DCU DRAMA COMMITTEE MEETING
Agenda: Monday, November 12th, 2007
Apologies: Marian
Matters arising:
- Rocky Horror costs might not be as awful as we first imagined
- the 350 that the SPC granted us can be spent on anything for Rocky Horror
- we were down 380 on ticket sales but we didn't spend 200 on rights and props
- we will only make a small loss after all
- Declan to get a receipt for the screens
- Pauric and Fiona to meet Olena at 1pm on Tuesday
- Yvonne to sort out a gift basket for Liam Halligan
- none of the SPC seem to know about the speakers that we want for comedy night
- if the SPC don't buy them in time they will fund us for sound
- Bob will host comedy night
- the hostel still needs to be booked
Play in a Day:
- Sunday didn't work out because we had no venue and we didn't get any emails from anyone interested
- instead, we will run rehearsals for it from 2pm to 7pm on Wednesday, with the performance on Thursday night along with the LOAFS
- it's unclear whether Liam can make it on Thursday or not
- will it be an improvised play with a theme or will it have a set script?
- Pauric will run a workshop for an hour or two at the beginning of the rehearsals on Wednesday
- then maybe give them a basic story to work with which they can flesh out for the performance itself
- put Play in a Day on last at the very end of the LOAFS
Open Days:
- Pauric to reply to Lisa's email
- Friday 16th and Saturday 17th, 10am to 4pm
- Friday: Pauric, Jenni, Fiona, Megan, Declan, Yvonne, Alan
- Saturday: Pauric, Jenni, Fiona
- Jenni will be moving from drama to art
- Conor and Susan can't make it
- Pauric to ask Marian if she is available
- could ask Susan Doyle, John Cannon, some enthusiastic first years
- set up at 11am on Friday (Pauric, Alan and Fiona)
- set up at 10am on Saturday (Pauric and Fiona)
- prize for the best stand: 1000 will be divided between a few societies
- get the scrapbook, the banner and the cup for the stand
- have a laptop with screensaver of drama photos
- bit of dancing
- maybe sing Avenue Q, Alan has the backing tracks
- play some music, project our drama videos
- Declan to get projector and screen from loans
- everyone will wear costumes, Yvonne as an Indian, Megan as a French Maid, Pauric as Zorro, Jenni as a Black Angel, Fiona as Tonkerbell
The LOAFS, judges and prizes?:
- Declan and John Cannon are handling tech for the LOAFS
- Pauric will present on the night
- judges: Bob, Joey, Gary Boylan, Hazel Hayes?
- Pauric to ask the judges to participate
- organise certificates as prizes
- announce the winners on the night
- make Play in a Day the last item in order to give the judges time to deliberate
- give the judges ten blank templates, let them know we want all the plays to get an award and allow them to name the awards themselves
- Fiona and Alan to organise printing off the certificates
- have a separate certificate for Play in a Day participants as well
- Fiona and Alan to organise Play in a Day certificates
- tech runthrough at 5pm on Wednesday and 5pm on Thursday
- no need for radio mics
- plain black background is fine
- store props in the snooker room
- all the committee need to be there to help out, be there from 5pm on Thursday
One Act Wonder, change of dates or venue?:
- the One Act Wonder Festival is supposed to be happening in Week 10 from Monday to Thursday
- the venue in Pat's has been provisionally booked for that week since last year
- but a lecturer in Pat's has taken the venue for that week for some drama thing
- no point arguing about it, the venue's gone
- Pat's want to hold the festival the following week, Week 11, but that doesn't suit DCU or DIT
- Megan went to the Helix to see if we could hold the festival in the Space in Week 10
- she got email addresses and made contact but no definite word yet
- until Molly gets back to Megan we don't know what's happening
- can we afford to hold it in the Space?
