Mark and Charles Video Interview
In this video interview, Mark and Charles clear up some rumours the started in the blog post they wrote for us. I totally believed them last time, too.
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Beatroute Preview of Super 8
PLACES PLEASE :: CALGARY
By Brianna Turner
Super 8
Lunchbox Theatre
February 6-25
After receiving acclaim for their production in High Performance Rodeo’s 10-Minute-Play Festival in 2010, co-writers Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto realized they were on to something. For those unfamiliar with the concept, the 10-Minute-Play Festival gives local theatre companies a line of dialogue and a prop and challenges them to write and then perform a ten-minute long play in only 24 hours. Netto begins the tale of Super 8’s conception by explaining that, “They gave us a clock and the quote, ‘Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.’ We were really drawn to the image because it was not a digital clock. The idea of two hands passing, for a moment they touch and then they move on. The idea of a clock for us was the importance of a moment in time and a connection.” This imagery led them to exploring the idea of a play set in a Super 8 Motel. Now, Netto and Hopkins have expanded their ten-minute play into a full-length production, debuting this month at Lunchbox Theatre. Hopkins describes the scene: “Super 8 is set at a Super 8 motel in Aberdeen, South Dakota, where the Super 8 franchise originally began. The play begins in the bar of the motel, where these two career loners, a man and a woman, have an encounter that forever changes them… or perhaps not.” While Super 8 does explore the depths of human connection, Netto asserts that it’s also potently infused with comedy.
FFWD Preview of Super 8
Super 8 fast and funny
David Trimble as Will and Kira Bradley as Angie in Super 8 by Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto. At Lunchbox Theatre, Feb 6-25 2012. Photo by Benjamin Laird.
Romantic comedy checks into Lunchbox Theatre
Published February 9, 2012 by Cadence Mandybura in Theatre
DETAILS
Super 8 presented by Lunchbox Theatre
Lunchbox Theatre
Monday, February 6 – Saturday, February 25More in: Theatre
Lunchbox Theatre
Monday, February 6 – Saturday, February 25More in: Theatre
Super 8 may be about a classic case of boy-meets-girl, but don’t expect it to be as sticky-sweet as a Valentine’s Day candy.
“It [isn’t] an overly sentimental play,” says director Kelly Reay. “It doesn’t have the clichés you associate with romantic comedy. These characters were immediately relatable, and their relationship was very true to life.”
Although the play was originally only 10 minutes long, its creators — local playwrights Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto — found the story compelling enough to expand to 50 minutes, the length of a typical Lunchbox production.
“Both stages of genesis for this play were actually pretty frenetic,” says Netto, adding that the expanded version is true to the original. “I don’t think anything hugely new necessarily entered the story, but I think we definitely worked on fleshing out the characters — who they were and what brought them to meet each other.”
The characters in question are Will (David Trimble), a travelling stranger who always stays in Super 8 motels, and Angie (Kira Bradley), a woman who frequents the Super 8’s bar.
“We have the opposites — one character who never travels and the other character who’s always on the road,” explains Reay. “Angie, she lets the world come to her, whereas Will is travelling the world.”
While it’s best to remain tight-lipped about the fast-paced plot, both Reay and Netto promise a show that will take you to unexpected places with laughs along the way, and further surprises in the shape of the set. “There’s an exciting design element that is rarely seen at Lunchbox Theatre that is going to make the shows that much more fun,” says Netto.
“It was a response to the challenge of trying to stage a play — a relatively simple and minimal play — that has multiple locations. How do you do that in simple small theatre terms? I think we came up with a pretty good solution,” adds Reay. “When you’re able to do it simply, it really cuts to the heart of the matter [and] allows us to emphasize what’s most important about this story — the relationship between these two characters.”
Read More: http://www.ffwdweekly.com/article/arts/theatre/super-8-fast-and-funny-8744/
Calgary Sun Review – Super 8
Charming motel stay makes for Super play
BY LOUIS HOBSON ,CALGARY SUNFIRST POSTED: | UPDATED:
You just know I’m going to say that Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto’s new play Super 8 is a super little comedy.
