Tartuffe is Open & Running Away with Laughs

Richard Whittington & Preston Lane, the co-founders of Triad Stage, give the Opening Night curtain speech.

Our Opening Night audience--a very full house.

Opening Night of Tartuffe, Thursday June 11th.

Eric Moss painted live in the lobby before & after the show.

Russ, Cana, Emily & Kelsey.

Overlooking opening night festivities are Franny, Emily, Scout, Nick & David Jr.

Josh Yoder as Cleante reads the prop paper in the stairwell.

TJ chillaxin' in the electrics room (aka the elevator room).

Chris Morris sittin' a spell between her bookended scenes.

Assistant Stage Managers Mary Beth, Sam, & Molly wave as Jason Scott Quinn waves his baguette.

Tartuffe Tech photos

Actors & director stand in silhouette during tech.

There are a lot of funny entrances & exits...

Heather Vandergriff, the draper, works on Mariane's skirt.

Emily Robertson, the assistant costume designer, stands with a wig in our greenroom.

Costume renderings with image research by Kelsey Hunt.

This photo was taken the first day of rehearsal (May 13th), and that is when the designers who can be present explain their designs to the company.

Here Kelsey Hunt explains the nuances of Orgon's trousers. In some of the other photos you can see how the costumes turned out, but if you want to see the rest of the costumes you're gonna have to come see the show...

Chris Morris as Madame Pernelle.

I am seen here cutting dramaturgical boards for the lobby that have embellished truths. (wink)

Josh Yoder (as Cleante) & TJ Austin (as Damis) converse in character.


Jason Scott Quinn (as Loyale) inspects a snack.
(He's a snacker.)

What are they all looking at??

Even Preston is trying to see...

Q & A with a couple cast members

DB: Hi John. A table becomes very important to your character, Orgon, in the play. Has a piece of furniture ever been so significant to you?

John Tillotson: Well, dining tables are very symbolic of group activities. Gathering for meals, discussions, holidays, etc. For more than 20 years I lived in NYC without one large, flat, smooth surface--not even a desk. Four or five years ago I finally was able to fit a table into my space. Well, it has changed my daily life immensely. No more meals with plates on laps. No more wrapping gifts on the floor. Now all those activities have a surface. But what is best is now that I can idle with friends over drinks & dinner, all relaxed and comfortable for hours on end, enjoying ourselves. (Sidenote: I recently used my table for a sawhorse and gouged a chunk out it. I shrugged--it gave the table additional purpose & character.)

DB: Hi Rosie. Your character in the play has lots of lazzi & the comedy seems second nature to you because it's so funny. I was wondering: what was the most recent favorite comedy that you were in?

Rosie McGuire: I'd have to say my own one woman show called Color Me Neurotic. I played over a dozen characters--some were very, very funny and some were quite tragic. But my favorite character was Kay-dee Bleeker--a homeless woman turned homeless dentist.

Kay-dee found some discarded dental tools behind a clinic one day & decided to teach herself denistry to help out her homeless community-- although she does use crazy glue occassionally. Mostly when a tooth is rotten, she'd give her patient a good swig of liquor and tell them to squeeze their "hoo-ha" so they don't feel the pain.

The audience was in love with this character, and loved her to a point where they would let her examine one of them. If she could finally get them to open their mouth, Kay-dee would then say, "That's it--yank it!" And the house would come down laughing. For me it was a comedy orgasm every night.


DB: Hey Gordon! Real quick: If Tartuffe was an animal or famous person or something, what or who would he be?

Gordon Weiss: Ah... probably Yosemite Sam, Bette Davis, and... a ferret.

Set building and storytelling

Jennie Lynn, one of our carpenters, removes the blue lining from the plexi-glass used on the set for Tartuffe.

Nick Hussong, the master electrician, gets help from our new sound supervisor, Carrie Cook.

(Note the rocks bordering the stage.)

Tom McCoy, the master carpenter (aka the Green Lantern), poses in our the back of our box truck with a fraction of the rocks used to line the set. They literally hauled in a ton of rocks for the set. Last year at this time, however, we had hauled in 3 tons of sand for Bloody Blackbeard.

Tom watches Jennie slice and peel the plexi lining.


I found the fireman's pole! That very pole will be used for entrances during the play...


Carrie is seen helping the unseen Scout focus some lights backstage. The little console on top of the light plot at her feet is a remote control for the light board in the booth so that they can manipulate lights while they are close to them. (Note the pole on the left.)

Shelley, our scenic artist, drafts floor designs in one of our vomitorium corridors.

Gordon Weiss & Rosey McGuire are married to each other...

... just so you know.

And, they, like most people, love listening to Preston Lane's stories about his family.

He keeps his cast enthralled.

(The punchline delivered.)

Family storytelling begets more family storytelling while on a break from rehearsal.

Preston directs TJ Austin, John Tillotson & Gordon Weiss.

Shhh... TJ Austin is hiding behind the topiary (as Damis).

Tartuffe sur la radio

John Tillotson (Orgon) reads a scene from Tartuffe at the Greensboro branch of WFDD 88.5.

Artistic intern, Asha, looks up and admires the exposed remnants of Revolution Mill (in Greensboro) where the radio station offices are located.

From left to right: John Tillotson, Katy Sink & Rosey McGuire inside the studio.

While we wait on others to be interviewed, Gordon Weiss tells us a story about waking up really early to run lines with Richard Dreyfuss when they both were in Sly Fox.

"So I picked up the phone-- and it was Richard..."

Gordon & Preston laugh about something funny as I take pictures behind the glass window of the studio.

Here is Krista Hoeppner (Elmire) as she performs a scene with Gordon Weiss who is playing Tartuffe.

It really was quite fun.

The Tartuffe interview with 88.5 FM will air on Tuesday, June 9 at 8:50 AM and again at 1:50 PM, then once more during “Triad Arts This Week” at 1:30 PM on Friday, June 12.

If you don’t have a radio, but do have your computer handy, you can listen on the web at:
http://wfdd.org/listen.php

Select WFDD-1

The segment should be uploaded to the “Triad Arts Up Close” archives by Friday, June 12.

You’ll be able to find it here:
http://wfdd.org/tauc.php

Find the Program Archives box and select June 9.