"a long, wacky excerpt from Home Movies, complete with accordion accompaniment, swelled the crowd outside the Provincetown Playhouse on MacDougal."
"One of the most wonderful downtown theater events of 2006 was Peculiar Works Projects' site-specific tour and staging of excerpts from 17 ground-breaking Off-Off-Broadway plays. Utilizing 14 directors and 80 performers, the pieces were performed outdoors at various West Village addresses, close to where the '60s plays were originally performed."
"At the "Home Movies" stop, a young kid begged his big brother to stop so he could watch—he was so transfixed that I’m sure this helped create a new fan of live theater. If only "OFF Stage" could be so rewarding for its intended audience!"
CAST
PAUL FITENI (swing) . TOM JOHNSON . STACY PARKER . CATHERINE PORTER
MUSICIANS
MATTHEW (MAX) FASS (swing) . BENJAMIN ICKIES . SPENCER KATZMAN
FULL EVENING'S DIRECTORS & CHOREOGRAPHERS
TIM CUSACK . MARK FINLEY . JULIE HAMBERG . JILLIAN HARRIS . JEFF JANISHESKI . ANNA McHUGH . CASEY McLAIN . CHRIS MIRTO . KAY MITCHELL . ELAINE MOLINARO . RENEE PHILIPPI . GABRIEL SHANKS . DAVID VINING . MIRIAM WEINER
CREATIVE TEAM
ROSALYN DREXLER . Book & Lyrics
AL CARMINES . Music
JULIE HAMBERG . Director
BENJAMIN ICKIES . Music Director
TARA HILL & J HAMBERG . Costumes
PRODUCTION TEAM
RALPH LEWIS . Producer
CATHERINE PORTER . Producer
BARRY ROWELL . Producer
PHOTOGRAPHY
JULIE HAMBERG . BARRY ROWELL . Archival
ALICE GERRARD . Promotional
BARRY ROWELL . Graphic Design
PRE-PRODUCTION READING
PWP did a reading of this musical before the walking tour that was FABULOUS. I'm grateful that these actors helped bring HOME MOVIES to life again
TOM BOZELL . JULIAN ELFER . CRAIG FITZPATRICK . JOE O'BRIEN . STACY PARKER . CATHERINE PORTER . JENNIFIER STEWART . DAX VALDEZ . NATASHA WILLIAMS
PECULIAR WORKS PROJECT TEAM
RALPH LEWIS . Co-Artistic Director
CATHERINE PORTER . Co-Artistic Director
BARRY ROWELL . Co-Artistic Director
a bit about HOME MOVIES
Originally presented by the Judson Poets Theatre in 1964, directed by Lawrence Kornfeld, the bizarrely funny musical HOME MOVIES was one of the first pieces to transfer from the fledgling OOB movement to Off-Broadway. This OBIE winner moved to the Provincetown Playhouse in May of 1964. The play was VERY daring for its time - what Feingold later called "among the bright, mordant, saucy, socially outraged, and sexually outrageous Carmines-scored events to emerge from Judson into the commercial arena." No one is spared the skewer, and yet the play is somehow tender-hearted and brave.
Apparently, no one wrote down the original score (or it has been lost) but we did have a recording of the music to work from that came from Rosalyn Drexler, the only known recording as far as Peculiar Works knew. Information seems scarce on HOME MOVIES. Here's a lovely obituary about the legendary Reverend Al Carmines in The Villager by Jerry Tallmer in which the play is mentioned. As of the spring of 2017, Ms. Drexler is very much still with us at almost 90 and having a bit of a public moment with her Pop Art. An amazing, multi-talented woman (professional wrestler, visual artist, novelist...). Do yourself a favor and look her up. I fell in love with this wacked-out piece and hope to stage the whole thing one day...if I can but find an outrageous producer to match it.
photo credits
top photos Julie Hamberg &. Barry Rowell | tour photos . Stefan Hagen
