Gail’s Most Memorable Shows of the Decade 2000-2009

Written by Gail M. Burns - December 2009

NOTE: These are the listings and blurbs as they will appear in the North Adams Transcript. I will elaborate on them between now and New Year’s Day 2010, so keep checking back! Although the lists are numbered, the shows are listed in random order, not in order of preference. These are NOT “Best of…” lists, they are lists of the most memorable productions I saw and/or reviewed between January 1, 2000 and December 31, 2009.

Most Memorable Comedies

All of these were just hilarious. Shakespeare & Company is the clear winner in this category, and two of their four shows were free outdoor offerings on the tented Rose Footprint Theatre.

1. “The Imaginary Invalid” (2007) Bakerloo Theatre Project
2. “The Servant of Two Masters” (2006) Shakespeare & Company
3. “Scapin” (2007) Shakespeare & Company
4. “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare” (2000, 2001 & 2003) Shakespeare & Company
5. “The Hound of the Baskervilles” (2009) Shakespeare & Company
6. “The Mystery of Irma Vep” (2000) Weston Playhouse Theatre Company
7. “Rumors” (2002) Ghent Playhouse (formerly the Columbia Civic Players)
8. “The Importance of Being Earnest” (2003) The Theatre Company at Hubbard Hall
9. “The Miser” (2007) The Theatre Company at Hubbard Hall
10. “Beyond Therapy” (2000) Victory Street Productions (sadly now defunct)

Most Memorable Dramas

Eight of my picks in this category were staged by community theatres or non-equity companies, most utilizing local talent. The professional companies stage fine productions of meaningful dramas, but that’s what you expect them to do. When you see your next door neighbor get up on the stage and move you to tears, that’s special.

1. “Molly Sweeney” (2006) Originally produced the Town Players of Pittsfield. Subsequently presented by Homespun Productions
2. “All My Sons” (2009) Main Street Stage
3. “The Elephant Man” (2007) The Theatre Company at Hubbard Hall
4. “Uncle Vanya” (2007) The Theatre Company at Hubbard Hall
5. “The Beauty Queen of Leenane” (2003) Ghent Playhouse (formerly the Columbia Civic Players)
6. “Hamlet: What Dreams May Come” (2009) Bakerloo Theatre Project
7. “The Tempest” (2008) Cap & Bells (Not reviewed)
8. “Waiting for Godot” (2008) Berkshire Theatre Festival
9. “A Body of Water” (2007) Oldcastle Theatre Company
10. “The Retreat from Moscow” (2005) Chester Theatre Company (then the Miniature Theatre of Chester)

Most Memorable Musicals

1. “La Cage Aux Folles” (2006 & 2008) C-R Productions at the Cohoes Music Hall
2. “Urinetown” (2006) Theater Barn
The Barn routinely stages a couple of smart, small musicals each August.
3. “Pippin” (2007) Mill City Productions
4. “She Loves Me” (2008) Williamstown Theatre Festival
5. “Henry’s House” (2002) The Theatre Company at Hubbard Hall
Weird, wild and wonderful! The book was incoherent, but the rock music was exciting and the cast, almost all over whom were under 20, were amazing.
6. “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee” (2004 & 2008) Barrington Stage Company
What fun to see a musical in the making! I slithered through February slush from Williamstown to Sheffield to see the workshop production in 2004 which was unforgettable.
7. “Ragtime” (2003) Weston Playhouse Theatre Company
8. “Falsettos” (2002) Barrington Stage Company
“Follies” was a close runner-up for BSC, but this smaller, quieter musical really moved me.
9. “Ain’t Misbehavin’” (2006) C-R Productions at the Cohoes Music Hall
C-R Productions is one of the few companies in the region to regularly present shows with large numbers of African-American performers. This was my favorite, but “Ragtime” (2006) and “Dreamgirls” (2009) were also excellent showcases for an underutilized pool of regional talent.
10. The Mac-Haydn Theatre, which produces nothing but musicals, routinely mounts one or two really excellent productions each summer. I found it impossible to choose a favorite!

