Theater Educators gathered from across NY State to learn alongside one another at the New York State Theater Educators Association (NYSTEA) Annual PD weekend in New York City. We visited the Museum of Broadway, engaged in panel discussions and workshops at Northeastern University NYC, and attended our annual meeting at the Drama Book Shop. On Saturday night we had time for a show on our own. A number of us enjoyed “Two Strangers Carrying a Cake in New York City.” Another successful NYSTEA PD weekend in the books, even despite the Nor’easter!
Over the course of a parent/teacher conference, a grieving mother and an emotionally overwhelmed primary school teacher have a fraught conversation about the tragic suicide of the mother’s son, Gidion. Gidion may have been bullied severely—or he may have been an abuser. As his story is slowly uncovered, the women try to reconstruct a satisfying explanation for Gidion’s act and come to terms with excruciating feelings of culpability.
Content Warning: suicide, bullying, loss of a child, descriptions of extreme violence and sexual assault
SHOW DATES & TIMES:
November 7, 14, 21 – 7:30 pm November 8, 15, 22 – 5:00 pm
Starring Kristen Tripp Kelley and Caitlin Coleman.
Directed by Lara Haberberger
“…resonant…[a] particularly eloquent study of people caught between the competing demands of reason, morality and family…harrowing…a narrative that is as elegant as it is chilling.” —Washington Post.
Kristen Tripp Kelley as Corryn Photos by Stefanie Warnick
Alleyway Theater hosted Enough! Plays to End Gun Violence, the local installment of a nationwide evening of staged readings. The plays are written by teenagers and call attention to the issue of gun violence in our schools. Nichols students participated with young actors from Cheektowaga Central, West Seneca West, Tapestry, and BAVPA high schools.
Students volunteered and took part in a public staged reading at the Alleyway Theatre on Monday, Oct. 6th at 7:30p.
A Wrinkle in Time adapted for the stage by Tracy Youngfrom Madeleine L’Engle
Cast List Meg: Madelyn Goldberg Charles: Hoor Siddiqui Calvin: Lucian Bartlo Mrs. Whatsit: Brenna Ring Mrs. Who: Kabari Bagia Mrs. Which: Madison White Reader 1: (postmistress, Fortinbras puppeteer): Emily Burnett Reader 2 (Father, Principal): Zach Amdur Reader 3 (mean school kid, Aunt Beast): Jasmine Fleming Reader 4 (lunchlady, neighbor 4, Happy Medium): Claire Farnham Reader 5 (Sandy, neighbor 2, Camazotz Mother): Ava Cowan Reader 6 (tramp, Camazotz Man): Eli Kiddy Reader 7 (neighbor 1, Mother): Zazie Anastasopoulos Reader 8 (teacher, henchman): Evie Walcott Reader 9 (popular schoolgirl, Man with Glowing Red Eyes): Xeni Anastasopoulos Reader 10: Oscar Fors (fortinbras, henchman)
Director, Costumes, Sound Design: Kristen Tripp Kelley
Assistant Director: Meghan O’Connor
Technical Director: Curt Steinzor
Set, Lights, Projections: Chris Cavanagh
Work of Life Stage Manager: Tate Boccaccio Work of Life Assistant Stage Manager: Lucy Coburn Rehearsal Stage Managers: Muffy Chiantella, Alexis Miyashita Light Board: Claire West Sound Cues/Projections: Nate Johnson Live Sound Reinforcement: Nate Gorton ASM/Props Master/Body Mic Master: Lucy Coburn SR Crew: Mia Gorton, Ellen Gwitt SL Crew: Willa Christensen, Eva Robinson, Eliana Cruz Photogrpaher/Videographer: Hamid Hussein
Production Photos: Hamid Hussein
Students performed a scene from the play at Alice, Ever After Books for story time hour before our final matinee.
NYSTEA teachers gathered in NYC to partake in workshops, network, and enjoy theater performances. Kristen Tripp Kelley engaged in workshops centered around fostering student play writing, exploring new play titles, and building community through a theater program.
Kristen Tripp Kelley joined by longtime Nichols colleague Kate Olena and former student and current Amherst High School Drama Club Director Alex Montesano.
Annual Meeting at Drama Book ShopThe view from the NY Film Academy. NYFA was our PD Day home base. Jez Butterworth’s Hills of CaliforniaShaina Taub’s Suffs
Fifteen Nichols students just completed the 2nd annual course in Geology and Ecology of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. What an epic success! This course brings Nichols School curriculum to the forefront. After work in the classroom we travel to the Yellowstone region for experiential learning designed by instructors Josh Ring and Kristen Tripp Kelley. We are grateful for the help we receive from Nichols, and for dinners and experiences provided by Delaware North. Thank you to all for making this trip a great success. Looking forward to 2025!
