Rogue Theatre

Mooney on Theatre Review of Boeing-Boeing

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 12:14:37 -0400

Mooney on Theatre Review of Boeing-Boeing:

Lovely review of Boeing-Boeing by Mooney on Theatre reviewer Mira Saraf, whose write-up includes the following:

In this performance, the timing was impeccable – the physical comedy was excellently choreographed and never missed a beat. The performance was dynamic, the actors performances were quite physical (at one point a flying suitcase landed on my foot – didn’t hurt too much and is a necessary byproduct of a performance like this in a small space). But they really interacted with the set and each other and this brought the performance to life.

"BOEING-BOEING OPENS TONIGHT AND RUNS UNTIL APRIL 8 AT THE COMMON GOOD UNDERGROUND SPACE (837 DUNDAS..."

Wed, 28 Mar 2012 14:03:30 -0400

“BOEING-BOEING OPENS TONIGHT AND RUNS UNTIL APRIL 8 AT THE COMMON GOOD UNDERGROUND SPACE (837 DUNDAS WEST). TICKETS CAN BE PURCHASED AT SECUREASEAT.COM!”

- Everyone at Rogue Theatre

"I think theatre should always be somewhat suspect."

Tue, 27 Mar 2012 10:00:05 -0400

“I think theatre should always be somewhat suspect.”

- Vaclav Havel

"WE OPEN IN TWO DAYS! TELL EVERYONE IN TORONTO TO COME SEE BOEING-BOEING AT THE COMMON GOOD..."

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 14:00:05 -0400

“WE OPEN IN TWO DAYS! TELL EVERYONE IN TORONTO TO COME SEE BOEING-BOEING AT THE COMMON GOOD UNDERGROUND SPACE BETWEEN MARCH 28 - APRIL 8!”

- Everyone at Rogue Theatre

"You really, really, really have to love what you are going to do in theatre because it is an..."

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 10:00:06 -0400

“You really, really, really have to love what you are going to do in theatre because it is an unmerciful life. It’s six days a week. It’s eight performances a week. And that’s doing the exact same thing over and over and over again.”

- Harvey Fierstein

Trailer for Boeing-Boeing, which opens this Wednesday at the...

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 14:11:28 -0400

Trailer for Boeing-Boeing, which opens this Wednesday at the Common Good Underground Space (837 Dundas Street West). Watch it, share it, love it, repeat.

Tickets are available at Secure A Seat. Support independent theatre in Toronto!

"I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being..."

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 13:27:14 -0400

“I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being.”

- Oscar Wilde

"I write plays for people who wouldn’t be seen dead in the theatre."

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 10:00:06 -0400

“I write plays for people who wouldn’t be seen dead in the theatre.”

- Barrie Keeffe

"The theatre is the involuntary reflex of the ideas of the crowd."

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 10:00:06 -0400

“The theatre is the involuntary reflex of the ideas of the crowd.”

- Sarah Bernhardt

"The good die young but not always. The wicked prevail but not consistently. I am confused by life,..."

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 10:00:05 -0400

“The good die young but not always. The wicked prevail but not consistently. I am confused by life, and I feel safe within the confines of the theatre.”

- Helen Hayes

Why a Designer Made the Transition from Advertising to a Startup

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 00:20:48 -0400

Why a Designer Made the Transition from Advertising to a Startup:

youmightfindyourself:

By: Keenan Cummings
Beaker Magazine, March 19, 2012

I was an agency-trained, senior-level, print/branding designer and left to work at a startup. Here’s why:

-1- I want my work to feel valuable.

It seems the higher up the institutional chain you climb, the more abstract the value you generate, and the more you are worth. The roles become so far removed from the end goals they are managing, and you have to wonder how long you can stay focused on what matters — making peoples lives better.

“The vast majority of the wealthiest people I’ve met are far more about building value for themselves than they are about creating value for anyone or anything beyond themselves.” (Are You a Role Model, HBR)

But this doesn’t add up in the startup world, mostly because there is not time nor room in the equation for anyone that doesn’t directly affect the outcomes of pursuing whatever the goals may be.

In a startup, value is a concrete measure of your contribution. I enjoy the clarity and trepidation that brings to the work. Things can fail, and the onus is on the person or team that failed to solve the problem correctly. (No blaming ‘bad’ clients!) Likewise, the triumphs are deeply felt because of the intimate relationship you have with the possibility of failure.

-2- I want to stop talking about good work and start making good work.

Startups are notoriously biased toward action — it’s a survival tactic in a competitive field.

I’ve spent a lot of time on research and development, writing pages of airy ‘positioning statements’ and the like. It often felt like intellectual glut that gummed up the process. “Research & Development” feels valuable, but I’ve found that it rarely delivers.

Startups trade R&D for insight and iteration: talk to users, find a solution, something elegant and surprising and useful, and try it out, not as a print out on the wall to be discussed and over-thought (and yes, over-thinking is symptomatic of many if not most stalled innovation processes), but something out in the real world with other people using it.