Happy Holidays from Everyone at Hubbard Hall!

Hi all! Just a quick reminder that The Hall is closed from Dec. 23 - Dec. 28! Please feel free to leave voice or email messages that we'll return starting on Monday the 28th.
Everyone have a very very Merry, warm and safe Christmas!

A Doll’s House At Hubbard Hall

a review by Alex Brooks of The Eastwick Press

The Theatre Company at Hubbard Hall has opened its 2009-20010 season with a production of Henrik Ibsen’s classic, A Doll’s House. As this play was written at about the same time that Hubbard Hall was built, the original proscenium stage is used, looking glorious in something like its original configuration. This arrangement also serves to accentuate the idea of Nora’s life being “in a doll’s house,” or as Director Laura Heidinger puts it in her notes, her “life behind glass.” The set, beautifully constructed by Alley Morse and the actor who plays Dr. Rank, Richard Howe, complements this idea nicely.
The play was shockingly modern when it was first performed, challenging the smug verities of Victorian life and challenging people to look deeper at marriage and relationships in general. Some have called it the first feminist play, and indeed it raises many of the same issues that have been brought up by the feminist movement over the last 50 years. But more generally, it probes the masks we wear, the roles we play and how these come into conflict with who we really are and how we really feel.
The most difficult thing about this play is to bridge the enormous gap between the happy, flighty Nora of the first act, and the serious mature Nora who emerges at the end when she confronts her husband and goes her own way. Likewise, Torvald is a difficult character because, although he is conventional, controlling and shallow, his delight in his wife is genuine and his devastation at the prospect of losing her is real. For the play to work emotionally we have to see the deceptive way they treat each other and see at the same time their genuine love for each other.
For the most part the leading couple here is able to pull this off. Stephanie Moffett-Hynds’ breathless, coquettish Nora is fascinating in the first act, and she has real gravitas in the final confrontation. One wonders a bit at the rapid transformation, but perhaps that is more a reflection on the play than the performance. And Jason Dolmetsch’s Torvald, though rather contemptible right to the end, being ready to throw Nora overboard when his career is in danger then suddenly forgiving and magnanimous when it no longer is, managed to retain my sympathy. His love is believable even if he is a prisoner of his conventional attitudes.
This production brings out the timeless themes of the play as well as any I’ve seen and leaves the viewer with much food for thought. The show will be offered on Friday and Saturday evenings at 8 and Sunday afternoons at 2 for the next three weekends – November 20, 21, 27, 28 and December 4 and 5, at 8 pm, and November 22 and 29 and December 6 at 2 pm. Call the box office at 677-2495 for tickets or information or visit www.hubbardhall.org.

Posted in Hoosick, Local News

Theatre Company Costumer in the News!

Check the link to the left - the Post Star ran a great story on Sherry Recinella! Sherry costumed our production of A Doll's House which is currently running weekends through December 6. Her costumes are truly beautiful for this Victorian-era drama, well worth the price of admission! Come see the show and her beautiful creations!

NYS Shape Note Convention Sets New Standard!

From Jesse Pearlman Karlsberg:

It's been a while, but I wanted to write you back finally about Hubbard Hall and the New York State Sacred Harp Singing Convention.

We had a fantastic convention and really have nothing but thanks and appreciation for the work that the Hall did to make our convention a success and to make us all feel at home. People had a great time and many expressed to me that they thought the Hubbard Hall complex was an ideal location and venue for the convention. This event rotates to different parts of the state from year to year, but folks from other parts of New York are already suggesting they'd like to see it come back to this area soon, and if possible to Hubbard Hall.

To be honest, I can't think of a single thing you all could have done better. The hall itself was just the right size for our group. We had just over 200 singers registered for the weekend and we never ran out of chairs, had plenty of room to move around the hall, but also didn't feel dwarfed in the space.

