Faces, Exhibit C: The Father-in-Law/Dad

Oh, don't worry, there are boys in this show, too! Here's one of them! Charles Schoenherr is playing The Father-in-Law in The Eiffel Tower Wedding Party and has provided the voice of the Dad in Peculiar Way. Now, if you're paying attention, you'll remember that yesterday's face (it was Mary Jo, remember?) was responsible for The Mother-in-Law and Mom... 2 and 2 equals Charles and Mary Jo being married in two shows in one evening! Happenstance? Coincidence? Casting decision? What are the odds? No really: what are the odds? My bookie's waiting.

Ohhhh, ok. Enough with the crazy funny jokes. Put your meeting people caps on for one Charles Schoenherr!

"Charles Schoenherr is thrilled to be working with The Nine. A graduate of the Acting Studio at the University of Illinois Urbana/Champaign, Charles has been performing in Chicago for nine years. Previous roles include "Rainey Brother #2" in The Ballad of the Sad Cafe, "Lucky" in Waiting for Godot, and "Don Jon" in Much Ado About Nothing all with Signal Ensemble Theater. While a company member with A Crew of Patches he has played multiple roles in many Shakespeare productions including: All's Well That End's Well, Julius Caesar, Taming of the Shrew, Twelfth Night, Romeo and Juliet, and Macbeth."

Faces, Exhibit B: The Mother-in-Law/Mom

Hey look, another darling face! This one belongs to Mary Jo Bolduc! Not only can you come see her as The Mother-in-Law in The Eiffel Tower Wedding Party, but you'll also get to *hear* her as the Mom in Peculiar Way. You see? Sight, sound, ALL THE SENSES! Or at least TWO of them!

Also, it's a little-known secret that MJ is functioning as our impromptu dance captain for The Eiffel Tower Wedding Party. What's that I say? Dances? Yes, and there are four of them, and they are so much fun you'll pee, and I'll tell you all about them in a future Faces post (hint: dances = choreographer). But first, you need to be feasting your eyes on this lovely lady:

"MJ is very excited to be a part of the second installment of The Nine, and has had a blast with this cast and crew! She is thankful to have performed with great theatres all over Chicago: WNEP, Mary Arrchie, New Leaf, Timeline, Provision, Trapdoor, Lifeline, Second City National Touring Co., Red Tape, Jackalope, Annoyance, ComedySportz, etc. Some credits include: “The Edward Hopper Project”, “MUD People”, “Six Years”, “Metaluna & the Amazing Science of the Mind”, “Beggars in the House of Plenty”, “Time of Your Life”, “Invasion of the Minnesota Normals”, “Amerikafka”, “The Shadow” (Jeff nominated - Best Supporting Actress), “Co-Ed Prison Sluts”, “365 Sketches”, the improvised “DanseMacabre”, “ScrewPuppies”, & “Dinner4Six”. Also, she thinks you look great in that shirt!"

OMG, the faces of Radio Silence! Exhibit A: The Bridesmaid

Well, Jesus H. Christ! It's Nine time again! I guess that means time to dust off the ol' blog, too, hunh? I have two birds that need killin' and one stone to throw, so let's lay this out. Last go around, I did a bad job at a) keeping this blog updated with production info, and b) giving you a place to go to peep the pretty and talented faces you saw at the show. (For the newcomers, we don't do programs at The Nine. Sorry.... kinda.) But the lightbulb went off, and I finally realized that this might be the perfect place to provide a go-to who's who! And since we have twice the cast that we did in Part One, I gotta get started early!!! So here's the first of many, many cast/crew members as we lead into opening on May 6th, where the awesomeness lurks.

First up, we have one of our very familiar faces from Part One: subUrbia. You might remember this lady from her stint drinking Jack Daniels on the roof of a 7-11... Ladies and gents, put your hands together and cheer with your faces for the one, the only, the Meghan Reardon -- soon to be rocking Radio Silence as The Bridesmaid in The Eiffel Tower Wedding Party!

"Meghan Reardon is proud to be a part of the second installment of The Nine, having played Bee-Bee in SubUrbia during the first production of this cycle last winter. She is a company member at Red Tape Theatre, where she has been seen as Tory in Church/Pullman, WA, Salvia in Obscura and Philomele in The Love of the Nightingale. Elsewhere, she has performed with Signal Ensemble, The Building Stage, Redmoon Theatre, The (a)Symmetry Cycle and more. Currently, she is workshopping the new play Aunt Susan by Seth Bockley at The Goodman Theatre. Meghan is a 2008 graduate of Knox College, home of the Prairie Fire. Special thanks to Bries for allowing her to come out and play with this talented group of rogues and rascals!"

Rehearsals - In Progress

Hey kids...

Tim here. Also Austin. Also photographer. Here's a brief sampling of what we've been up to, y'all.

Bootleg!

First, an announcement: there are officially less than 300 seats remaining for Part One: Eric Bogosian's subUrbia. And, based on my very unscientific research, there are another 100 or so who have replied 'yes' to the Facebook invite who also have yet to reserve. You probably want to beat them to the punch, especially if you're looking to come on opening or industry night, which are each over 1/4 sold, or (somewhat randomly) February 27th, which is already half sold.