On Monday, April 22nd, Julia Miskines hosted a community discussion of burnout among theatre practitioners led by a curated panel of local professionals in the Buffalo Region. Following the moderated panel discussion, the event featured an open forum for conversation with attendees to provide local workers with an opportunity to share any ideas, perspectives, and questions. This event was organized as a part of a graduation project at the University at Buffalo Arts Management Graduate Program. It was sponsored by the Association of Regional Theatre Artists & MusicalFare Theatre.
The Nichols School Advanced Acting performed at the Alleyway Theatre Cabaret for their final offering of the season: “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged).”
A hot off-the-presses, 2023 revision of the script that took the Edinburgh Fringe by storm in 1987, this hilarious, irreverent, and imaginative play gave Nichols actors the chance to develop their comedic chops in an intimate professional venue. Two sold-out houses enjoyed every minute.
Alleyway Theatre Lobby The Alleyway Main St. CabaretStage Manager gains experience in a new space
The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged) (Revised) (Again) By Jess Winfield, Adam Long, and David Singer. The latest revisions by Jess Winfield and David Singer were presented by special arrangements with Broadway Play Publishing, Inc.
Nichols Upper School theatre students presented Iphigenia and Other Daughters Adapted by Ellen McLaughlin from Sophocles and Euripides on December 1st and 2nd, 2023 at the Flickinger Performing Arts Center.
ARTA (Association of Regional Theater Artists) Directing Workshop: 3 Directors, 1 Scene The ARTA Education Committee proudly presented a free to the public, interactive workshop on the art of directing for the theatre. When: Sunday, November 12th, 6-8pm. Where: Paul Robeson Theatre, 350 Masten Ave. Buffalo, New York 14209 What: Accomplished WNY directors Verneice Turner, Kevin Craig, and Megan Callahan showed us their approach to the first day of rehearsal using a common scene from Albee’s “Zoo Story” and volunteers from the workshop. Kristen Tripp Kelley and Peter Horn moderated discussion throughout. One scene three ways—a night of learning and sharing.
Q&A with our PanelOpen Rehearsal with Megan Callahan
Anna Kay France’s Penumbra is a powerful play looking at the bond between two sisters and the complexity of their relationship—the intimate connection of loyalty with rivalry, love with manipulation and betrayal. It looks at the mysterious way family tragedies repeat themselves in subsequent generations—and the tension between the desire to obscure family secrets and the compulsion to bring them to light.
Directed by Kristen Tripp Kelley Featuring: Christine Turturro as Nora, Carolyn Freeman as Emily and Patrick Cameron as Shaun
A Buffalo Writers’ Theater event in collaboration with the Buffalo and Erie County Libraries
The reading event will be held October 7th, 2023 at 2 pm at the Ring of Knowledge. It is open to the general public and all are welcome!
I’ve very much enjoyed revisiting Anna Kay’s beautiful play. I first came to it as an actor as part of ICTC’s Sunday Series with Derek Campbell at the helm and Kristen Kos and Brian Riggs as my cast mates( early 2000s?). Now Patrick Cameron, Carolyn Freeman and Christine Turturro bring these well-drawn characters to life. Thanks to Anna Kay France for the invitation to direct this staged reading, and to Matt Doyle for his support through Buffalo Writers’ Theater. Hope you can join us!
Actors and Director with playwright Anna Kay France and Matt Boyle of Buffalo Writers’ Theatre
Led by Andrea Mancuso and Kristen Tripp Kelley, the Nichols Upper School Film and Advanced Acting classes collaborated on four short films united by the theme of Untold Stories. Students served as directors, screenplay writers, actors, art directors, production managers, editors, sound designers and cinematographers. Teams chose genre, four character types and two plot points at random, and all teams shared a common prop (skeleton key) and line of dialogue from Shakespeare’s Hamlet (“there are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, that are dreamt in your philosophy”). We shot largely on location in one day at the Buffalo Science Museum. We couldn’t help but be inspired by the recent on-campus film work of our alumni James Grachos, Liz Cappuccino and Michael Thompson. Michael Thompson joined us to capture some footage that’s used as connective tissue between the shorts. Student collaborators overcame many obstacles in all phases of production through creativity, flexibility, critical thinking, and cooperation. We were reminded that collaboration is rarely easy but always rewarding as it pushes our limits and celebrates both individual skill and collective vision.
The Folger Shakespeare Library held a satellite workshop in Buffalo, NY. Nichols Upper School students Kate Coburn, Clare Ring and Jeremiah Williams joined me at the Ujima Theater on Friday, April 28th, 2023 as part of a larger program of performance demonstrations by schools and professional theater companies. We shared exercises used to access Shakespeare’s As You Like It as we explored themes of race, class and accessibility. Nichols Alumna Dr. Nora Williams Platt, professor of Shakespeare and Early Modern Drama at the University of Essex, visited our advanced acting class to help us get started in this work. I’ve included a photo of the demonstration (captured by Andrea Mancuso) to give you a taste. I’ve also attached a pic of my chalkboard filled with the ideas and themes generated in class discussion that ultimately shaped our performance work.