Some more stats, just for your interest: We had singers present from 15 states and 3 countries + the US. Singers were present from as far away as Alabama, Oregon, Ontario, the United Kingdom, and Switzerland.

We recognize and are deeply thankful for the level of support from Hubbard Hall staff, and the the fact that we used not just the hall, but multiple spaces over a 2-day period. Our informal organization of Albany-area singers has very little money in the bank and our singings are always free and open to the public (as are Sacred Harp conventions elsewhere in the country). This event was generously supported by donations from the singers who came and we actually took in more money than we had anticipated.

Please pass along my sincere thanks to Benji, yourself, and anybody else at Hubbard Hall who helped us prepare for this event.

I could not have asked for a better relationship with a venue for the convention. If you'll have us, we'd be thrilled to sing at Hubbard Hall again in a few years.

Thanks, Jesse

Halloween Happenings

Trash Bash

Hubbard Hall kicks off the fun on Friday, October 30 with the Don't Miss Party of the Year -- TRASH BASH! Ages 21+, 7:30pm-midnight, $13 cover. To benefit Hubbard Hall and the Greenwich Citizens Committee.
Find Out More

The Fly-by-Night
On Saturday, October 31st come by The Hall for family puppet fun at 11am when the Hubbard Hall Puppet Club presents "The Fly-by-Night," a not-too-spooky tale that will delight all ages!
Find Out More

Opera for Everyone! Puppets too...

Opera singers with a backdrop of bubbles? Interacting with cute fuzzy animal puppets onstage? Yes!

This past weekend wrapped up a wonderful run of the opera Carmen here at Hubbard Hall. The opera was amazing--but a bit intense for my 7-year-old (some very realistic special effects with knives and blood involved). So I opted instead to bring her to the Family Day at the Opera last Tuesday afternoon (bonus: it was free!).

We were treated to some of the most well-known arias and duets in all of opera -- you know, those feats of vocal acrobatics you hear in movie soundtracks and TV commercials. Plus a few fun surprises from classic musical theater. All performed by the talented and engaging Select Conservatory participants studying at Hubbard Hall this summer.

The program was carefully designed by director and opera educator Dianna Heldman to get the audience members involved and interacting with the opera students. There were opportunities to get on stage, to put on "gypsy jewelry" from Carmen, to act and dance along, and more!

Hubbard Hall Opera Theater's "Family Day at the Opera" was presented in collaboration with the Hyde Collection's Season of Degas event series. Their Degas and Music exhibition runs through mid-October.

If you missed this year's Family Day at the Opera, be sure to look for it to come around next August during opera season...

“La Tragédie de Carmen”

Excerpted from the review was written by Gail M. Burns - August 2009

...The Hubbard Hall Opera Theatre (HHOT) is presenting La Tragédie de Carmen, which is Peter Brook’s 1981 Tony Award-winning adaptation of Prosper Mérimée’s 1845 novella Carmen (Click HERE for an English translation) using some music from Georges Bizet’s famous 1875 opera, also titled Carmen and also based on Mérimée’s novella.

“We are doing a new investigation of [Carmen] – hence the new title – and what we have done is to separate its central core from the rest of the material, like boning a fish. Everything is trimmed away to focus on the intense interaction, the tragedy of four people.”

– Peter Brook

Brook (b. 1925) has been a leading innovator on the international theatre scene for more than half a century. La Tragédie de Carmen is the result of a collaboration with Jean-Claude Carrière and Marius Constant. Brook’s production, which opened in Paris, had a French libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halevy. At Hubbard Hall it is performed in an English translation by Sheldon Harnick whose greatest claim to fame are the lyrics for Fiddler on the Roof.

“La Tragédie de Carmen is a peculiar hybrid, a bird that makes noises like an opera but looks like a play and may be neither so much as a celebration of a director’s ingenuity.”

