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Theater-going is among the many, many things we can’t do anymore.
But that doesn’t mean the stage is completely off-limits. The Geffen Playhouse, Westwood's non-profit theater company, run through UCLA, has launched a YouTube series called The Geffen Stayhouse. It's an attempt by the theater to bring its community of audiences and performers back together, in these trying times.
“I want to stay in contact with our patrons, who we miss dearly,” said artistic director Matt Shakman on KPCC’s Take Two. “And I want to stay in contact with our Geffen artists.”
Each short video featured in the "stayhouse" includes a Geffen alum doing a performance of their choice.
Our top pick? A profanity-laden excerpt from the play “Glengarry Glen Ross,” performed by actress Kathryn Hahn and her family, using American Girl dolls.
The series also includes some powerful music performances by people like Zonya Love, who brings down the house (in her own house) with the gospel song, “Hang On Just a Little While Longer.”
A new video comes out every Wednesday.
“How do I create intimacy through an internet world? We’re trying to do that in small steps forward,” said Shakman.
It’s the first step, of many, for the theater community -- which is now faced with the task of figuring out how to perform in our stay-at-home world.
In a few weeks, the Geffen will debut a new kind of show called, “The Present,” which will be performed live, with a twist -- viewers wil get a surprise present in the mail, to open as the play unfolds. Right now, it might just be one of the hottest things in town: tickets for the 5-week run sold out in less than an hour.
Listen to the full interview with Matt Shakman below:
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