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Oh my godness, be Frank, where the only way to be is Frank. Hello, everyone in, welcome to being Frank. We're the only way to be is Frank. I'm your host, Frank Lebono, and I'd like to thank you for joining us on what we liked all the Intelligent Conversation podcast where no conversation is out of bounds and all points of view are welcome. You know, we go live to tape and we always give you the date so you have some context and relevance to our conversation. Is the
twelfth of September. Well, they've done the impossible again for the third consecutive year. The Phoenix Theater Ensemble is staging thirteen live theater performance in just twelve days in and around six different venues in the charming hamlet of Nyack, New York. Of course, I had to say that because it's my hometown as well, and you know I'm always
bragging about Nayak. This is another reason why. And you can imagine executing such an event as well Shakespearean in nature, and it takes a special team to pull it off. We have three key people who have been making it happen from the very beginning. I'd like to introduce you to first two guests and then a third coming up shortly. They're returning to Being Frank. They came last year to
talk about the Phoenix Festival and they return. Craig Smith and the Leis Stone are founding members of the Phoenix Theater Ensemble, amongst their other accomplishments too many to read, and they are the creative heart and soul behind the festival. They also partners in life as well. So welcome back, guys. It's always a pleasure to host you here of Being Frank.
Thank you for having us Ran.
It's great to be here, Frank. Thank you. Okay, we's got a lot to unpack. What We've got to introduce. Our third guest joining us for the first time and indeed a pleasure, is Thomas Schneck. He's a president of Visit Nayak, and orization that promotes the village and tourism to the village. The Visit Night team has been involved since twenty twenty one and is of great value to the festival in a way. They are the uber project manager and Thomas knows the workings of the festival as
well as anyone. He is also on the board Festival. Welcome Thomas, thank you for joining us here.
Thanks Ran, thanks for having me.
All Right, as I mentioned, there's an awful lot to unpact. So but before we do, we get again. We mentioned thirteen live shows in just twelve days. That's massive. But let's refresh people if they didn't see you the first time around, Both Craig and at least talk a little bit about Phoenix Theater in general first and then the festival. Let's bring them up to speed. We've mentioned this is
the third year. Let's take them back to the first the concept of it, and then we'll bring them to where we are now.
We'll do Thanks Frank. Aleisa and I lived in New York City, in the East Ville for many decades. We met in the theater, we got married in the theater, We raised our kids in the theater. So the theater is part of our lifeblood.
It is.
And then in twenty eighteen we moved to Nayak while maintaining our theater company in New York. And you know, this was a time that we could have a time of reevaluation, certainly for me it was a time to consider retirement and that type of thing and stepping away from the theater business.
But the.
Vibe in Nyak was just kind of amazing to us, and the passion of theater took over. Once Agare and we started looking at each other and said, no, maybe we could do a festival in Nayak, not knowing at all we had done small festivals before, we hadn't done anything large. So we did that. Then we got delayed by COVID for a couple of years, and then finally we did the first one in twenty twenty two, which
was mostly outdoors again because of COVID. Successful artistically, very successful, and we had critics coming up from New York and they loved it.
I have to, you know, in.
Full transparency also say it was not successful financially. We lost money with it, and we kind of expected that somewhat with any kind of a new adventure. So we went back to the drawing board and we put together the twenty twenty three festival and we changed the formatting of it and tried to cut some expenses and to maximize the income and things like that, and we lost money again, but we didn't lose as much money is lost in twenty twenty two, so we were kind of
moving forward in the right direction. So that brought us to twenty twenty four.
This year.
This is our third annual festival and we reconfigured it again this time is something that we were really interested in doing. One thing that I have noticed is the people in Nyack and Rockland County and Westchester are discerning and avid, are takers of performing arts, but they tend to go into New York and see a Broadway show and then they turn around and come back and they miss a total, dynamic, wonderful environment of exciting, innovative theater
that they don't see. So at Leasa and I were talking and said, well, okay, they don't see that, maybe we should bring that to Nayak. And that's exactly what we did for this third festival. We started talking to some of our friends who are to artistic directors and producers of key, very exciting theater companies and dance companies and music companies and said, would you be interested in coming to Nayak as part of our festival and they
said yes. So that kind of set us up for this one and this one where we have thirteen performances over eleven days, and it's kind of like the D Day in Asian, you know, kind of like that. And a Lease has been just amazing at organizing this, and she is a multitasking titan, and she makes up for me because I'm not, and then I we're and we're taping this on the day of our opening party and our opening gala. So we are at the same time enormously excited and looking at our telephones and seeing if
anybody's going to call with any kind of issues. Been no issues so far. We are enormously excited about this festival.
And we're going to talk about that because hopefully we will be streaming by this evening and people will see and hopefully joined the celebration at the Nayak Hotel. We'll talk all about that in some detail. But you've mentioned Elisea, and I want to bring her into the conversation now, especially since she has such an intimate involvement with the festival. A kind of a twofold question. What remains the same? What has changed over the course of the three years
from the beginning. Give us your perspective.