Bottom line? It's time to e-mail theninechicago@gmail.com and get you some tickets!

So, we're hot and heavy into rehearsals for Part One: subUrbia, and one of the big the biggest discoveries is how to deal with the reverse round staging we are using for the show. It wasn't until halfway through the first blocking rehearsal that I even stopped to consider that this idea might not have worked -- I've never used it anywhere before and honestly had no good reason to be so certain it was going to pan out. Luckily enough, it did, and we don't have anything to worry about in terms of our entire conceit falling through.

One of the things we've learned about putting up a reverse round show, however, is that staging comes first, character second (speaking solely from a directorial scheduling standpoint). That isn't to say that any less focus is being placed on the characters. What it is saying is that before we can allow time for the cast to settle into the skin of these characters, we have to shake them out of proscenium style movement and into this 360-degree world. It also means that my cast is packed full of tremendously wonderful actors for being game to be moved about like pinballs as we work out ways to ensure that all sides of the audience are played to as often as possible.

We finished the initial blocking for the entire show on Saturday. This week we get to start truly finessing the ground plans we've worked so to hard create. And I couldn't be more ready. There was a moment last week during which we inserted a two-person scene that we had already blocked into a larger group scene that it is a part of. Possibly more exciting than learning that the reverse round staging is going to work, what we discovered is that the scene, which was solid when we initially staged it, instantly grew emotional legs the second time around. Confident in the basic structure of the scene, they were newly able to explore the character intricacies of the scene without having to worry about which side of the audience may or may not be out of the line of sight.

And sometimes... well, sometimes it just clicks right away. The following video is from the initial blocking rehearsal for this scene. Granted, it was at the end of the night after we had worked it a while, but still -- first night this was on its feet. This is why I love my cast. What follows is rehearsal footage combined with in-show footage. An impromptu parking lot concert by Pony (Sam Quinn) is caught on tape by Buff (Greg Wenz). When you come see the show, keep this footage in mind -- this is what it looks like through the camera Buff is hauling around. Also appearing in the scene: Sooze (Emily Shain), Jeff (Alex Hugh Brown), Bee-Bee (Meghan Reardon), and Erica (Katie Genualdi). Enjoy! Enjoy and then reserve your seat!

Bries.

I've got two steps for you.

Step 1: Take a listen to this cut from the pre-show mix for Part One: Eric Bogosian's subUrbia:

Makes you wanna get up and dance? Shake yo' groove thing? Be pretty much amazing? Awesome. Hold onto that feeling. You'll want it for the show. Especially that dancing part. And that pretty much amazing part. Okay, now that you're in the right state of mind, the second step.

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Step 2: If you haven't done so already, e-mail theninechicago@gmail.com and make your subUrbia reservations now. For real. We've set up a Facebook invite for this guy and the Yes count is already over 120 -- that's not even counting any Maybes. You might remember that magic 360 number? Yup, we've got a yes count over a third of our entire run capacity, and we're still a month out from our Feb. 19th opening! (Speaking of which, Opening Night and our Monday, March 1st Industry Night are going twice as fast, so get in that line, like, yesterday.)

We'll be back this weekend with a full report on all of the awesome happening in rehearsal, and there is much awesome, but I thought you might want the heads up while there's still a few tickets for you left to grab.

You can thank me later. At the show. When I see you there.

Bries.

Here we go!

Alright, the holidays are now long over, it's for real time to get back to business -- business being Part One: Eric Bogosian's subUrbia, of course. What did you miss in the past couple of weeks? Quite a bit, actually!

First, personnel: We've added one new cast member and done a little shuffling with two others. I'd like to first introduce you our new Erica: Miss Katie Genualdi! We couldn't be happier to have Katie on board with us and ready to roll. Also in the way of cast changes: Aimee Bello, initially our Pakeesa for the second half of the run, will now be taking the role for the entire run, while Amrita Dhaliwal, who had been listed as our first half Pakeesa, is sliding over behind the scenes as our Language/Dialect Coach. Little bit of last minute settling before we begin...

And begin we shall, in full force! I've been meeting with the cast individually over the past couple of weeks to discuss the changes in the script. (By the way, have I mentioned that there's a new script? Bogosian's revisions from the from the 2006 Broadway production were published on December 1st. How convenient is that?) And tonight begins rehearsals proper!

So expect blog content to pick back up and expect it to change quite drastically. Where I was giving you lots of talking and philosophizing before, be keeping an eye open for the nitty and the gritty. Maybe some rehearsal photos from our very own Austin D. Oie! Maybe a couple of guest blogs from cast 'n crew! I even hear rumblings of a video! Lots of exciting stuff, and a lot more in the trenches just for you.

Also, now that rehearsals are starting, the reservation lines have been opened completely. I'm working on getting a ticket counter set up so you can have a real-time look at how few seats are still available, but for the time being let me tell you that it's less than 350. Repetition: there are less than 350 seats available for the entire run of subUrbia. Looking to plant your fanny in one of them? E-mail theninechicago@gmail.com or call 312-772-4014. And do so soon, 'cause that counter keeps ticking down!

Bries.