– Anonymous, NY Times

Indeed, Managing Artistic Director Alexina Jones selected of this pared down Carmen, with four singing and two speaking roles, because it fit her limited space and budgetary requirements, not because she shared Brook’s vision. I am not criticizing Jones’ choice – it is prudent producer who knows her company’s limitations as well as its strengths. This second season has been one of life-altering change for Jones, who gave birth to her first child last month, and for last season’s conductor, Richard Giarusso, who was married on the opening weekend of this production. Consequently the …Carmen orchestra is under the baton of Michael Ricciardone.

After a season of reviewing great musicals performed with inadequate instrumental accompaniment, it is a joy to watch and listen to a 15-piece orchestra. The audience for this production is seated on and in front of the stage, and on both sides, the performance space is on the floor, and the orchestra is tucked under the balcony behind the singers. I missed last year’s super-titles projected on the front edge of the balcony because even in Harnick rather pedestrian English translation it is not always easy to catch all the words. The other thing missed sorely this year was the splendid formal dress Giarusso affected. A conductor should be in white tie and tails, not in a faded black t-shirt and jeans, even in a little rural opera house.

I have actually seen and written about a concert staging of Carmen presented at Ozawa Hall at Tanglewood as a benefit for the now-defunct Berkshire Opera Company in 1998. It starred Denyce Graves and it was FABULOUS! I may be an opera dummy, but I realized even then that seeing and hearing Graves sing Carmen live was a BIG deal.

Graves was rightly billed then as “the world’s reigning Carmen,” but having seen Kara Cornell’s performance I think Graves now has serious competition. Cornell sang the role of Dorabella in last year’s HHOT production of Cosi… and when she first threw off her cloak and revealed herself here my heart sank because her blonde good looks didn’t immediately make me think of a hot-blooded gypsy. But that fear was quickly laid to rest as Cornell’s powerful soprano, her fine acting, and her sensuous dancing (the choreography is by MK Lawson) overcame all ethnic boundaries and made her Carmen through and through.

In fact, Cornell completely eclipsed everyone else on stage. Tenor Cameron Smith’s Don José and bass Andrew Cummings’ Escamillo were fine, but they were not as electrifying or vocally excellent as Cornell’s performance.

In the non-singing roles, John Goodrich looked like he was having fun playing the evil Lilas Pastia, and Richard Mazzaferro was an earnest Zuniga.

Here you are presented with a strong production of a Carmen few have had a chance to see, with a dynamic young soprano in the title role for a top ticket price of only $30! I wouldn’t let this opportunity pass you by.

The Hubbard Hall Opera Theatre production of La Tragédie de Carmen will be performed August 14, 15, 20, 21 and 22 at 8 p.m. and August 23 at 2 p.m. at Hubbard Hall, 25 East Main Street in Cambridge, NY. There will be a Pay-What-You-Will preview at 8 p.m. on August 13. The show runs 75 minutes with no intermission and is a little too racy for children under 8. Tickets are $25 for members, $30 for non-members and $20 for students/children. Call the box office at 518-677-2495 for tickets and information.

Copyright Gail M. Burns 2009

Opening Weekend of Carmen!

It's Opening Weekend for the Hubbard Hall Opera Theater's production of Bizet's La Tragedie de Carmen!