-3- I want other people to find value in my work.

That value is directly tied to making people’s experiences — and *hopefully lives — better. You have to deliver on that if you expect any kind of real impact.

Client work can often be far removed from any real world positive affect. When your goals happen to align with a client’s, then sure, it’s great to help them achieve that. You’re lucky if you can build a roster of clients you deeply believe in.

More often you are operating under one major but overlooked assumption — that lending clarity and delight to any message makes the world a better place, regardless of the real value of the message you are helping to sell.

Working as part of the team that is defining not just how a product gets communicated and used, but what that product is and what it does for people — that’s an opportunity you rarely get with client work.

*Part of the reason I have a very specific idea of the type of startup I want to work for. There are plenty of problems I don’t care to solve, and more power to the people out there tackling those.

-4- I want my mom to understand what I spend my time doing.

You ever meet someone very successful and say to yourself “what the hell do they do?” You ever meet someone that can hardly answer that question themselves?

I’ve come to believe that “coordinating teams of interdisciplinary, strategic partnerships for generating long term sustainable growth” is code for makin’ spreadsheets and delegating real work (the spreadsheet has even become the symbol of faux productivity).

-5- I want to design with empathy, and that means being close to the ground.

I want to get as close as possible to the people that will love, hate, use, abuse, praise and sh*t on my work.

There is power in making something for someone you know well, someone that you’ve taken the time to listen to.When you are designing for a real person with a real problem you exercise that designer’s empathy that you’ve been trying to squeeze out of yourself when you read vague marketing reports about a ‘target’ consumer or an archetypal customer.

You sit down for a casual cup of tea and a chat and they blow your mind with insights into what the problem is and how to make something that really works. You take that with you, synthesize and sift through it, and cone up with something that you are uniquely qualified to come up with. It is grueling, sweat-dripping-from-the-brow work — empathy exercise. Getting it right is intense and rewarding.

-6- I want my stamp on the things I make.

I don’t want to contractually hand over credit for my work to any institution. Too many designers do great work that is absorbed by client’s contracts or even by the agency they work for.

The industry is changing. Designers are getting involved long before the brief is created. They are helping identify opportunities and build platforms and even products and in turn, generating an immense amount of value. The industry is demanding much more out of agencies but the rates aren’t changing. And we aren’t just talking learning new tools or building a web team or hiring film producers. Clients are demanding deeper domain knowledge, broader expertise, and bigger ROI.

I can go create this value somewhere else, for something I really believe in, and for a company that is moving quickly and iterating responsively.

One could make the point that this is why people like us get involved in so-called small-time, indie theatre. We seek to create value for ourselves and our audiences.

fuckyeahtoronto: downtowndistrict: Toronto’s Mixed Forest. Blue...

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 00:11:35 -0400

fuckyeahtoronto:

downtowndistrict: Toronto’s Mixed Forest. Blue Mist of December (by Katrin Ray)

Charles Bukowski, "As the Sparrow"

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 00:10:42 -0400

sharingpoetry:

To give life you must take life,
and as our grief falls flat and hollow
upon the billion-blooded sea
I pass upon serious inward-breaking shoals rimmed
with white-legged, white-bellied rotting creatures
lengthily dead and rioting against surrounding scenes.
Dear child, I only did to you what the sparrow
did to you; I am old when it is fashionable to be
young; I cry when it is fashionable to laugh.
I hated you when it would have taken less courage
to love.

(submitted by justanotherayesha)

katekilgour: When Toronto was taken over by fog

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 12:22:53 -0400

katekilgour:

When Toronto was taken over by fog

Work hard. Play hard. Rogue Theatre’s production of Marc...

Sat, 17 Mar 2012 13:40:28 -0400

Work hard. Play hard.

Rogue Theatre’s production of Marc Camoletti’s Boeing-Boeing runs March 28 - April 8 at the Common Good Underground Space. Tickets are on sale now: secureaseat.com

We are on Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook, jumping up and down for...

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 14:44:42 -0400

We are on Twitter, Tumblr and Facebook, jumping up and down for your attention. Come see what we’re about. Put a little Rogue in your life.

We're on Twitter!

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 11:55:10 -0400

Bored? Get on Twitter and toss us a follow! It’s good for what ails ya.

(If you were running for mayor, Rogue would vote for you.)

https://twitter.com/roguetheatre

WHAT IS YOUR EARLIEST HUMAN MEMORY?

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 02:09:00 -0400

Our memories are based on things that haven’t happened yet; they are remembrances of and from the future.

For instance, we remember mounting Marc Camoletti’s Boeing-Boeing at the Common Good Underground Space between March 28 and April 8, 2012, and how it was amazing, fun, and amazingly fun. We remember that you came and had a blast of airline proportions.

March 28 - April 8 at Common Good. We’d love to see you!

Wed, 14 Mar 2012 20:12:00 -0400

March 28 - April 8 at Common Good. We’d love to see you!