Happy Holidays

Thank you to everyone who attended Emil of Lonneberga, Rudolph the Ugly Duckling Aristocats.  It was a fantastic December!!  See you all in the New Year.

Emil Is Coming to Berkeley

This weekend, "Emil of Lonneberga" will open at Freight and Salvage in Berkeley.  The show features live music and puppets!  But, that's not all that is going on--Our Youth Education Program has a terrific production of "Aristocats" performed by the Piedmont cast coming up on Sunday.  And our San Ramon Holiday show, "Rudolph the Ugly Duckling and Other Cracked-Up Holiday Tales" has 2 preview performances this week.  A bit busy around here!

Puppets!!!

In order to make sure that our actors are strong enough to operate the puppets, they exercise their hands and wrists every day at the beginning of rehearsals.  We also supplied knee pads and gloves for everyone in the cast so that they can operate the feet of the puppets!

Goodbye Bus, Hello Emil

So, The Magic School Bus cast departed for their national tour and we started rehearsal for Emil of Lonneberga--all on the same day!!  We wish the cast of Magic School Bus all the best for their fantastic journey.  In the first week of Emil rehearsal, the actors are learning to work with their puppets and we had a special guest come to rehearsal to help pronounce  some of the Swedish names and words. 

Fun Questions

Here are some of the questions that the cast of Magic School Bus have fielded at elementary schools across the Bay Area:
"Lizard, where did you get your shoes?"
"How does the sunlight get into the solar panel?"
"Do you know a lot about science"
"If all the ice melts, what happens? There’ll be a waterfall out of the glaciers?"
"Do you know why you call it CO2?"
"What are the globes on Ms. Frizzle’s shoes?"

New Highland Elementary School

Tomorrow morning, Magic School Bus Live will be performing at New Highland Elementary School.  Thank you to the Rogers Family Foundation for sponsoring this performance. 
Interesting Fact: The actors are carpooling and taking public transportation whenever possible to get to the school shows.

The Bus goes to School

We had two terrific performances of Magic School Bus Live! The Climate Challenge yesterday at Allendale Elementary School in Oakland.  The kids were engaged and enthusiastic through the whole assembly.  Thank you to the principal, teachers and staff who make it possible. And a huge thank you to the Clorox Company Foundation for sponsoring the show!!

The Bus is Off and Running

Great opening weekend in San Ramon!  Now we move the whole show to Berkeley to perform at Freight and Salvage.  The actors will have a few days off in between--much deserved after a long tech week.  It was so thrilling to hear the audiences sing-a-long at the end of the show with the lyrics "Go Green" and "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Rethink!"

Magic School Bus Opens

After 14 days of pre-rehearsal workshops, 6 weeks of rehearsal, one week of tech, the bus leaves the station today at 2pm.  The artists and technicians involved with this process have done an incredible job capturing the potential for theatre to help children learn and discover.

Final Dress Rehearsal!!

This evening "The Magic School Bus Live! The Climate Challenge" will have it's final dress rehearsal.  The tech process has been long, but very rewarding thanks to the incredible work of our designers, actors and directors.  For this show, we are integrating music, sound cues, light cues and projections, so there was a lot of work to be done to make sure that every cue syncs up with the next.

Welcome to Nina's Notes

The Magic School Bus Live! The Climate Challenge rehearsal process is going great!  Our incredible playwright, Scott Elmegreen is in town from New York and is working with the director and the cast to perfect the script. It is a real treat for the actors to work in the room with a playwright in a completely collaborative process.

First Test post

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