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senior citizen actors

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Topic: senior citizen actors
Posted By: clelia
Subject: senior citizen actors
Date Posted: 4/29/04 at 10:08pm

The majority of our CT volunteers are well over age 60. Finding plays to accommodate them is difficult. Any  suggestions ?




Replies:
Posted By: Gaafa
Date Posted: 4/30/04 at 3:44am

I don?t know if this would help or not?
If you take a play, say like ?Our Town? & disregard the ages specified & modify it to suit your needs.
Others that come to mind are the comedy?s ?Last of the summer wine? & ?One foot in the grave?, both are BBC productions of old age  British culture.  Hereby the scripts of say 3 or 4 consecutive  TV episodes, can  be joined together as one production. With intervals inserted as required. I?m sure you would have simular TV productions, which maybe more suitable to your accents & local culture.
On the same lines, have a look at doing a programme of 2 or 3  1 Act plays, under a collective show title.  You can  make up a name to cover the occasion & possibly in line with a common thread or indicative of the genre of the different plays.
Otherwise I would suggest adapting the age requirements of any play,  into the age brackets you have in the group, with a few tweaks & a bit of re-modeling of the play can work as well!.

G'donya & Chookas Celia

 



Posted By: Bets
Date Posted: 4/30/04 at 10:15am

Being a senior citizen myself, I understand your problem. I have directed several plays for a group of over 50s in my retirement community.

There is a senior theater website ( http://www.seniortheatre.com/ - ) that can give you some help. However I found that the plays listed there were not what my group likes--most were oriented around senior problems. We want to do less serious plays. I have found several light musical spoof types at the Pioneer Drama ( http://www.pioneerdrama.com/ - ). We have done Don't Say No to the USO and Westward, Whoa! I just saw Forty-five Minutes from Broadway last night by another senior group. Also by constantly searching, I have come up with a few more elsewhere.

There is the Senior Theater League ( http://www.seniortheatreleague.org/ - ) for help in other areas.

If I find a play that I would like to direct, I don't care about the character's ages. We just do it. If high school seniors can do characters that are older, why can't we do characters that are younger? After all, we've been there. Our audiences, drawn from our retirement community, total around 700 over 4 nights.  We don't sell outside our community...yet.

I hope this helps. I have a lot more info, if you want more.Smile



Posted By: Doug
Date Posted: 5/01/04 at 11:31am

We are in the same position.  Try The Cemetary Club (**), Over the River and Through the Woods (***), On Golden Pond (***), Arsenic and Old Lace (***), Same Time Another Year (**) (note it is Another Year not Next Year), Waiting in the Wings (*), Foxfire (**) and The Kingfisher (*) to start with.  I may be able to think of more. 

I always wanted to cast Neil Simon's Chapter Two with older actors - I think it would work even better than the specified ages.

If you have one young girl who can sing try Valley Song.

Hope this helps

Doug

 



Posted By: reba77
Date Posted: 5/03/04 at 10:10am
I agree with Cemetery Club. Another good one that
uses three senior women is The Exact Center of the
Universe. In addition it has a part for a around 40's
man and a younger women.



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