In this week’s blog post, Playmaking teacher Susan Willerman explains her process with the students, and makes us all wish we were still in middle school. _____________________________________________________________ The first day of Playmaking is always a special day! We ask the kids why they think people write plays. This time around, answers we got: to entertain people, […]
Greetings from Heather Shields, APAC’s Interim Executive Director
In this week’s blog, Heather Shields, APAC’s new Interim Executive Director shares her history with and excitement about working with APAC. Welcome Heather!_______________________________________________________________________________________________ Within moments of setting foot off of the N train for a friend’s Kentucky Derby party back in 2008, I was plotting my move to Astoria. Well, at least as soon as […]
Writers’ Reflections on the Midwinter Reading Series
In February, APAC hosted our Midwinter Reading Series at the Queens Council on the Arts. It featured a play, Carefully Taught, by Cheryl L. Davis and a musical, Love, Always, by Bill Connington and Michael Cooper. We asked the writers of these pieces to share their experiences for the APAC Blog. Here’s what they had […]
Reflections on Playmaking Round One
Our 10th Anniversary of Playmaking is underway and once again students from Horace Greeley Intermediate School (IS 10) are taking part in an afterschool program where they learn to write their own plays from Playmaking instructor Susan Willerman. These young playwrights then see their original works brought to life by professional actors and directors in a evening of staged […]
Playwright Cody Daigle shares his journey with In The Bones
In The Bones is a play about the ongoing (and maybe never-ending) process of dealing with and internalizing profound, catastrophic loss. Structurally, each scene of the play moves forward one year, detailing how time has changed the nature of grief for the play’s characters, and whether they’re moving closer or further away from healing and […]
Dev Bondarin (director of In The Bones) is named Artistic Director
Please join us in welcoming the In The Bones director, Dev Bondarin, as the new Artistic Director of APAC! I am excited and proud to join Astoria Performing Arts Center as Artistic Director and to begin my tenure with this fall’s production of Cody Daigle’s In The Bones. Cody and I are longtime collaborators, and I […]
Three Weeks Down
Erin Moore, APAC’s New Executive Director started her position at APAC just over three weeks ago. She began it during one of the busiest times of our season and had to hit the ground running. She wanted to share some of her perspective from the first three weeks on the job. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Tonight is our […]
Journey to Allegro
Tomorrow night actor’s take the stage under lights for the first time, in what we refer to as Tech, all the pieces of Allegro will start to come together. As we enter this last week before audiences will start seeing our work, we wanted to share another behind the scenes perspective. Mark Falconer first came to […]
Dancing ‘Til Your Feet Hurt
With Allegro in full swing, we wanted to share some more perspectives from our creative team. From the first meeting, it was clear with this show that dance would play an important role in this production. With this large dance show, it seems most appropriate to spend time hearing from Choreographer, Christine O’Grady. ____________________________________________________________________________________________ I’m […]
Playmaking Round Two
On Thursday, a second group of Middle Schoolers from IS-10 will see the plays they created through Astoria Playmaking come to life onstage with the help of some professional actors and directors. Susan Willerman, who is the force behind this great program, wanted to share some of her perspectives on this session of Astoria Playmaking. […]