so you will know the finalists in the running for the trophies.

In rehearsal soon … two superb plays

Zane E Lucas is soon to start rehearsals for Neil Simon’s semi-auto-biographical Chapter Two, a great comedy to run on the Main Stage and penned by a master of the genre, while Graham Crutchley will start rehearsing Colder Than Here, described as a comedy-drama, which will run in Theatre Upstairs. Auditions for these productions will be held on Sunday January 22, so why not come along and try out for a role? Bookings will open at the end of January.

Members’ Bar busy with great entertainment

The social events scene in the members’ bar has been a great hit this past year, thanks to Tim Garrard and Jenni Ferguson … and they have much more in store, including Ryan Koriya on January 13, The Weakest Link on January 22 and Rob Osborne on January 27. These are highly entertaining evenings and we invite all members and their guests to come along for a super social evening in good company, usually with accompanying food and, of course, our bar, which is now better stocked than for many years!

Snippets

• Preps is looking for a new co-ordinator, Katie Cooper having had to give up because of pressure of study and work (thanks to Katie for the past few years’ hard work!). The group will start meeting this Saturday, January 14.
• Repteens start 2012 this Friday, January 13, with co-ordinator Kyla render planning great things for the group – including a Main Stage show in April.
• Front of House and Box Office teams are looking for new volunteers. Please contact the Reps office if you would like to join a team, be on a team or get trained to do box office. Current volunteers are reminded of this year’s social/briefing sessions – January 17 (6pm) and January 21 (12 noon); choose which one to attend and advise either Graham Crutchley or Stan Higgins.
• Sue Charnley has very kindly organised a clean-up of the gardens running from the car park to the foyer and it is already looking GREAT. Thanks to her and her helpers for this effort! She also arranged paint for portions of the theatre building to be upgraded.
• Dress-Up Heaven (aka the Reps Wardrobe) is open until 6pm most evenings, thanks to Collina Mvududu and her willingness to be open at a more convenient time for some of our patrons.

Did you know ...

... that sponsors are now being sought for all Repertory Players’ productions, to help the theatre keep shows running and to boost the standard of inputs into shows? If you would like to know more about sponsoring a show then please contact the Reps office. Spar Zimbabwe sponsored the pantomime and this enabled the team to get the staging and costumes arranged timeously, as well as help ensure that proceeds from ticket sales can be ploughed into Reps’ running costs and developmental expenditure.

Until next time

Keep well

Reps Exco

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