Collected Item: “An Empty Theater”
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An Empty Theater
What sort of object is this: text story, photograph, video, audio interview, screenshot, drawing, meme, etc.?
My video of our chant during a cast meeting in our theater.
Tell us a story; share your experience. Describe what the object or story you've uploaded says about the pandemic, and/or why what you've submitted is important to you.
Every year for the last 20 years, our community has planned, practiced, and performed a tribute to Broadway in a production called "Best of Broadway". We have a cast of over 100 local community members that sing and dance to 20 or so different Broadway songs. Our rehearsals are in an old Veterans Memorial building that comes to life during January to March with our songs, lights, and energy. The chants in the hall echos against the old walls, the stomping of feet on the stage threatens those downstairs, and the beat of the music pumps your heart. When one is in the hall, they are guaranteed to hear laughter in the back corner, a director shouting at the sound guy, and a piercing squeal in the speakers. The sounds in the hall define the busy enthusiasm of the cast and crew. However, this year, our production was shut down the day before our opening night due to Covid-19. The heartbreak of working for months on a show that was cancelled was devastating. After our annual production, we always have a day to clean and put our props and costumes away and clean the hall. But, this year, we just...left. The hall remains filled with our Broadway stuff. And when someone walks into the building, the silence of a show that was never performed is deafening.
Use one-word hashtags (separated by commas) to describe your story. For example: Where did it originate? How does this object make you feel? How does this object relate to the pandemic?
#broadway #songs #susanville #deafening #sound #cancelled #devastating
Who originally created this object? (If you created this object, such as photo, then put "self" here.)
Carla Dollar
Give this story a date.
2020-10-14