Posts Tagged SteppingStone Theatre for Youth

Art Making at the Library!

On December 28 & 29, SteppingStone visited the Saint Paul Public Libraries Arlington Hills and Rice Street branches to lead two mask-making workshops for students ages 6-12 as part of the library’s winter Maker Break program.

Teaching artist Jack Bonko holding a half-mask covered with white fur and brown trim.

During this 2-hour workshop, young artists were encouraged to imagine a creature living deep in a winter forest and design their creatures using a mask base and art materials. They brought their creatures to life using their voices, bodies, and imaginations in guided creative drama explorations.

SteppingStone is regularly invited to join the Saint Paul Public Libraries in their Winter, Spring, and Summer Maker Break series where we offer workshops in music, movement, comedy, mask-making, makeup design, stage combat, play creation, and more. Saint Paul Public Libraries offers Maker Break workshops free of charge, with no advanced registration, and all young people are welcome to attend.

Learn more about the Saint Paul Public Library’s offerings here!

Photo: Teaching Artist Jack Bonko with his abominable snowman mask.

Park Square and SteppingStone Theatre to Join Forces

PARK SQUARE THEATRE AND STEPPINGSTONE THEATRE ARE
JOINING FORCES
TO CREATE “THEATRE FOR LIFE”

Media Contacts:
Connie Shaver,  shaver@parksquaretheatre.org
Kiersten Birondo kiersten@steppingstonetheatre.org

This fall, Park Square Theatre and SteppingStone Theatre for Youth join forces to create “your theatre for life” in downtown Saint Paul. The two companies have entered into a Memorandum of Understanding that will lead to more robust regional theatre programming for all ages. Through joint management and mission, though operating as separate legal entities with separate boards and finances, the two companies will provide a full range of theatre experiences out of the Historic Hamm Building. 

Those experiences will encompass all ages and the best that both theatres have to offer: classes and camps for young people, workshops for adults and intergenerational groups, family-oriented productions for young audiences, and Park Square’s full mainstage season of new works, classics, mysteries and beloved musicals. In tandem the two partner organizations will serve an audience of 125,000 with more than 70,000 young people attending performances and educational programs.

“I got my start in a theatre for youth company at eight and had my first theatre internship at 18,” says Park Square executive director Michael-jon Pease. “What excites me by joining forces is how together we truly become Saint Paul’s theatre for life for artists and audiences. This innovative partnership is a natural outgrowth of the theatre-in-residence concept Richard Cook started with the addition of Park Square’s Andy Boss Stage.”

SteppingStone’s artistic and executive director Mark Ferraro-Hauck agrees. “With the planned sale of our building near Summit Avenue and Victoria Street in Saint Paul, SteppingStone will return to its downtown roots for performances while maintaining easy accessibility for our hundreds of camp and class families through neighborhood-based programs and facilities.  Greater geographical flexibility and the strength of our combined resources are essential to meet the evolving needs of young artists, families, and schools.”

Each company has championed new work for the stage, from Park Square’s world premiere commission of Christina Ham’s NINA SIMONE: FOUR WOMEN that has gone on to productions around the country to SteppingStone’s recent world premiere of Ricardo Gamboa’s THE REAL LIFE ADVENTURES OF JIMMY DE LAS ROSAS. Park Square’s mainstage subscription programming will continue, such as the upcoming world premiere of BAD THINGS, GOOD WHISKEY, and the new musical TRIANGLE (a co-production with The Ordway). SteppingStone’s annual productions by and for young audiences will move to the Park Square stages during the school year, with summer productions held elsewhere to accommodate the growing summer audience. The partnership kicked off informally on August 1 and 2 with the SteppingStone production of DISNEY’S LITTLE MERMAID, JR, which took place outdoors on the 7th Place Plaza in front of Park Square.

“Partnerships with artists, theatre companies, and schools have also been integral to both Park Square and SteppingStone’s work in recent years,” comments SteppingStone Board President Mike Erlandson.  The new joint venture will include ongoing partner relationships with local companies such as Ghoulish Delights/The Mysterious Old Radio Listening Society, Flying Foot Forum, PRIME Productions, Ballet Co Lab, Full Circle Theater, TruArtSpeaks, and Trademark Theatre. 

“This step not only protects both Park Square and SteppingStone during the continued pandemic and forced theatre ‘intermission,’ by bringing together their assets and skillsets,” notes Park Square Board chair Paul Mattessich, “but re-establishes the Hamm Building – which also houses the former SPCO recital hall and the former Vieux Carré jazz club – as a thriving, diverse performance center that can help rebuild downtown’s economy once the pandemic is over.”