I won’t apologize because it’s not just a play on words.
This story of two lonely people who meet one night at a Super 8 motel is as charming as it is off beat.
By the end of the show you feel you know these two people and are glad you had the opportunity to spend an hour with them
That makes any comedy super.
Angie (Kira Bradley) spends too many nights at the bar in her local Super 8 because no one from town goes there. This way she can meet strangers and, for a while, pretend to be someone she isn’t.
Will (Dave Trimble) has seen far too many Super 8 motels. Exactly why this is so is one of the clever little twists in Super 8. Bradley plays brassy with ease and conviction which is why you believe Trimble is wary of her.
Some of the show’s best laughs are at Will’s expense because Trimble makes him so wonderfully timid.
The look on Trimble’s face when Bradley misinterprets what he says is hilarious.
Several times you expect him to get Bradley’s drink in his face when, in reality, he doesn’t mean to insult her.
The way Trimble gets on his bar stool gets a well-deserved laugh each time he does it. It’s an actor confident in his craft.
Julia Wasilewski’s revolving set allows us to travel from the bar to Will’s room and what happens there is a delight and very believable.
Hopkins and Netto first wrote Super 8 as a 10-minute play which they took to Lunchbox Theatre’s artistic director Pamela Halstead.
To her credit she could see the potential that has been realized by Bradley, Trimble and their director Kelly Reay.
It’s super that Lunchbox is so dedicated to showcasing Calgary playwrights and sparing no expense of money and talent to do so.
Read More: http://www.calgarysun.com/2012/02/10/charming-motel-stay-makes-for-super-play
Calgary Herald Review – Super 8
Check in to Super 8 for an engaging stay
BY BOB CLARK, CALGARY HERALD FEBRUARY 11, 2012
Review
Lunchbox Theatre presents Super 8 by Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto through Feb. 25.
Rating 4 out of five.
Time stops for no one, but happily the hands of the clock come together just long enough for two lonely strangers to share a small piece of it in the Lunchbox Theatre show Super 8.
Well-written by Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto, Super 8 is an affecting comedy about what hap-pens when Will (played by David Trimble) and Angie (Kira Bradley) meet in the bar of the first Super 8 – in Aberdeen, S.D. – on the eve of the well-known motel chain’s rebranding.
When we first meet him, Will – who apparently makes checking into Super 8s in order to check them out his daily job – is excited enough about the impending rebranding to do an eight-count (hey, it’s Aug. 8, 2008).
Angie spends her non-working hours sitting at the Super 8 bar pretending to be other people in order to talk to strangers. At first, Angie hasn’t much of a clue why Will should care so much, let alone know so much, about Super 8s – nor why, for example, he should insist on not confusing rebranding with “logo” (a running gag between them).
When she finally finds out, she teases him with it and in pretty quick order there’s some pretty funny talk touching on everything from making bogus, albeit wildly imaginative, complaints to motel management to, um, “intimacy kits” in the room’s fridge bar.
Directed by Kelly Reay, Bradley and Trimble build and play off each other beautifully.
You find you’ve grown rather fond of their characters by the time the turntable bed-and-bar set has gone full-circle once again at the end of the play.
Trimble, especially, turns in an emotionally sensitive, natural performance that lends a quality of nobility to the unassuming Will.
He’s the proverbial “little guy” who, proud of what he does, still knows the value of dreaming of something better. And finding it with someone else. In what turns out an engaging, lovely play.
bclark@calgaryherald.coms
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
Read more:
http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/Check+Super+engaging+stay/6137799/story.html#ixzz1m7oZlYVK
Media Release: Fascinating Ladies by Catherine O’Brien
Press Release/Media Call
For Immediate Release – February 10th 2012
Take a trip through a lifetime in song at Lunchbox!