To get yourself relaxed and ready for the big weekend - register for our Foot Massage Workshop taking place in Thursday, August 13 from 6pm - 7:30pm in the Beacon Feed Building. It's only $15 per person or $25 for a couple. So bring a friend, sibling, neighbor or spouse along to get the best deal. Foot massage can be a powerful tool in supporting the health of yourself and your family. This introduction to working the terrain of the feet will be a hands-on-feet event! Bring your curiosity and questions, a pillow, towel and light blanket. Instructor Anne Snyder began her 20+ year career by first learning foot massage. She's given me a foot massage that was 20 minutes of sheer, relaxing bliss even for my beat up runner's feet! Registration is required so please give us a call at 518-677-2495 to register! George Bizet's La Tragedie de Carmen Opening Weekend! In 1981 Peter Brook's adaptation of Georges Bizet's Carmen premiered in Paris. In 1984 La Tragedie de Carmen won the Tony Award for Outstanding Achievement in Musical Theater. With the help of famous lyricist Sheldon Harnick, the English translation of this evocative work allowed Carmen to be understood in a new light. This version is not meant to replace or outdo the usual Carmen, but rather is meant to hone our focus on a more intimate and no-frills tale as the tragedy of seduction, jealousy, lost freedom and lost love unravels and delivers a spicy and compact punch which can serve as a warning to anyone who has ever wanted everything in life and risked it all. August 13 - Pay What You Will / Open Rehearsal August 14, 15, 20, 21, 22 at 8pm August 23 at 2pm Tickets: $25 for members / $30 nonmembers / $20 students/children Advance ticket purchase/reservations strongly encouraged. Call 518-677-2495 for tickets! Box Office and Hubbard Hall Offices are open Monday - Friday from 9am - 5pm only. Please call during regular office hours for tickets. Please leave a message that contains your name and phone number if we are unable to take your call. We'll call you back during regular office hours so please leave the phone number that you may be reached at during these times.

To round out your weekend, don't forget that we have the last of the Music from Salem Summer Concert Series performances this coming Sunday (8/16/09) at 3:00pm here at The Hall. This concert will feature a WORLD PREMIERE performance of Yu-Hui Chang's piece for piano and cello! Tickets will be available at the door which opens at 2:30pm. Tickets are Pay What You Will thanks to a generous donor supporting this summer's series! See you here at The Hall this weekend!! Sincerely, Debra Foster Hubbard Hall Projects, Inc.

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Happy beautiful, sunny day! I just wanted to give everyone a quick reminder of a couple of programs happening tomorrow, Thursday, August 8, 2009. During the day we are hosting the final Music from Salem Children's Workshop! I went to this program last year (okay, I'm stretching it to qualify as a "child" being just a few decades over 12) and had a terrific time! Bring your kids, grandkids, neices and nephews, the annoying neighbor kid or just the kid in you!

And don't forget about the special Pay What You Will opera performance! Songs for a Summer Evening with Dianna Heldman, Opera Director of Cosi fan tutte and La Tragedie de Carmen and pianist Richard Cherry Thursday, August 6 at 7pm in Historic Hubbard Hall A collection of English art song on texts by your favorite poets. Pay-what-you-will fundraiser. Everyone is welcome and encouraged to enjoy this special performance to benefit the Opera Theater. All donations gratefully accepted and needed!! Think you're not an opera fan? Well, live opera in such an intimate setting is an entirely different, and exciting, experience versus listening to recordings! I was a completely "opera - yuck" devotee until experiencing last summer's Cosi fan tutte, which blew me away. Right up there with U2! Challenge yourself to something new tomorrow night; you can't beat the price because you decide what it is!

See you at The Hall! Sincerely, Debra Foster Hubbard Hall Projects, Inc.

Touring Shakespeare...methinks it doth ROCK!

The Theatre Company at Hubbard Hall kicks off its summer tradition on Thursday night, July 23, with the opening night of the Summer Outdoor Shakespeare Tour!

A Midsummer Night's Dream
by William Shakespeare
Directed by Kevin McGuire

Join the adventures of four young lovers, a group of amateur actors and their interactions with the fairies who inhabit a moonlit forest. Our story takes place in Midsummer and is a bewitching farce featuring Hermia, Lysander, Helena and Demetrius. But, "the course of true love never did run smooth" as their romantic intrigues are confused and complicated still further by entering the forest where Oberon, the King of the Fairies and his Queen, Titania, preside and where Puck is full of mischief and tricks!