With this move, the two organizations are also transforming their leadership model and building on Park Square’s March announcement of a cohort model of Artistic Associates including Kim Vasquez, Rick Shiomi and Ellen Fenster. Mark Ferraro-Hauck becomes the newest element of the artistic and executive leadership team, serving as interim Executive Director, while Vasquez will become Producing Director of the Park Square Mainstage. Another Artistic Associate is currently meeting with the team and is expected to be announced in the coming weeks. Michael-jon Pease, Park Square’s current Executive Director, will remain with the company as a part-time consultant through the transition. Pease begins a new career as Executive Director of the Saint Paul Parks Conservancy in September. Ferraro-Hauck observes, “As we have discussed the challenges of the current economic moment and the complexity of bringing together two organizations, we have also been inspired by the necessity of re-imagining artistic leadership in ways that join and celebrate the many gifts and lived experiences found in our artistic community.”

As a teacher at St Paul City School, a current board member of SteppingStone Theatre, and a subscriber and donor to Park Square Theatre, Pondie Taylor agrees. “I think the energy of SteppingStone and Park Square Theatre truly complement each other well. Thanks to their theater classes, SteppingStone has given my children the tools and confidence to be on stage. Park Square Theatre has invited my students to watch the magic of a novel come to life on stage. I bring my entire family to watch a SteppingStone play and my husband and I enjoy date night at Park Square! I think these two theaters together will continue to strengthen the art scene in the Twin Cities and the greater Midwest.”  

Artistic and Executive leadership

Mark Ferraro-Hauck
Interim Executive Director of Park Square, Artistic Executive Director of SteppingStone Theatre for Youth
Mark has a passion for providing all youth with an opportunity to grow, discover their strengths, and interact with the world around them. He has conducted teacher and parent trainings in arts-based wellness strategies for youth and led a federal study of the role of the arts in building resiliency with traumatized youth. Mark has directed and designed over 60 plays throughout the Midwest at professional and educational theatres. He was a founder and held the position of Executive Producing Director of the Great River Shakespeare Festival in Winona, Minnesota, and was also founder of Public Theater of Minnesota in 2010, a program focused on professional Shakespeare productions featuring young actors. In addition to working in the arts, Mark spent 15 years as the principal designer and co-owner of Bluestem Construction, a nationally recognized residential and commercial remodeling firm.

Kim Vasquez
Producing Director of the Park Square Mainstage, Park Square Theatre Artistic Associate
Kim Vasquez is a Saint Paul native specializing in the development of new plays and musicals as head of Gray Lady Entertainment, Inc. She is currently a producer on Be More Chill (Chicago, London, Broadway and Off-Broadway) and Austen’s Pride. Kim is a proud Founding Producer for the currently defunct New York Musical Theatre Festival (NYMF), which survived for a glorious 15 years. Her most recent directing credit was for the New York Times bestselling Author and Poet, Rupi Kaur, in a live theatrical production of The Sun And Her Flowers at the Tribeca Performing Arts Center. Kim is also an Actor recently having worked on In The Heights, the movie, and Saturday Night Live. Proud member of SAG-AFTRA.

Ellen Fenster
Park SquareTheatre Artistic Associate
Ellen Fenster is a professional theater director and arts educator in Minneapolis. Ellen has directed at Pillsbury House Theatre, The Illusion Theater, Yellow Tree Theater, Theatre Mu, Artistry, Gremlin Theatre, U of MN/Guthrie Theater Actor Training Program and Park Square Theater. She is an associate artist at Pillsbury House Theatre where she ran the Chicago Avenue Project from 2008 to 2016.  She is also an artistic associate at Illusion Theatre where she helps connect the theater with young and emerging artists. She is currently the Artistic and Executive Director of Twin Cities Theater Camp, a summer theater intensive for children.

Rick Shiomi
Park Square Theatre Artistic Associate
Rick Shiomi is a founding member and the Co-Artistic Director of Full Circle Theater. He has been a playwright, director and artistic director in the Asian American theater movement since the 1980s and was a co-founder of Theater Mu and Artistic Director for twenty years. His twenty plays include Mask Dance, Rosie’s Café and Yellow Fever. His directing credits include: Flower Drum Song (David Hwang version), Into The Woods, The New Mikado and Caught by Christopher Chen. He has received The McKnight Distinguished Artist Award, The Ivey Award for Lifetime Achievement and the Sally Ordway Irvine Award for Vision.

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Park Square and SteppingStone spread autumn joy for all ages!

Media Contact:
Connie Shaver  shaver@parksquaretheatre.org

Saint Paul, Minn., Sept 30, 2020 – Newly partnered Park Square Theatre and SteppingStone Theatre are springing into action with virtual programs to keep audiences connected with friends and family through the autumn, embodying their concept of being “your theatre home for life” even during the pandemic. Online programs, theatre classes, a ghoulish variety show, outdoor Halloween family day, and a one-man epic play offer diverse ways to enjoy theatre – while safely at home or socially distanced – in the coming months.

While school is out for MEA Break, SteppingStone is bringing families two full days of active moving and making with VIRTUAL MEA FUN DAYS. Young people from Pre-K through 6th-grade are invited to join in live from their living room on October 15 and 16. Pre-K & K will explore “A Monster’s Dilemma,” 1st – 3rd-grade will create “Spooky Stories and Spaces,” and 4th – 6th-graders will uncover the “Legend of the Haunted.” Activities for each age will include active theatre games, creating physical props and projects, and inventing their own original play with their virtual cohort.