Let's see the first year we produced some really gigantic shows up at Marydale the second year. We wanted to and were requested to by local businesses who are our sponsors and supporters and partners, and bringing the festival to Nyak to bring more of the festival into town. We had some shows in town the first year, but not nearly as much as what we are doing now. So we incorporated that we did more venues in town, which puts us in very non traditional spaces because we don't
have a theater space in town. There's really only one theater in town, as you probably know, which is the Elmwood Playhouse, and they use their space all the time. And so we are performing in places like the Nayak Center, the Library, the First Reformed Church last year, at Hudson House this year, also at Big Read Books and at Story Space Arts, so a lot of very unconventional places.
We're asking artists to do dance in theater and concerts and this year really we're moving closer to how we have envisioned the festival to be and grow into the future.
It had always been this model of the way the Edinburgh Theater Festival works, which is that the whole town, all of Edinburgh becomes a stage many different places, pubs, restaurants, stores, wherever anybody is willing to host a show, and people are willing to play, and people go, and the whole atmosphere is that you go in you see everything possible, So you'll go and see three performances for performances a day,
whatever you can fill your dance card with. And it has long been our vision that, in fact, this would be a festival destination in Nayak, that people would come and be able to partake of cultural offerings. So this year we've really morphed closer into that because we are doing a solid twelve days of events happening, as opposed to trying to slot ourselves into a weekend run of something.
And everything has one performance only, so people cannot hesitate, and some of our venues are quite small if you wish to see things. And I have to say, there is a ticket buyer today who I see has done the festival the way the festival should be done. They had started purchasing tickets to see as many events as that they can possibly can, and that's the.
Way to take it in.
We are bringing New York theater companies and artists up to Nyak for exactly this kind of Edinburgh type event that people can take part in. So I was excited to see that.
A good friend, a local Nayaker, just came back posted wonderful photos of the festival in Edinburgh, and if we could in any way mimic that, that would be absolutely terrific. I want to bring I want to bring Thomas in at this point because I think it's important and you mentioned how you know, you have to run things and there are costs involved and no one likes to lose money,
so it becomes part of the equation. How can local businesses support the theater, because once the theater is supported, the theory would be that people will come and support the businesses I either rest or, et cetera in the village as well. So it's a balance, I'm sure. And I want to talk to Thomas a little bit about how he came to becoming involved and how important that connection is with the community, the business community in particular,
but the Nayak community at large in general. So Thomas, tell us a little bit about how you first became involved with the Hull Festival.
Yeah, so I got involved with the first festival. So we're going back now three years. At this point, I also already was the president of Visit Nayak. Maybe just a quick background, who Visit Nayak is Visit Niak has a longer profit volunteer organization, and we are basically the marketing destination organization of Nayak. So our goal is it to bring visitors and guests to Nayak. So they spent ultimately time and money here in Nyak to support our
local businesses, which is very very important. Most businesses could not survive if it would not be for our external guests coming to Nayak. Yeah, and when Greg and Lee's contacted me and said, you know, they would like to have a local partner on the ground who knows us a little bit obviously our business community and you know, various locations and venues if and I would be interested in helping, we obviously were all over that. We said absolutely,
it's a great concept. It's not something we've had before here Nayak. And that was that was really the start.
You know, I want your you're feeling too, it's as being a naiactar. Now I'm not a native. It's only been forty one years, so they're starting to accept me grad You'll get there. Craig and AlSi forty one years, I'm still working a giant SERATORI zone. I went to Nayak High School, all right, I went to Fort Lee High School, forgive me, but I'm still anyway, you know. And the town, it does pride itself on being progressive. It has its issues. We've talked about here on being frank,
some of the homeless situations, etc. Panhandling, just tip. That's a conversation for another day. But the point that I want to make is is how do you strike a balance. And it kind of reminds me of commercially successful singers. Okay, it's like, well, I never liked them, you know, I did like them until they were a commercial success. How do you convince people that the two things are related? You can keep your artistic integrity. I guess that's the
long winded point I'm trying to get to. How do you balance, you know, keeping the progressive artistic integrity if you will, with things that you know are important. They have to be somewhat commercial. As you said, things you have to pay for staging, sound people, lighting people. Those are realistic things. I worked in the news business, and everyone likes to think that news is for free, but I like to get paid for my camera work. So anyway, Tom,
forgive me for the long winded. Like an organization at yourself, how do your marketing strategy in order to be able to convince people this is the right thing to do, it's good for the village.
Yeah, So I think there are different target groups we have in mind. So one is I think, Frank, you were talking about the business community, why would the business community support the Phoenix Festival, And you know, maybe have to to you know, zoom out a little bit here to talk about tourism in general, because I think it's it's important to draw a little bit of a bigger picture here. So tourism, I think ultimately you can think
about tourism as a as a competition. We're competing as a naiak in many ways for the time and the share of wallet of potential guests. So take our typical target market. Let's say a family in New York City and they only have so many weekends or day trips they're going to make out of the city and you know, choose to go somewhere. And let's say they're saying Yeah,
we want to go into the Hudson Valley. How do we make sure as visit Nayak now that they come to Nayak and then they're not going to Tarrytown, they're not going to Cold Spring, they're not going to Beak, and they're not going to Hudson. So that's a big challenge obviously. Now the good the starting point for us, and the good news is we have a lot to work with. You know, we have Hook Mountain, we have the river, we have great restaurants, we have great retailers,
we have museums, we have galleries. So there's a lot to work with. I would say nig is very unique with all these different assets. That challenge we have, and it's really a challenge, is that a lot of people in New York City, let's stay with that target market. Many of those people only have a very vague idea what Niger is really like. They've heard of Niak, and I think we all have been there. You know, we're in the city, we talk to people, they ask us where you're from.