We invite you to bring a picnic, blankets, folding chairs etc. to enjoy a beguiling evening of Shakespeare for the whole family! All performances being at 7:00pm. And they're FREE!

Thursday, July 23 - Hildene, Manchester, VT
Friday, July 24 - Subscriber's Gala
Saturday, July 25 - Crandall Park, Glens Falls, NY
Sunday, July 26 - Cambridge Guest Home, Cambridge, NY
**Monday, July 27 - Greenwich Commons, Greenwich, NY**
Tuesday, July 28 - Park McCullough House, North Bennington, VT
Wednesday, July 29 - Georgi Museum, Shushan, NY
Thursday, July 30 - Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, NY

**Added performance!

"Dance for a Dollar" honors National Dance Week

Here at Hubbard Hall we're in the midst of a week-long celebration of Dance. And yes, all week long you can boogie for a buck at any of our ongoing dance classes!

We're finding so many ways to celebrate. On Saturday we held our Dazzle With Dance kick-off event, a performance by faculty and friends in our studio which helped to raise the first $200 toward a sound system (our studio doesn't have one yet). Dance Collective member Katy Schonbeck presented an excerpt from her new work, Clouds Dancing, and faculty members Darcy May (Irish Step), Vicki Webberley (Cleopatra's Dance), and yours truly (Dances of India) presented works with our students. The evening was rounded out by the participation of our wonderful and daring audience who learned some Irish ceili and Middle Eastern dance moves, together with our faculty and friends. Then we relaxed and cooled off in the Visual Arts Studio while enjoying cake and punch and good company.

On display in the art studio are the winning entries from our first annual National Dance Week essay and poster contest, "What Dancing at Hubbard Hall Means to Me." First place was awarded to Susannah Throop, second place winners were Devlin Kennedy and Linnea Seegers, and honorable mention was given to Ajanta Deibel and James Young. The winners received gift certificates to the Village Store, a fine art print of a painting of the Hubbard Hall stage by Adriano Manocchia, and a very unique black "Hubbard Hall Dancer" cap -- only 5 were made in honor of our winners! We are proud of all the writers and illustrators and hope you enjoy seeing their work as much as we have.

National Dance Week celebrates the diversity, energy, and joy of dance for EVERYONE with events across the country. Find out more at www.nationaldanceweek.org!

"Seascape " is well worth seeing

By Bob Goepfert
The Record

Click to enlarge

"Seascape"

Usually when a theater company produces a "neglected masterpiece," I tend to cringe. Too often that means they are producing a bad play by a great writer that would be better off ignored.

I am happy to say that Hubbard Hall’s production of Edward Albee’s rarely produced "Seascape" is well worth seeing.

Despite winning the Pulitzer Prize in 1975, "Seascape" is not a great play, but it is a charming piece of well-performed theater that offers an interesting and good time. If you can wrap your head around the idea of Edward Albee writing a whimsical play, that play is "Seascape."

Its premise is simple even if the play isn’t. An older couple lounge on a beach where they are joined by a pair of lizards who have the ability to speak and to intellectualize. The lizard couple engage the human couple in discussions about being human and inquire about such things as emotions, mating, child-raising and monogamy.

Though the discussions are often very funny, the talk is never silly. For example, one character defines progress as "a set of assumptions." For some playwrights that thought would drive an entire play. In "Seascape," Albee uses it as a throwaway joke line.

Director Laura Heidinger does a great job in keeping the work focused and, for the most part, avoids the pitfall of making Albee’s writing seem too dense. However, she cannot do much to overcome the overwritten first 20 minutes of the play.

Despite very good work by Stephanie Moffett Hynds and Richard Howe as the older couple the opening is slow and tends towards Albee-like lecturing. It doesn’t help the performers that they are a decade too young to play Charlie and Nancy. At Hubbard Hall, they are a couple going through a mid-life crisis rather than a couple reflecting on an entire life spent together. It lessens their comparison to the more innocent still-learning lizard couple.