- it would cost 600 for the four nights, but there are tech costs on top of that
- we also have two other events going on that week
- we can't really worry about hosting it, we have too much other stuff to organise
- another option: put it in Week 9
- Pat's could hold their equivalent of the LOAFS on the Monday night and then we could have the One Act Wonder Festival on the Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday nights
- our LOAFS will be fresh for it J
- there is a One Act Wonder meeting happening at 7pm on Wednesday night
- we'll know more after that
Set:
- Cian keeps telling Jenni different things every time she asks him
- first he said that the SPC didn't want us to buy a set and simply throw it away afterwards
- but then he said that we are allowed to be funded for a set but the SPC don't want us to store it, i.e. we can buy a set but we have to throw it away afterwards
- it's a bit late to order in a set for the panto now, because we don't know what we really need for the panto and for other shows later in the year
- it would be better to just order in a cloth backdrop for the panto
- it will look the same as painted wood except it will be cloth
- the backdrop can be delivered within three working days, even from the US
- there are still some boards left downstairs in the Venue which we can use to build small backdrops on the sides
- Marian also wants a boulder
- could Art help with the set?
- Jenni to bring it up in Art's committee meeting
- Marian to decide on a backdrop as soon as possible so that we can order it
- short term solution: we will order one main backdrop for the panto and we will build and paint the two sides
- long term solution: think about that later
Student director:
- John Cannon has expressed an interest in directing Fame
- it saves us 3,000
- he has a lot of time on his hands
- he knows a lot about tech
- he is very dedicated
- he has DCU Drama experience
- he won't be intimidating, but can he command respect?
- that would be an issue with any student director, not specifically John
- we are all happy with John J
- Stephen Grimes has also expressed a bit of interest in directing the musical
- Pauric will talk to Steve to find out whether he's still interested
- if Steve is interested, arrange a meeting between Olena, Steve and John
- if he's not, inform John that he's got the job and arrange a meeting between Olena and John
- Pauric to contact Steve, John and Olena
- we also need to organise a choreographer
- Aoife Kearney from Style and Dance is interested
- we could ask Dance Soc to see if there's anyone else in the society that's interested
- could we hold auditions for a student choreographer?
- Pauric to suggest to Olena that she might hold trials for a choreographer
- who decides whether we get a student or professional choreographer?
- we should wait until the director has been definitely decided and then once the director and producer have put their heads together they can provide their own input on the issue of choreographer for the musical
- this can be brought up again at next week's meeting
Stage hand strike on Broadway:
- the stage hands who help backstage for shows on Broadway are on strike at the moment
- should be sorted by the time we get to New York
- Marie Claire Hoey has dropped out of Broadway and Brendan O'Rourke has taken her place
- Megan is dropping out of Broadway too LLL
- Megan to contact the next person on the list, Michelle Ryan, and get her to organise the 500
- Alan to give Megan Michelle's number
Panto:
- everything seems to be going fairly okay at the moment
- will need everyone to help out with costumes, set, make-up, etc. when the time comes
Comedy workshop:
- the comedy workshop is happening next Tuesday 20th, from 7pm-ish to 9pm-ish
- Conor contacted a stand-up comedian, Paul Tylak, to hold the workshop
- but he is looking for 200 for an hour
- Jenni says that's not happening
- Conor's friend says that Paul Tylak was the only one available to do the workshop next week
- but Megan's uncle's brother, Ian Coppinger, might be able to do it
- Megan to contact Ian Coppinger
- if he says yes, that will be sorted
- if he says no, Pauric will contact someone from Whose Line Is It Anyway? to hold the workshop
- Pauric to produce comedy night
- Jay is also holding a tech workshop next Wednesday 21st, at 5pm
AOB:
- we need to sort out the committee mailing list because Declan and Marian aren't getting the committee emails
- to go into Campus for next week: comedy workshop and tech workshop
- dates in the Helix are still up in the air
- drama members with Clubs and Socs Ball tickets can meet in the Old Bar at 5:30pm tomorrow evening before the ball, and then head to the bus at 6:30pm
- Pauric to send out an email to them all
- Alan to have access to the DCU Drama gmail account as well as Pauric
Next meeting: 7pm , Monday, November 19th, 2007