A cast recording of the Off-Broadway production of The Memory Show (Festival of New Musicals 2009) at member theatre Transport Group has been released digitally and is coming to CD soon.
Day 5
The 2009 Festival featured Memory is the Mother of All Wisdom by Sara Cooper and Zach Redler. After the Festival, the show was a produced at Barrington Stage Company (a NAMT member theatre!), and with the help of a National Fund for New Musicals grant, Transport Group (another NAMT member theatre!) produced the show Off-Broadway this past year, now with the new title: The Memory Show. Though the title changed, the cast stayed the same through all of these productions.
Look below for images of Leslie Kritzer and Catherine Cox staring in this powerful piece—4 years apart!
We are honored to announce this year’s recipients of our National Fund for New Musicals grants. Now in its fifth year, the National Fund has distributed 56 grants totaling $234,000 to non-profit member theatres around America.
A special thanks to our funders including Stacey Mindich Productions, The Alhadeff Family Charitable Foundation and The ASCAP Foundation. This fund would not be possible without their contributions. If you are interested in supporting theatres developing new musicals around the country, please consider making a contribution to our National Fund for New Musicals.
National Fund grants of $10,000 to support full productions have been awarded to:
Barrington Stage Company (Pittsfield, MA) for Southern Comfort by Dan Collins and Julianne Wick Davis. This project previously received a Project Development Grant in support of its time at CAP21, a Writers Residency Grant for its time at Playwrights Horizons and was presented in NAMT’s 2012 Festival of New Musicals.
Transport Group (New York, NY) for The Memory Show by Sara Cooper and Zachary Redler, with support from Stacey Mindich Productions. The Memory Show was presented in NAMT’s 2009 Festival of New Musicals.
National Fund grants between $2,500 and $5,000 to support a workshop or reading have been awarded to:
Chicago Shakespeare Theater (Chicago, IL) for Summerland by Laura Eason, Jenny Giering & Sean Barry. Giering is an alumna from NAMT’s 2005 Festival for Princess Caraboo.
Dallas Theater Center (Dallas, TX) for The Fortress of Solitude by Itamar Moses and Michael Friedman, with support from the ASCAP foundation. Itamar Moses is an alumnus from NAMT’s 2012 Festival for Nobody Loves You, which also received a Project Development Grant in 2011-2012 in support of its time at The Old Globe.
Human Race Theatre Company (Dayton, OH) for The Noteworthy Life of Howard Barnes by Michael Kooman and Christopher Dimond with support from The Alhadeff Family Charitable Foundation. Kooman and Dimond are alumni from NAMT’s 2011 Festival for Dani Girl.
Lyric Theatre of Oklahoma (Oklahoma City, OK) for Triangle by Thomas Mizer and Curtis Moore with support from Stacey Mindich Productions. Triangle was presented in NAMT’s 2012 Festival of New Musicals.
An interview with Sara Cooper and Zach Redler, writers of The Memory Show from our 2009 Festival, about the life of the show and its upcoming Off Broadway production.
The Memory Show is a two-person comic tragedy about the troubled relationship of a woman who has just been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and her estranged daughter who moves back home to take care of her.
What has happened with The Memory Show (other than a shorter title) since the Festival in 2009?
We had a reading and then a production at Barrington Stage Company, which was an excellent experience. The Memory Show was also translated into Korean and produced in Korea this fall season. We got to go out there and see it, and it was awesome!
What was it like having the production up at Barrington and seeing the show on its feet?
We were so fortunate to have Bill [Finn] and Julie [Boyd] supporting us and believing in our work, and to have such an amazing director and MD and actors and designers. It was a really smooth process. We were so happy with how it turned out.
What has changed in the show since your NAMT Festival reading and what has changed since Barrington?We did some rewriting after NAMT, and then Joe [Calarco, director] and Vadim [Feichtner, music director] were really helpful in figuring out what to cut at Barrington. Basically, the piece has just gotten tighter.How did The Transport Group production come about?
Barrington produced a closed reading in New York, and Jack and Lori from Transport came to see it. We love them. We can’t wait for the production.What is most exciting about finally having your show Off Broadway?
Because the piece is so personal, we are just really excited to share it. The piece takes place in Brooklyn and so the tone is very New Yorky. We feel like it’s just coming home.
Why should people come check out The Memory Show?
It’s a wonderful cast and creative team (truly!!!) and they have really brought our little two-person musical to life. We poured a lot of ourselves (and our parents, and our grandparents) into this piece, and we think it says something very truthful about parent-child relationships. We hope this is a show that is universal because it’s so real to us.
For more information about The Memory Show, please visit www.transportgroup.org.