Fascinating Ladies by Catherine O’Brien
Calgary, AB – In March, Lunchbox presents the Western Premiere of the touching musical revue Fascinating Ladies, by Catherine O’Brien and conceived by Catherine O’Brien and Julain Molnar. Fascinating Ladies runs March 5th to 24th, and features Elizabeth Stepkowski Tarhan, Esther Purves-Smith and Katherine Fadum, and is directed by Jan Alexandra Smith with musical direction by Joe Slabe. It tells the story of three cousins who uncover some long hidden secrets about their grandmother while preparing for her 100th birthday party, leading them to confess some of their own along the way. It all takes place against the back drop of the songs that shaped their grandmother and the century that she has lived.
“Fascinating Ladies was a hit on Prince Edward Island last year and it seemed a perfect match for Lunchbox”, says Pamela Halstead, Lunchbox Theatre’s Artistic Director. “It’s a heartwarming story about the bonds between women in a family and all that fabulous music, which spans many decades and styles, cinched it for me.”
Fascinating Ladies features Elizabeth Stepkowski Tarhan as Louise, Esther Purves-Smith as Francine and Katherine Fadum as Patty. The production team features director Jan Alexandra Smith and musical director Joe Slabe, set designer Becky Solly, costume designer Rebecca Toon, lighting designer Jason Schwarz and stage manager Kelsey ter Kuile. Fascinating Ladies runs March 5th to March 24th, Monday to Saturday at 12:10 pm, Fridays at 6:10pm and Saturdays at 7:30 pm.
The world’s longest running lunchtime theatre, Lunchbox Theatre is a professional company that caters to downtown office workers over the noon-hour by producing seven plays per season on the TransCanada Stage, as well as the Suncor Energy Stage One Festival and the RBC Emerging Director Program. Lunchbox Theatre is located at the base of the Calgary Tower.
Media are invited to a Media Call on Monday, March 5 at 1:15 pm.
1:15 pm – B-Roll of Fascinating Ladies (2 minute scene)
1:30 pm – Interviews as requested with actors Elizabeth Stepkowski Tarhan, Esther Purves-Smith and Katherine Fadum, director Jan Alexander Smith, musical director Joe Slabe, or Lunchbox Theatre’s Artistic Director Pamela Halstead.
www.lunchboxtheatre.com
For more information, to RSVP, or to request an interview:
Kathryn Blair
Marketing and Communications
Lunchbox Theatre
403 265 4292 x 229
kathryn.blair@lunchboxtheatre.com
Kelly Reay on directing a world premiere production
I did a little interview with Kelly Reay, director of Super 8, about directing new work. Where the playwrights might come to rehearsals, and changes may be made.
Calgary Herald Interview with Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto
Super 8 playwrights had to be super speedy
BY STEPHEN HUNT FEBRUARY 6, 2012 2:08
Playwrights Mark Hopkins, left and Charles Netto’s new play is set in bar at Super 8 Motel and opens this week at Lunchbox Theatre. Photo by Gavin Young, Calgary Herald.
Some plays are inspired by history — personal, national or military. Some arrive in the world commissioned by whoever’s paying.
Super 8 came from a prop and a quote.
Lunchbox Theatre’s newest production, which first sprang from the quills of Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto around this time in 2010, was created as part of the 10 Minute Play Festival, a 24-hour marathon in which local theatre companies create, write, rehearse and stage a 10-minute play in 24 hours.
The prop (which every group also received) was a clock, and the quote, according to Hopkins, was one misattributed to Dr. Seuss: “Don’t cry that it’s over. Smile that it’s happened.”
Each group gets handed their inspiration Friday night, then sets to work.
“I was handwriting (scenes),” says Netto. “(Then) Mark was typing (them). I started directing the first scenes while Mark was still writing the second scene.”
“Total insanity,” says Hopkins.
That’s a pretty wide-open canvas to begin with, but Hopkins and Netto are pretty imaginative guys.
They’re the co-founders of the Swallow-a-Bicycle Theatre Company, a local collective of actors, writers and artists who stage performance creation shows at various site specific locations around town. Their highest profile gig has been producing the Freak Show and its subsequent sequels at the last five High Performance Rodeos, as well as last year’s iRobot.