Monster-madness continues as The Mysterious Old Radio Listening Society gets their monthly residency into the Halloween spirit with OLD-TIME RADIO: FRANKENSTEIN (October 19).  Two original stories each written and performed in the style of a classic radio series, including commercials, music and sound effects, will honor Mary Shelley’s iconic tale.  “Long Live Frankenstein,” by Tim Uren, follows the path of Captain Walton’s ship through deadly arctic conditions to capture the legendary creature, while in Joshua English Scrimshaw’s “Inglorious Monsters,” a scientist reanimates the dead to create the perfect soldier!

Keep Halloween spirits high and your family safe with FAMILY DAY OUT: HALLOWEEN EDITION, hosted by Steppingstone Theatre in collaboration with Park Square (October 25). From noon to 4:00 PM, come to the West 7th Place Plaza (outside of Park Square Theatre in Downtown St. Paul) for socially distanced trick-or-treating, a pumpkin contest, costume parade and outdoor artmaking. The cherry on top? Two performances of Mixed Precipitation’s PICKUP TRUCK OPERA in the center of the plaza. Admission will be limited for the safety of all with pre-registration available to reserve your spot.

Park Square Mainstage then presents THEATRE OF THE MACABRE, a three-chapter online variety series (Oct 29, 30 and 31, 2020) hosted by Twin Cities actor/director Craig Johnson, all to benefit Park Square. The three unique pre-recorded evening performances are filled with horrifying tales of terror, true ghost stories, and monologues and scenes from Edgar Allan Poe to William Shakespeare! Performers include local favorites Ann Daly, Hope Nordquist, Mo Perry, Tinne Rosenmeier, Laura Salveson, Eric Sharp, Dane Stauffer and The Orchard Theatre Collective: Anna Leverett, Damian Leverett, Ben Shaw and Mackenzie Shaw, with special appearances by Robert Francis Cole and Zachary Zito. “It’s a delight getting to know the work of so many talented Twin Cities artists,” says Producing Director Kim Vasquez. “Every evening a new spine-chilling chapter will haunt you with terror and thrills for every taste.” Theatre of the Macabre is produced and directed by Kim Vasquez and co-directed by Craig Johnson.

Get ready for 4 weeks of active imagination and bodies during SteppingStone’s FALL VIRTUAL STUDIOS, beginning Nov 3. These youth-driven cohorts will be captivated as they join a band of superheroes and devise their own adventure-play, explore social and climate justice through theatre, or create an original improv comedy show. Classes are available for 18-month-olds through high school students.

Early in TEARS OF MOONS (Nov 19 – 22, 2020) the vast scope of the one-man play becomes apparent. My job is called different things,” says The Poet. In West Africa, it’s called a Griot. In Greece; Homer. On Franklin and Chicago; Crazy.” Antonio Duke’s poetic tour-de-force travels through time – on the 5 bus – examining the impact and historic pervasiveness of the threat faced by Black people today. Deeply personal and encompassing an epic sweep of historical storytelling, Duke reckons with the violence and shares a vision of strength that interweaves Haitian, Nigerian, and Ghanian spiritual figures and mythology. The play will be directed by Ellen Fenster. “Well trained and highly charismatic, Duke uses his craft to give this piece light and pathos.” Star Tribune, 2018.

TICKET & REGISTRATION PRICES
Virtual MEA Fun Days: Pay-As-You’re-Able, valued at $175
Family Day Out: Halloween Edition: Pay-As-You’re-Able, valued at $25/family
Theatre of the Macabre: Individual Evenings $15, 3-Night Package $30
Fall Virtual Studios: Pay-As-You’re-Able, valued at $180
Tears of Moons: All Tickets $25

Park Square tickets are on sale at www.parksquaretheatre.org and SteppingStone registration can be found at www.steppingstonetheatre.org.
The ticket offices are temporarily closed due to corona virus. Please email tickets@parksquaretheatre.org  or education@steppingstonetheatre.org with questions.

CALENDAR INFORMATION
Virtual MEA Fun Days: Oct 15 & 16, 8:30 am —2:30 pm
Family Day Out: Halloween Edition: Oct 25 12—4 pm
Theatre of the Macabre: Oct 29, 30, 31 at 7:30 pm
Tears of Moons: Nov 19, 20, 21 at 7:30 pm, Nov 22 at 2:00 pm

PHOTOS
Available at: https://www.parksquaretheatre.org/media/photos/
Theatre of the Macabre: Craig Johnson. Photo by Craig Johnson
Tears of Moons: Antonio Duke. Photo by Brad Hildebrandt
Disney’s The Little Mermaid Jr, performed on the 7th Street Plaza. Photo courtesy of SteppingStone Theatre

PARK SQUARE THEATRE. 20 W. Seventh Place, Saint Paul. www.parksquaretheatre.org

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Tickets

The box office is currently closed. Please email tickets@parksquaretheatre.org with any questions.

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