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Area 51 |
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Area
51 is the name of NRTG's warehouse and the
home-away-from home for many of NRTG's dedicated performers, crafts-persons,
and volunteers. It's where we build and store our sets and costumes.
Until we moved into Cardinal O'Hara, it was where we rehearsed as well. |
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Lost in Space |
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When
we suddenly had to move out of the Niagara Falls Convention Center in
September 2002, to making way for the Seneca-Niagara Casino we not only lost
our theater, we lost the space we used for storage of props,
costumes, sets, lighting, and sound equipment. We lost our space for
building, painting, and sewing, and for stocking our paint, lumber, tools,
and materials. We lost our rehearsal space, our place for auditions.
We lost meeting space for production confabs and Board of Directors'
meetings. We lost alot. |
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Space - The Final Frontier |
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Enter
Jim Danni and Fran Newton. Within a few days they had found a place, settled on a deal, and begun to plan a multi-purpose work
area for the group. Even before the ink was dry on the lease, Jim and
Fran, along with the tireless Roger Watts, were feverishly transforming an
area of an old,
ramshackle warehouse loft into our new home, which
affectionately became known as "Area 51." |
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Beam Me Up, Snotty |
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Despite all the work our team put into the space, our first winter in Area
51 was taxing. Sure we had new walls, reconditioned floors, new
shelving, lots of lighting, huge storage and work areas, and a rehearsal
area, but, we were (and
are) still
short on amenities. |
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Modernized restroom facilities remain high on the project priority list.
Additional space heaters were installed last winter, providing more than
enough heat over the rehearsal space. Gone is the merciless, record-setting cold of the Winter of 2003
that saw one My Fair Lady cast member spending her
downtime between scenes knitting caps, looking rather like her street-urchin
character in the show, bundled head-to-toe. These days the cast
is
warm enough to knit without wearing gloves. |
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And now at our new performing home at the Cardinal O'Hara Performing Arts
Center we have the added luxury of rehearsing in the theatre, right on the
stage where we'll be performing. This has the added advantage of now
allowing set building to be done in the evenings at Area 51 while rehearsals
are taking place on-stage. |
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