Our next show is about the Federal Budget.

Here’s the skinny…

The year we spent creating Living with the Tiger allowed us to wander freely through our artistic and creative imagination. We had no logistical restrictions, except for the performance date and location. The only artistic restriction we had was that the three of us alone would perform it. This meant we could explore every avenue and sink into the artistic process without self-imposed limitations. We allowed ourselves the complete freedom to take Tiger in any direction it wanted to go. We learned a lot about how we worked and what we wanted to say with our work in the process.

This time around, constrained a bit more by time, we’ve decided to play around with that freedom. We’ve given ourselves a set of limitations in creating this new piece– some for practical reasons, but also in an attempt to challenge ourselves again to think about how we make things and how we want to make things. Here’s what we’ve set before us for the first draft:

- Create a piece about the United States Federal Budget

- Explore “presentation” as performance

- A time limit of 20min

- One performer

- An octopus has to show up

And of course, it wouldn’t be a Haymaker show without source materials:

http://www.deathandtaxesposter.com/

http://www.ted.com/talks/john_bohannon_dance_vs_powerpoint_a_modest_proposal.html

http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/show/10478

We don’t know what all that means either yet – but we’re really excited for the possibilities!

What’s our next production?

It’s the question we’re most commonly asked. (And thank you for that).

We decided after a few weeks of absolutely no tiger talk to spend a whole weekend discussing what exactly is next.  So much to consider…what do we want to say to the world? What’s going on personally that would relate to y’all? Do we set a time or do we let the muse and only the muse guide us?

Then we got a call from our friends at Fullsteam: “Want to help us throw a strange and beautiful Christmas Party? With a Variety Hour? And live art? And a holiday gorilla?”

Hot Damn! DO WE EVER!!! Strange and beautiful are our team colors.

Don’t you love it when the Universe provides? Quick and dirty. Turn on the broiler: we’re cooking up this party in under a month. We’re so excited to collaborate with the artists at Fullsteam to produce  A VERY MERRY DURHAM. You should join us, literally:

Friday, December 16^th at 6:14pm

Fullsteam Brewery, 726 Rigsbee Avenue, Durham

6:14pm – 7:30pm: Holiday Shenanigans (holiday crafts, live art, puppetry, appearances by Poetry Fox, and much more)

7:30pm: A Very Merry Durham Variety Hour

 Admission is FREE with the donation of a new, unwrapped toy (but don’t be a Scrooge — $10 value recommended).

Show us your SKILLZ!

Join the fun by strutting your stuff on stage!

We’re looking for home-grown talent to take the stage. All kinds of performers: musicians, actors, dancers, singers, jugglers, steppers, puppeteers, you name it…all are invited to pitch an act as part of the show. Want to play “Silver Bells” on wine glasses? Reenact a scene from “A Christmas Story”? Juggle ornaments? No matter how unusual your talent or your idea, we want to hear it.

Sign up HERE to join the fun!

Damn, people love us!?

If we didn’t know it before, we definitely discovered it during our opening weekend.

From as far away as Nashville, New York City, and Dover, DE, and especially including the band of people who drove the four-hour drive from Washington, DC, a host of friends and family came to Durham to see our first show, Living with the Tiger. That includes our awesome new friends in the Triangle who supported us; man, do we feel the love. To those of you who couldn’t make it and probably won’t in the next two weeks, you’ll definitely be missed.

To be honest, we feel a bit like kids who got too many presents on their birthdays. With so much, how can we ever say thank you enough?

Like the poster says,” No bullshit. Without you, none of this would have been possible.”

Sure, it’s the great American novel. But try to forget that for a second.

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Freedom, Love, Hate, Sacrifice, Messiness, Desperation, Brutality, Community, Get rich quick!, Violence. A thousand words, songs, poems, movies, books, etc. describe our Grand Experiment. Everyone’s America! is their own ideal. Like our country, that fact is both perfect and broken.

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One morning you wake up and decide to see America.

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