VIRAL News
Posted August 31st, 2009 by Sean WilliamsMac Rogers has been called a lot of things, but lately those things have switched from “in need of a shower” and “gains weight like a woman” to “needs to be on Broadway” and (and I’m not making this up) “genius”.
It does bring to mind the whole “if your grandmother is such a genius, why is she sitting in the neighbor’s car” comment from Parenthood, but I’m totally fine with this characterization. People have been very generous with me about this show, and as a producer I definitely get the best of all worlds. I’m not part of the rehearsal process, so I get to watch the show the same way the audience does… but I also get credit for the production. But when people congratulate me, I generally have to point out that Jordana and Mac did the real work, that I’m just on a skateboard, sorta holding on to the back of the car.
Last night, someone grabbed me when I made that joke and said, “Hang on for dear life and DO NOT LET GO.”
I’m sure, had Mac heard that, his fear of commitment would have snapped to attention, and he’d have hid under his seat.
We got a stack of good news last night. We’ve been in talks for the last week or so about extending the show as part of the Fringe Encore series, and last night, they made the official announcement. It was always our assumption that the Encore Series was reserved for shows that have a possible commercial future, so it took some time for them to convince us that our show was indeed just this sort of show.
Independent of that, the adjudicators for the festival were kind enough to award us with the “Outstanding Play” award. I really do appreciate the fact that they don’t do “best” in the festival… it has to be pretty weird for the big award shows to compare totally different performances in completely different genres and figure out who “won”, but the “outstanding” label is just a bit of a mouthful, so everyone shortens it in conversation to “best” anyway.
We’ve been really careful not to do that. It’s hard because you only get a couple of words in marketing material, but we’ve really tried to honor the spirit of the festival. In the past, we’ve referred to “Two Time FringeNYC Award Winner Mac Rogers”, but technically, it was for “Outstanding Musical” and “Outstanding Playwright” for two different productions. In conversation, I just end up saying “Best Musical” and “the Playwrighting Award”…
It’s all very heady stuff, I’m not gonna lie. But my responsibility is to continue to look at other theater, now that this is already in production, and to write about and talk about what it all means to me. I’m in Myrtle Beach for a week vacation, but I have a backlog of thoughts about the dozen or so shows that I’ve seen and have yet to write about.
I don’t claim to be a theater blogger, but I am a theater producer, and as such, it’s my responsibility to talk about other productions. I probably won’t talk about what I hate, unless doing so is constructive to the larger conversation going on in New York Theater. For the record, during this year’s Fringe Festival, I saw what I believe is the worst piece of theater I’ve ever seen in my life, and I’m still trying to decide if it would be constructive to write about it.
If you’re reading this blog, chances are you probably saw the show. There aren’t that many people interested in Indy Theater, and we sold a lot of tickets. If you saw the show, I just want to thank you, and if not, why not come?
Congratulations!!!!!