Shameless Plug Saturday

A Navy SEAL, a former Marine and a unexpected end to our staged reading series

Folks,

There is good news and bad news.

The good news is this is your last chance to get tickets to the Parlor in 2021. The bad news is this is your last chance to get tickets to the Parlor in 2021.

That’s right, after our staged reading of Steve Martin’s Meteor Shower tonight, we’re cancelling our final two shows of the year.

I guess it’s not that surprising. COVID season is upon us: it’s cold, Omicron is here, everyone’s scared and pissed off, etc. Cases have been spiking in the Cornwall area, even hitting several folks that are part of our extended VetRep family. Governor Hochul declared a state of emergency and the NYS COVID guidelines tightened up a bit. Which all sucks.

We created the Parlor as a community-oriented performance space where our friends and neighbors could gather and enjoy a first-class theater experience. Sure, we knew we’d run it at a bit of a loss, but we really wanted to do it because it was a fun diversion - fun for us and our actors and our audience. But between COVID and the policies that come with it, it felt irresponsible to run the Parlor as we had been running it - it felt even worse infringing on the experience we wanted to provide at the Parlor.

So we’re cancelling our final two shows.

Now, we never intended to do shows from January to March since we need that time to develop new work which is, by the way, our primary line of effort. So we’ll reopen the Parlor on Saturday April 2 and hope to see everyone as we enjoy the warm weather and hopefully a return to something approaching normalcy.

The bottom line is the Parlor is meant to be fun, low-maintenance and carefree. If it’s going to be a pain in the ass we’re not going to do it. And it seems like returning in April minimizes the ass-pain.

So what happens in April?

Well, I don’t want to unveil our full 2022 season just yet because it’s not 100% locked in. But I’m really excited about it. We anticipate a full return to staged readings - not only established plays but also new works. We also plan to run each show for about four consecutive Saturdays so everyone has a chance to see a show, not simply the first 16 to grab tickets!

Of course, you don’t have to wait until April to get content from VetRep.

It’s probably a good time to remind everyone that the Savage Wonder podcast is up and running on every podcast platform available - ITunes, Spotify, Podbean, etc. It’s long-form, one-on-one conversations with veterans in the arts - a truly rare breed of warrior/artist. From a Marine machine-gunner-turned-dance choreographer to a school shooting survivor-turned-Army Ranger-turned fiction author, it has been an incredibly humbling and eye-opening experience talking with folks whose triumphant grit is only matched by their wide range of experiences.

If you haven’t checked our our most recent episode with David B. Meadows - a Navy SEAL-turned-actor - you’re not going to want to miss it. Such an interesting dude with a sharp mind and an articulate understanding of the warrior/artist dynamic.

And on Monday, we drop a new episode with former Marine MP and current poet Dex - a familiar name for those of you who saw her at our Verse in Color live poetry readings a few weeks ago.

If long-form interviews aren’t your thing, no worries. At some point in 2022, we’re going to be launching audio plays on the Savage Wonder podcast as well. Maybe some laughs, maybe some drama or maybe some scares. No one is more bummed than I that we’re not going to do our last two staged readings. But we’re only as far away as your computer or phone. And we’re going to be prolific.

We’ll keep taking these Saturdays to tell you what else is going on with us, but in the meantime, thanks for taking this ride with us. It’s meant a ton to us that you’ve chosen to be part of the Veterans Repertory Theater community. There’s going to be a lot more good news to come. You deserve it.

Talk soon,

Chris