The age-factor diminishes the play rather than hurting, however, it as Howe and Hynds offer strong performances in catalyst roles. Besides, once the lizards arrive we stop noticing the humans. Costumed in sensational lizard suits designed by Karen Koziol, the pair infuse life into a stagnant situation. Who’d have thought the most endearing portrait of a compassionate caring couple seen so far this year would come from a pair of lizards?

Where Charlie and Nancy are dull and tired, Leslie and Sarah are energetic and alive. Doug Ryan infuses Leslie with a curious mind and a funny view of the world. Courtney King as Sarah is gentle, probing and wise. Together they are an amphibious Adam and Eve who are clearly ready to go to the next rung of the evolutionary ladder. The tastiness of "Seascape" is it questions whether, if given the choice, they should move up the ladder to become Charlie and Nancy.

"Seascape" is that kind of a play. It has you laugh yourself into a conundrum as director Heidinger keeps the balance between light and heavy from tipping too far to either side. This is a very smart, well-acted worked that is given superior technical support.

Interestingly, the work is the opening production for the company’s new black box theater. The new space is part of Hubbard Hall’s own evolution process as it starts to work more outside its traditional performing space.

Choosing "Seascape" for its first show offers awareness the company knows success is not about the past or the future but can be found by offering good work in the present. And this is good work.

Ciao bello! The cyclists are coming....

Get psyched for race weekend with this classic 70s film!

Film: Breaking Away
When: Friday, April 17 at 7:30pm
Where: Hubbard Hall
Cost: Free!

In this 1979 coming-of-age film, a small-town teen obsessed with the Italian cycling team vies for the affections of a college girl. Winner of an Academy Award for Best Screenplay, this film on the American Film Institute's list of America's 100 Most Inspiring Movies. Rated PG, 100 minutes. Free. Please consider making a donation to support Hubbard Hall's community art programs and Cambridge area Farm Team Cycling.

Information on the real-life April 18-19 2009 races and related events at Tour of the Battenkill.

Classic Films Plus!

So we've started a new film series, bringing you classic cinema from the past paired with related fun.

Last Sunday we screened the hilarious Marx Brothers' farce Duck Soup, accompanied by analysis by comedy instructor Rick Conety.

Coming up on Sunday April 4 for a 2pm matinee, we'll bring you The Mark of Zorro to be followed by an exciting live sword fencing demonstration by foil instructor Richard Cherry and students.

In May, we're hoping to bring you a Friday night classic 80s flick accompanied by pizza from Spoonful Catering at our outdoor community bread oven. Help us select the film by answering the poll at left. Or, join the conversation by posting your thoughts and comments here!

Drum roll please....

Introducing the ONLINE EDITION of the Hubbard Hall Times!

We know you LOVE the paper edition of the Hubbard Hall Times. Must be the smell of the ink. Don't think we haven't noticed you lurking in the hallway behind the Village Store and Valley Artisans Market waiting to grab the first copy hot off the presses.

So why do we want to blog the Times? Yeah, we try to be green. And we'd love to get you all the latest news and updates at faster-than-snail-mail pace. Watch this blog space and you'll be among the FIRST to get news of upcoming opera and theater performances, dance events, and concerts. Get details on classes and workshops so you can register before they fill up. Get tickets before they sell out. Yup, you'll see it here first.

But the BIG IDEA behind a Hubbard Hall Times blog is to open a new kind of dynamic communication with our audience. Which classes are you signing up for and why? What did you really think of last weekend's performance? Share your ideas, feelings, point of view; it's a two-way conversation. After all, our mission is to Make Art and COMMUNITY happen!

Now that's a reason to lurk around, don't you think? We look forward to your participation. Thanks for helping us get with the Times!
- Gina

from Gina Deibel, Program Director (on behalf of the Hubbard Hall staff)