Grinder's Grumblings

There's a new document in the sidebar today. It's called "The Grinder Gazette." What is this, you may ask? Well, the Grinder Gazette is one of the most powerful tools at our disposal to promote the summer season. I encourage you to download it, read it, print it off and e-mail it to all of your friends. The Grinder Gazette contains all the information you'll need to know about our summer season: Shows, times, dates, etc, but it also contains a plethora of contact information for local B&B's, restaurants, festivals, events and other attractions. Our hope is that it may be used to help tourists who are planning to visit Centre Wellington this summer plan their trips, so if you know of anyone who's coming from out of town then this would be an excellent resource for them. With any luck (and money!) we'll get a few of these printed up and distributed at strategic points around Centre Wellington, but our best way to get the word out is through you...

I thought today I'd tell you a bit about casting a show. This is perhaps the most important, most misunderstood and most frustrating part of any show (and also among the most enjoyable!). Getting the right people for the right roles is part art, part science, part faith, part extreme sport. Since we're trying to fill seven summer shows with exactly the right people I thought I might offer up few tidbits about the things I consider when I'm casting a show, in no particular order. Does a person have the necessary physical traits to play the character in question? Are they tall enough, short enough, do they possess any physical traits that are directly referred to in the script (I have one female role this summer that calls for a "well-developed chest" - try casting that one politely!). Can they handle the demands of the role? Leading roles are a lot of work, some smaller roles have unique challenges. For me, probably the biggest question is can they learn the ...

Well, my ticker says I have 1 month, 2 weeks and 1 day to opening night. Time to get back to the regular postings. First off though, my apologies for the extended e-silence over the past couple of weeks. Getting sick and then getting behind has left me playing catch-up with work that I would much rather not be playing catch-up with. I'm still not 100%, but one of the many the joys of being your own boss is that you can't call in sick, so I'm going to see if I can get myself back into a routine of productivity this week, gently working myself back up to full speed. The other problem with not getting things done is that I didn't have much to write about, and since I don't like "filler" posts just for the sake of having something here, I decided to keep the blog quiet. But now I'm back, and I do have a few things to let you all know about. First of all, the website has been updated again. I have fixed a few bugs, and put the link to this blog on ever...

Came across this on an American Theatre blog, but it makes a good point, and I think it's particularly relevant to our situation here in Centre Wellington. Just what constitutes a "local" production? If the actors are from Guelph or K-W or Elmira or wherever is it still an expression of "local?" Does it even matter where the people come from, and is it the play itself that makes the determination? The posting also talks about the concept of "tribal" theatre - a bit of a catch-all for collective creation, acting ensembles and theatre focused around a particular theme or manifesto. While intrigued by tribalism, I think it's perhaps a bit limiting and exclusionary, and can lead to elitism. Taken to extremes outside of theatre, tribalism has led to most of the world's bloodiest ongoing conflicts. Nonetheless, this is interesting. Check it out. Grinder Theatre Ideas: Defining Local

Hello once again everyone. Sorry for the e-silence last week, I was a little under the weather and run off my feet with non-Grinder work. But now I'm back with a big announcement... The new website has arrived! Click here. Check out all the cool new layouts and features. Of particular interest to the "veterans" of Grinder may be the "All Time Cast and Crew List" that I have posted in the past shows section. Lots of memories there! Please let me know about all the spelling mistakes and any other gaffs (like I said, I was sick last week). I'm still working on creating a links page, as well as a photo gallery, and putting Google Adsense onto the site, but it's being a pain (the joys of Frontpage!). Grinder

I thought that today I'd write about the most difficult yet most important job in the theatre business - getting those "bums in seats." I do have a confession to make though, too. There is a part of me that really hopes that what I write every day here, on this blog, as well as the newsletters, posters, brochures, flyers, faxes, e-mails, advertisements, pamphlets, programs, press releases, website and every other piece of promotional literature I put out there is so wonderful, so moving, so perfect, that it will inspire you to go out there and start selling tickets to the shows at Grinder Productions. And who knows? Maybe it is, and maybe some of you will, but for the vast majority out there (myself included) selling anything is seen as dirty, icky, and undesireable, except in the face of massive personal commissions. That's been how I've seen things for a long time, and it has made the (minimally successful) promotional activities that I have mentioned above s...

Well, it's that time of year again. It was about this time last year that I got a letter from the Centre Wellington Chamber of Commerce, the driving force behind the Centre Wellington Community and Business Awards of Excellence, informing me that I was a nominee for the Youth Entrepreneur of the Year Award. It seems that this year I've been nominated once again. Those of you who are close to me know that I feel very uncomfortable being singled out for personal acheivements like this, that I would much rather let others have the limelight, and that it's about being a part of a great team that brings true satisfaction and success. For the first year that I ran Grinder Productions I didn't even put my name on the posters, as I saw no real need to. I still don't, but apparently it's prudent marketing, so I allow it, but still, it's all a little weird for me. I didn't think I still qualified as a youth anything, but apparently if you're under 30 and run...

Auditions Announcement: Grinder Productions seeks fresh talent for 2008 and beyond Please pass this along to everyone you know! Grinder Productions, Centre Wellington's largest, most dynamic live theatre company will be holding open auditions on Saturday, April 19th at the Grinder rehearsal hall. "We're back," says Grinder's Creative and Executive Director, Eric Goudie. "It's been a long winter rebuilding the company, and we're ready to make the summer of 2008 our best season ever. We would love to have some fresh faces to add to our talent pool this summer." The company will be casting for all seven shows coming up this summer at the Ennotville and Belwood Summer Theatres, as well as shows in the 2008 - 2009 Fall-Winter-Spring seasons at the Fergus Grand Theatre, Elora Centre for the Arts and other venues. No experience is necessary to audition; in fact people who have never been onstage before are encouraged to come out and try their hand at ...

No post today, except to say this.... BIG ANNOUNCEMENT coming tomorrow. You won't want to miss this, especially if you're an actor-type (nudge-nudge wink-wink). Grinder

You read that right! Finally, after years of waiting with bated breath, Grinder Productions now has a truly professional box office experience to offer our patrons. Thanks to the folks at www.ticketleap.com we are now able to process ticket orders on the internet, in addition to taking orders by phone. You can purchase tickets at Ticketleap, or visit the Grinder website at as soon as the re-vamped version is launched (watch for that in a very few days!). There's even a link to buy tickets off of the Grinder page on Facebook, and of course, there's a button included right here in the sidebar on the blog. One of the things I like the best about this new box office is that we can now process payments by credit card, which is huge leap forward in ease and convenience for our patrons. And while offering the flexibility to order tickets by credit card online is wonderful in and of itself this system is so simple and easy to use that we'll be able to extend our credit card sa...

I thought today I'd post the "Grinder Manifesto." It's not so much a manifesto in the sense of Karl Marx's ode to communism, nor even the much more engaging Punk Marketing Manifesto that I've been reading lately. No, this is more of a working document, an open-book on the past, present and future of where the company is going. It's personal, polemical, long on platitudes and short on specifics, ie the kind of thing politicians love and English teachers love to rip apart. I post it here not in the hopes that it will be a tool of conversion, but perhaps a tool of discussion. I wrote this at the beginning of the journey that has been Grinder Productions. Is it still relevant to what we're doing today? Does it still make sense, or should it be changed or even abandoned completely and whole new one written? Suggestions please... Theatre That Dares to be Different We are the ones who dare to be different. We dare to find other ways, better ways to r...