Walkabout Gets A New Idea

Last week we had the opportunity to test out a new idea.

This year's Walkabout is different because we decided to take one play - "Art" by Yasmina Reza - break it up into three acts and then have three separate theater companies perform one act of the play at different downtown Elgin locations, like Villa Verone, Elgin Art Showcase and Ravenheart Cafe.

We'll still be starting at Elgin Public House (pictured) and finishing up at Al's Cafe for those classic malts.

But what's interesting about all of this would be that the actors would change from venue to venue, so while the characters would stay the same - Marc, Serge , Yvan - they would be played by different people. To further add interest, we decided to have the actors grow younger as the play progressed forward until its climatic comic conclusion.

If it appears like we're playing with time and space, like something out of the recent movies Start Trek or Inception, you'd be right. Honestly, that's a great part of the fun when producing an event like Walkabout - you can experiment and try out different things.

So far, the experiment seems to be working. But not like I expected. We had all three theater companies come in and perform their "acts" from the play. We conducted a rough run-through from front to back and the results were interesting and fun.
To be continued....