Producing Harriet’s House Episode 5: Applying for funding

There are two grants, with due dates of February 1, 2010, that we are applying for. The first is the Toronto Arts Council Theatre Projects Grant and the second is the Ontario Arts Council Project Grant. Both grants provide a small independent theatre like Gailey Road Productions with support to mount individual productions. The process of applying for the grants has helped crystallize our production plans making the task valuable to us even if we aren’t successful in securing funding. But, of course, we hope we are!

In my next blog, I will talk about the arrangements we’ve made with Hart House Theatre to produce our three-performance run of Harriet’s House.

All the best,
Tara

Producing Harriet’s House Episode 4: Creating a Publicity Plan-First Steps

Website and blog site design
The first step of our publicity plan began with the design of the Gailey Road website (www.gaileyroad.com) and this blog site in October 2009. I designed the website myself on my Mac laptop with their software program iweb. I kept the design simple, and focused on having the website clearly describe the mandate of Gailey Road Productions, the founders of the company, and our productions. The blog was created to help Gailey Road reach out to other artists interested in women-centred, research-informed theatre and keep connected to the artists we’ve already worked with. The content of the blog site evolved organically and now focuses on five themes that move from the generation of new writing to professional development and networking opportunities to independent theatre production (see the entry on January 5, 2010 for a more detailed description of these five themes).

Step 2: Graphic Design work
Once I had the website and blog site up, the production team was ready to focus on the graphic art and design work for the publicity materials for Harriet’s House. We are currently working on coming up with an image that will attract audiences to the production and inform the design of the set. Once we have designed this image, we will design and print a set of posters and postcards to publicize the production. Meanwhile we have printed a set of “coming soon” postcards that we can used be used immediately.

The next steps of our publicity plan will be discussed in future blogs. In my next blog, however, I will turn to the process of applying for government funding for Harriet’s House.

All the best,
Tara

Producing Harriet’s House Episode 3: Becoming Part of the Toronto Pride Festival

As a new Canadian play being produced by a small independent theatre company, I wanted Harriet’s House to be part of a larger arts festival to help build an audience. The play’s interest in international adoption in a same-sex family (see the blog entry on November 16, 2009 for a synopsis of the play) made the Toronto Pride Festival being held from June 26 to July 4, 2010 an excellent choice.

Acting on the advice of Doug Floyd, the General Manager of Hart House Theatre, Jocelyn Wickett (the Director of Harriet’s House) and I decided to choose the first weekend of the Pride Festival to perform Harriet’s House. The second weekend is the first long weekend of the summer, the weekend of the Dyke March and the Parade, and the first weekend of the Toronto Fringe festival. With that kind of competition for an audience’s attention, the first weekend seemed to be a better choice.

Our next step is to apply to the Toronto Pride Festival to become an affiliated festival event. Application forms are expected to be out in a week or two and I will describe the process of becoming part of the Toronto Pride Festival in future entries. However, in my next blog, I will continue the story of producing Harriet’s House with Episode 4: Creating a Publicity Plan.

All the best,
Tara

The Evolution of the Gailey Road blog site

The Gailey Road blog site, which was launched in October 2008 and has been up for almost three months, has evolved to focus on five themes:

1. News about the theatre company itself, for example, last Monday’s introduction of Gailey Road’s new intern Monica Nunes.
2. The story of producing Harriet’s House which will be performed at Hart House Theatre this coming June, for example, next Monday’s story of becoming part of the Toronto Pride Festival.
3. News about professional development and networking opportunities for theatre artists and enthusiasts, for example, the theatre classes and workshops at Hart House listed in the December 28, 2009 entry.
4. Ideas about generating new writing for the theatre, for example, the November 26, 2009 entry on a playwriting group developed in Michigan.
5. Information and descriptions about contemporary research-informed theatre, for example, the entry on the Pastor Phelps project on December 8, 2009.

The blog also lists current women-centred, research-informed plays and productions I’m following.

The blog site has attracted an audience of theatre artists and playwrights interested in independent theatre production, professional development and networking opportunities, the generation of new writing and women-centre, research-informed theatre, both within and outside of Canada.

In my next blog, I will continue the story of producing Harriet’s House with Episode 3: Becoming Part of the Toronto Pride Festival.

All the best,
Tara

Introducing Gailey Road’s new intern Monica Nunes

Gailey Road is continuing to mature as an independent theatre company and we are delighted to welcome its new Intern Monica Nunes to the company. Monica is a Masters of Public Health candidate at the University of Toronto specializing in Health Promotion and Community Development. She is very interested in using theatre and performance to disseminate research in the area of health education and will use her internship with Gailey Road to learn more about the creation and production of research-informed theatre. As a performer, Monica has been involved with productions for V-Day
Toronto, the Toronto Fringe, the Montreal Fringe, and the Toronto
Centre for the Arts.

In my next blog, I describe the evolution of the Gailey Road blog site and the audience it is beginning to attract.

All the best,
Tara