CHILDREN'S THEATER COMPANY
Innovative Productions
The Seem-To-Be Players are the resident children's theater company of the Lawrence Arts Center. The Players are a professional troupe of actors, playwrights, directors, teachers and musicians who seek to expand the imagination, encourage creative thinking and promote an appreciation of human values through innovative productions and drama education for children, educators and families.
The Players provide an early induction into the diverse world of theater for thousands of children each year using a variety of theatrical styles and forms to illuminate classics, showcase biographies, and to share imaginative original stories. Since 1973, the players have shared a vision of a world where girls have great adventures as quickly and as often as boys, where the unexpected is necessary, and where fantasy and reality meld in an absurd potpourri of theatrical images stirred and mixed with original music.
The Seem-To-Be Players tour regionally and nationally in the Fall and the Spring, and put on several home shows at the Lawrence Arts Center a year.
ON TOUR
Fall/Winter 2004-2005
The Boston Tea Party, the American Revolution in 55 minutes or less, a musical melodrama
The Ugly Duckling, a delightful musical retelling of the H.C. Andersen classic
Spring 2005
Los Zapatos Magicos: Pedro's Magic Shoes, a bi-lingual play based on Latino folk tales, directed by Jose Cruz Gonzales and funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
All written and composed by Artistic Director, Ric Averill
Coming in 2005-2006
BOOKING INFORMATION
These productions are being booked by Mainstage Management, for more information contact:
Deborah SharnMainstage Management
8144A Big Bend Blvd.
St. Louis, MO 63119
(314) 962-4478
main@mainstage-mgmt.com
PRESS, PROMOTION & EDUCATIONAL MATERIALS
~Logos~
Seem to Be Players and corporate sponsor logos to download.
~AMELIA EARHART~
The story of America's premiere Aviatrix
By Ric Averill
~THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK~
Newly discovered writings from the diary
of
Anne Frank, as well as survivor accounts, are interwoven to create a
contemporary impassioned story of the lives of people persecuted under
Nazi
rule.
Adaptation by Wendy Kesselman, from the original
stage
play by Goodrich and Hackett
~THE BOSTON TEA PARTY~
An American Musical Comedy Melodrama
By Ric Averill
~THE UGLY DUCKLING~
A Musical Adapted from H.C. Andersen By Ric Averill
~LOS ZAPATOS MAGICOS:
PEDRO'S MAGIC SHOES~
A bi-lingual play derived from Latino Folk tales
By Ric Averill
Directed by Jose Cruz Gonzales
MORE ABOUT THE PLAYERS
WHERE HAVE WE BEEN?!?
OK, so the Seem-To-Be Players tour? what does that mean? It means we took the following four productions:
- LOS ZAPATOS MAGICOS: PEDRO'S MAGIC SHOES
- BIRD WOMAN: THE STORY OF SACAGAWEAY
- THE RUN-A-WAY ORCHESTRA
- TALES OF TOM SAWYER
And performed them a combined total of 190 performances (88 in the fall and 102 in the spring) In 41 communities in 15 states including:
- Kansas*
- Missouri
- Iowa
- Illinois
- Wisconsin
- Michigan
- West Virginia
- Virginia
- North Carolina
- Florida
- Kentucky
- Texas
- New Mexico
- Arizona
- California
* Kansas communities included: Lawrence, Topeka, Tonganoxie, Ottawa, Shawnee, Norton, Russell, Hays, Phillipsburg, Concordia, Wamego, Liberal, Scott City, Newton, and Arkansas City
Serving audiences of more than 150,000 students, teachers and families
And . . .
- All of these plays were written and/or adapted by Ric Averill
- All of these plays were costumed by Jennifer Glenn
- All of these plays were stage managed by Danny Rogovein
- All original music was composed and arranged by Ric Averill
- Two of these plays were designed by Jon Cupit
- Two of these plays were designed by Monica Wille
- Thirteen professional actors performed in these plays
- Fourteen professional musicians were hired to create the scores for these plays
It is with your help and our strong base of support from the Lawrence Arts Center, the Lawrence community and the nation that we continue to share theatre with children and families across the country. Consider a gift to the Seem-To-Be Players today.
Seem-To-Be PlayersLawrence Arts Center
940 New Hampshire
Lawrence, Kansas 66044
(785) 843-2787, ext. 123
ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
Ric Averill
Ric Averill has been the Artistic Director and principal playwright, composer and director for the Arts Center's Seem-To-Be Players professional children's theatre company since he and his wife, Jeanne, founded the company in 1973. The company has toured in more than 50 Kansas communities and 35 states, entertaining and educating more than 200,000 students per year.
Now in their 31st Season, The Seem-To-Be Players tour nationally through Mainstage Management and have been granted the Kansas Governor's Arts Award and received major project and touring funding from the Heartland Arts Fund, Kansas Health Foundation, Payless Shoesource, Hallmark Cards, US Bank, the Kansas Arts Commission, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
In addition to the professional Seem-To-Be Players, Ric serves as Drama Program Director for the Arts Center - supervising classes and performance based programs including Lil' Bees, Soon-To-Be Players, First Saturday Players and City Youth Theatre. Ric is Artistic Director of the Summer Youth Theatre Program, now entering its 30th Season. This program gives over 125 students per month from ages K-12 the opportunity to spend a month doing theatre with professionals.
Ric writes both plays and music, with degrees from the University of Kansas in both Music Composition and Children's Theatre. Ric has received numerous Playwriting Fellowships and been selected for five professional play development symposiums including the Kennedy Center's New Visions/New Voices and the Indianapolis Bonderman Youth Theatre Playwriting Symposium.
Ric's plays, published by Dramatic Publishing, include The Seven Voyages of Sinbad the Sailor; Bird Woman, the Story of Sacagawea; The Princess and the Pea and other short plays; Pixies, Kings and Magical Things; Alex and the Shrink World and T-Money and Wolf (with Kevin Willmott.) Ric also wrote the Actor's Handbook for Fran Tanner's high school textbook, Basic Drama Projects.
Included among Ric's many commissions are the Kennedy Center's Alice in Wonderland, First Stage Milwaukee's Little Drummer Boy, the Coterie Theatre's Frankenstein and the Kansas Health Foundation's Red Blood and High Purpose. Ric's fusion of music and theatre has culminated in an opera for children based on the story of The Emperor's New Clothes which was commissioned by the Kennedy Center for a world premiere in November of 2001 and a national tour in 2003-2004.
Contact Ric Averill, Artistic Director, for more information or to book The Seem-To-Be Players. (785) 843-2787 or lacdrama@sunflower.com