Just one week after I attended a production of It Happened on Route 66, I had the fun of seeing another one of my shows. Tonight it was The Last Radio Show at the Academy Theatre in Phoenix.
This theater company is the flip side of Center Stage Theater Group, which produced my popular diner comedy last Saturday.
Where Center Stage is only two years old, the Academy Theatre has been around for a respectable eighteen.
Where Center Stage is a community theater for adult actors, the Academy Theatre is an arts school for youth with a small adult program.
Where Center Stage has a small troupe of veteran actors to draw from, the Academy Theatre focuses on newbies or those with limited experience.
And where Center Stage is located in a fast-growing middle-class suburb of Phoenix, the Academy Theatre finds its home in the urban heart of the city, where its mission of nurturing disadvantaged youth is most needed.
When I first emailed the founder and director Angel Arredondo about attending the show, he confessed he wasn't sure whether the cast would be excited or nervous. I told him not to worry. I enjoy seeing my plays performed by actors of all different skill and experience levels. What's important is the passion and sense of fun they bring to their roles.
The Academy Theatre may be the smallest proscenium theater I've ever been in as it has only four rows of eight seats each (all of which were filled for tonight's performance). The stage was small too, but Angel made the most of it, managing to squeeze an entire radio station into the space from the performance area to the reception desk to the oh-so-important coffee station (you'll have to read the play to know why!).
When I sat down to look over the program, I was surprised to find how truly inexperienced the cast was. Two of the ten actors had never acted before. Two more hadn't acted in ten years.
Still, the cast did a wonderful job. Their comedic timing and delivery were excellent, and the audience responded with a steady barrage of laughter that lasted right up until the climax of the play.
That's when I held my breath. The biggest moment in the play comes when Jimmy, the mild-mannered office boy, finally gets to prove his acting chops by single-handedly performing a three-minute radio play--including a dozen different voices. As the miniplay-within-a-play comes to an end, so does Jimmy, collapsing to the floor in exhaustion. He saved the radio station, and that moment has never failed to get a show-stopping burst of applause.
I'm happy to report that it didn't this time either. The crowd cheered, and I could breathe again.
The play ended shortly after, and the cast took their well-deserved bows.
Those familiar with the play know that one of its big draws is that it gives the audience a chance to see how many of those old-time radio show effects were made, whether somebody crinkled cellophane to make the sound of a crackling fire or shook a thin metal sheet to make the sound of thunder. The Academy Theatre didn't have that luxury so they simply piped in all of the sounds using audio files.
While not ideal, this worked much better than I would have expected, and so I can recommend it as a viable alternative for theater companies that are strapped for either resources or time.
I didn't get to take any pictures with the cast, and that's okay. I always take my lead from the cast and this cast didn't ask for it. But I did get to shake hands with each of them and let them know that they did a bang-up job.
It was a magical evening, made even more magical by the energy and dedication of the entire cast and crew.
Angel must be doing something right.