Additionally, this year, Hopkins associate produced the entire High Performance Rodeo, and is the man behind We Should Know Each Other, a bi-weekly house party he hosts at which he hopes to one day meet everyone in the city.
If anyone could turn a Dr. Seuss quote and a clock into a story, it was these two guys.
And it started, as these things often do, with an image, followed by many hours of panic, writing, rewriting and finally, exhaustion.
“We had talked about a man on a highway who sees the yellow neon glow of a Super 8 sign,” says Netto. “And that got us — especially Mark — looking into intricate details about Super 8.
“About two in the morning,” he adds, “we came up with the idea of someone making ridiculous complaints at a Super 8, and just started asking ourselves what were the silliest complaints one could come up with at a Super 8?”
That set in motion the 10 minute version of Super 8, which generated such strong buzz that Netto submitted it to Lunchbox’s Suncor Energy Festival of New Work play development program.
Much to Netto’s shock, he received a phone call shortly thereafter from Lunchbox artistic director Pamela Halstead.
“I remember getting the phone call,” Netto, “and it’s not like I always think this, but she said hey, it’s Pam from Lunchbox, and the honest thought in my head was, you don’t need to call me to tell me we’re not in. It never for a second crossed my mind that she would take us up on this little gem of ours.”
Halstead delivered good and almost-good news: the play had been selected for its reading series (good). The catch? The playwrights needed to expand it into an hour long script in a single work week.
Although considering the play’s birth story, a whole work week may have seemed like an eternity.
The upshot of it all: working with a generous group of theatrical collaborators, including actors David LeReaney, Karen Johnson-Diamond, dramaturge Sheri Wattling, and Halstead, the young playwrights crafted an additional 50 minutes of material in four days (at the same time they were performing a play that Swallow a Bicycle had been commissioned to do in Vulcan).
The play, which now features David Trimble and Kira Bradley as a pair of lonely wanderers who meet in the lounge of a Super 8, is a testament, Hopkins says, to the collaborative nature of this city’s theatre community, where everyone, it sometimes seems, chips in to work on each other’s new work.
“We were really lucky,” Hopkins says. “You couldn’t ask for a better collaborators — to have Shari Wattling as your dramaturge? To have David and Karen as your actors? The feedback we were getting in those sessions was just incredible.”
“The amount of incredible Calgary actors we’ve had working on this has been amazing,” adds Netto.
And while it’s a little mainstream to go from producing a site specific freak show to writing a show for Lunchbox, Hopkins sees the move down theatre row as one more step in his theatrical and personal journey — for one thing, there’s a lot of Lunchbox patrons he hasn’t met yet that he can now invite to his We Should Know Each Other parties.
“It’s such an honour,” Hopkins says. “We’ve really been embraced by the theatre community here. It’s really cool to see it being done by Lunchbox Theatre.”
Preview: Lunchbox Theatre presents Super 8 by Mark Hopkins & Charles Netto at Lunchbox Theatre through Feb. 25. Tickets and info: lunchobxtheatre.com or 403-265-4292
shunt@calgaryherald.com
twitter.com/halfstep
© Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald
Charles on the specificity of words
Note from Kath, Marketing and Communications at Lunchbox: This is the second in a series of blog posts about Super 8 that I asked Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto to write. This one is by Charles. Larger pictures of the tattoo in question are here.
A couple of days ago I wrote Kelly Reay, the director of the Lunchbox production of Super 8, discussing a minor change involving a sound cue that he had suggested. I mentioned that Mark and I were okay with that change but that the epilogue should probably not be changed as it had been permanently inscribed on my arm. Tattoo Pictured here:
Kelly wrote me back:
“wow dude! That’s dedication. Now I really feel the pressure to make sure you like the production!”The truth is how the production turns out and/or is received will not affect how I feel about my choice to put the epilogue of Super 8 on my body.Don’t get me wrong I am extremely excited for the production, it’s a great team and I know it will be an awesome production. However it’s not because of the production that I did this. For me the words in the epilogue of Super 8 hold power in themselves, whether or not there was a production.I have occasionally considered getting a tattoo. There have been ideas I have toyed with, usually connected to my Trinidadian heritage or my father. However nothing has resonated with me over time enough to commit to getting done.So why now?It was the right time for some permanent tribal markings. In this case my tribe is theatre and stories. I was attracted to the idea of putting words on my body, more so words that I had been a part of writing.As I researched Tattoos it became more and more clear how much words resonated with me. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but I also think words can create a thousand pictures. Pictures that can change and shift depending on the context of who is reading them, and when and where they are being read. Words can hold great power in them as an entity beyond the speaker or writer.
“wow dude! That’s dedication. Now I really feel the pressure to make sure you like the production!”The truth is how the production turns out and/or is received will not affect how I feel about my choice to put the epilogue of Super 8 on my body.Don’t get me wrong I am extremely excited for the production, it’s a great team and I know it will be an awesome production. However it’s not because of the production that I did this. For me the words in the epilogue of Super 8 hold power in themselves, whether or not there was a production.I have occasionally considered getting a tattoo. There have been ideas I have toyed with, usually connected to my Trinidadian heritage or my father. However nothing has resonated with me over time enough to commit to getting done.So why now?It was the right time for some permanent tribal markings. In this case my tribe is theatre and stories. I was attracted to the idea of putting words on my body, more so words that I had been a part of writing.As I researched Tattoos it became more and more clear how much words resonated with me. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but I also think words can create a thousand pictures. Pictures that can change and shift depending on the context of who is reading them, and when and where they are being read. Words can hold great power in them as an entity beyond the speaker or writer.
Why those particular words?
A few reasons. Mark found a beautiful simplicity in the words when shaping my original over-written draft. As well the format of the text is important to me. It is one that Mark and I use when writing, so the text represents collaboration as well.
Most important though the lines themselves reflect a philosophy that resonates with me. A philosophy about simple, honest connections between people and yet the impermanence of those connections, and of course the impermanence of life itself. These themes are important to me even if I sometimes struggle with the impermanence aspect.
People have told me it was a brave, bold, passionate, crazy thing to do. It may be all of those things, but for me it just made sense.
Having said all that, I have not told my mother yet…
WIN TICKETS: If you’d like a pair of tickets to Super 8‘s opening performance at 12:10pm on Monday, February 6th, email me (Kathryn Blair, kathryn.blair@lunchboxtheatre.com) by 5:00pm on Sunday, February 5! with your name and contact info, and that you’re entering the Super 8 ticket giveaway!
Charles Netto is Co-artistic Director of Swallow-a-Bicycle theatre and playwright of Super 8.
A Conversation About Super 8
Note from Kathryn, Marketing at Lunchbox: I’ve asked Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto to write some blog posts for us! Here’s the first one, stay tuned for more! Apparently they had this conversation as a kind of draft for their playwright’s notes.
(Transcript from a conversation between Mark Hopkins and Charles Netto, authors of Super 8, on January 31, 2012.)
MARK
Wow. Charles, do you realize that someone – other than us – is producing one of our plays? An established, reputable theatre company, no less?
CHARLES
It’s like we fooled them, though I’m not sure how we did it exactly.
MARK
Also, did you know that Lunchbox Theatre has a blog?
CHARLES
I’ve heard rumour that this is the case.
MARK
For me, this was NEW INFORMATION. I am very excited!
CHARLES
Not as excited as I am about having a REVOLVE in our play. Am I allowed to give that away?
MARK
Tell me about this “revolve”. Is that some fancy theatre word that theatre people use?
CHARLES
Well, Mark, it is a stage that actually REVOLVES to reveal multiple sets. The last time I acted on a revolve was in Grade 12 for the production of Stalag 17. I played Schultz and spoken German badly.
MARK
Is Stalag 17 a German sci-fi, where aliens live in a Berlin ghetto?
CHARLES
You’re going to give away the aliens in Super 8 if you keep dropping hints like that.
MARK
At any rate, I’m happy that Super 8 will have AT LEAST the same production value as your high school play.
CHARLES
Hey, I went to private school. We had a pretty nice budget, let me tell you!
MARK
That’s a great segue way, Charles! I think the idea of this blog is to give people a “behind-the-scenes” look into Super 8. We just learned that one of the writers was a private school boy. Now, why don’t you tell the nice readers what Super 8 is about?
CHARLES
Even though we wrote it together, I see some themes that I often come back to: traveling, loneliness and simple human connections. Mixed, of course, with your love of meticulous research.
MARK
Oh, the research. Did you KNOW that Redfield, South Dakota, is the pheasant capital of… wait, the United States? The world? Let me look it up.
CHARLES
Wikipedia. Where would we (and really Mark) be without you?
MARK
Yup, pheasant capital of the world. A title that dates back to 1908!
CHARLES
Did they give that title to themselves or is there an official governing body?
MARK
I don’t think there’s fierce competition.
CHARLES
Should we bother explaining to people how we write? You know, how you write all of Will’s lines and I write Angie’s?
MARK
Really, Super 8 is just a transcript of how we first met. (pause) Oh man, there are so many pheasants on Google. I’m staring at this crazy picture of dozens of dead pheasants, strung up on, like… a clothesline.
CHARLES
Save it for the sequel, Hopkins.
MARK
People might not know that Super 8 was first written for the 10-Minute Play Festival, over a feverish 24-hour writing period. How did we manage?
CHARLES
The key to my success as a writer was energy drinks. LOTS of energy drinks. You?
MARK
I’m now trying to wean myself from energy drinks. People keep telling me about this video that shows what Red Bull does to your insides. I’m afraid to watch it.
CHARLES
You should be. I sometimes think, if you keep up your pace of energy drinks, that you’ll become a PSA warning to children. “Mark thinks he’s writing a play, but really he’s just hurting his friends and family. And his insides.”
MARK
And then there’s a picture of me, lying on the sidewalk, a can of Full Throttle in my hand, its neon green contents spilling around my prone, twitching body. I think it’ll be really effective.
CHARLES
True. Of course, you won’t play yourself in the PSA. So the question is: who will play you?
MARK
I think it should be Dave Trimble. That guy is just brimming with talent.
CHARLES
And you’re often mistaken for each other.
MARK
We should really work with him sometime. Hey, wait – did I hear that Dave Trimble is actually performing in the premiere production of Super 8? The WORLD premiere?
CHARLES
I believe he is, indeed, in the WORLD premiere. Of course, in the Mars premiere, Will was played by Zarlock Xegis, and the Jupiter production featured x3jdgu21C, but they’ve got nothing on our WORLD premiere crew.
MARK
(Behind-the-scenes factoid: Charles hates it when people use the term “world premiere”.) Did you know that, of the three Super 8 hotels in Calgary, not a single one has a Super 8 bar? It’s a good thing we didn’t set this play in Calgary, because the inaccuracies would be running rampant.
CHARLES
True. Also, setting it in Calgary might have led to more “hands-on” research than would have actually been helpful.
MARK
You mean, like, actually setting foot in a Super 8 bar? That sounds like a lot of work.
CHARLES
Your need to research everything would have forced us to research every beer. (Behind-the-scenes fact: Mark has never stayed at a Super 8.)
MARK
I can’t imagine that Super 8 bars stock very good beers. But, then, I get to imagine, don’t I? The joys of fiction!
CHARLES
(Behind-the-scenes fact: Mark is a beer snob.)
MARK
All this talk of theatre makes me want to have a beer.
CHARLES
I hear that.
[Mark opens a Red Wheat Ale from local brewery, Wild Rose.]
MARK
Take that, Super 8 bar!
[Mark donated blood today, so this beer may topple him. Also, Charles got a tattoo today. Apparently, a day for needles.]
MARK
You got a tattoo, Charles? What is it? Oh, on an unrelated note, I was thinking we should cut the epilogue for Super 8. It just doesn’t work.
[No reply.]
MARK
Charles? Charles, are you still there? … Charles?