Yes, you're right, yeah, exactly on you the guy on you guys near the bridge upstate, upstate. I've tightened that story many twenty five miles. Oh my god, it's okay, Yeah, that's really upstate.
On you, the guys with the street fears, on the guys with good restaurants, I say, yeah, it's all true. But ultimately that's really all they know about Naya and they've never really been here. So from a tourism standpoint, how we think of the Phoenix Festival as one of those what we called trigger events. Trigger events are those which are so rich and are so precious and so unique that people ultimately say, Okay, now I'm finally gonna make my long way up to Nayak.
I heard about the upstate to see exactly.
I'm gonna pack my backpack. I'm gonna take everything I have and go on this long haul.
There are people who think that we're north of Albany.
I've told this free, and I gotta jump in because I've told this story, you know, originally from Fort Lee and other Bridge to Georgia. When I first moved up here, my friends were shocked by my god, we're up up the country exactly.
But here's the good news. So once we have them here and again, that's why we need those trigger events like the Phoenix Faus Festival. Once they're here, we know this too. They're fall in love with Nayak. They say, oh my god, this isn't better than I thought, and then I'm going to come back over and over and over again. And that's why the Phoenix Festival strategically is so important for us, because it provides us exactly with
the opportunity to finally get people into the village. And that's also my pitch to the business owners here Ni to say, guys, you know, we have a lot here, but we have to find out that we break through this kind of channel awareness of Nile and really have people come here and experience this firsthand. And so that's why we are very much behind it and saying, yeah, this really moves the needle for us, and it floats
a lot of boats in the village. And so that's really from our side, our pitch, how we get the business community excited about it terrific.
I'm gonna go back to Craig and Elise now at this point too. And you mentioned challenges and of course obviously a festival of this size, the staging some you know, it's one thing to put on twelve consecutive performances on a single stage stage is pretty well set. You may have to change some pieces every night. But however, this is why don't you talk first again another two part question. Talk a little bit about the unique challenges of staging
something like this. You touched upon them, but if you can something that really sticks in your mind, that's wow, this is really I've done. And you've both been in the theater, as you mentioned, your whole lives. This is pretty unique to this particular festival. And then with that, of course, usually comes great rewards. What are some of the nicer things that you've heard and feedback that you've got, Some of the rewards that you've gotten for doing this well.
One thing is that you know, the audiences love it because they love going into a place where they don't expect theater, and they go in and they see a storytelling thing, a quality storytelling thing, and they really enjoy it. They can go to a restaurant and sit down at the table, you know, at the Hudson House and have drinks at a cash bar and see a play, an extraordinarily well done play. So that's that's the good thing.
The different thing is we come in with the actors and say, well, where's the dressing room, Well, there isn't a dressing room. Well we got a bunch of props. Where are we going to store the props? Well, there isn't any place to store the props, you know, and and and you know, and there's no lighting designer, there's no this, there's no that where we're going to put
the box office where we're going to sell tickets. You know, all of these, you know, uh, the challenges that we have come up, and we've gotten.
Pretty good at it.
And then the other thing is that the audiences really roll with it.
You know that they.
Understand that this is this is a place where you wouldn't normally see a play, a quality play this, so that they kind of understand that there are going to be a few hiccups along the way. But I think we've done a really good job. And we just go back just a little bit where you were talking about, you know, you know, the commercialzation and and and and what you do. We have stayed very true to our mission.
We didn't come to Niak to change the mission. Our mission is we do plays that are rich in language, We do plays that touch on social justice issues, uh, and and plays that take you to a different landscape. They don't remind you of your own ordinary life. We want to take you to a place that's different, that you haven't seen before, maybe where you are slightly vulnerable. Even if even if it's a comedy, you know that
we want something to be different. Because nayakas the Elmwood playoffs, they do a really great, terrific job, and we love Elmwood. We don't we we don't want to bring anything where we are in competition with them. We want to augment what they do and when people come and they see us, they will And we also promote Elmwood and promote all of the other nonprofits. Is make a day of it, Come and visit the Wonderful Village at twenty four miles from New York City and oh yes, and by the way,
there happens to be a wonderful festival. But you're going to have a great time in this village. So those are some of the things we are answer that.
Yeah, there, I mean, there are certainly many challenges.
As Craig said, you know, we have We've had.
Situations where we have actors who are dressing and then we discover that's the only way to an accessible bathroom, and audience members are walking through.
Like we've had, We've had to make a lot of.
Adjustments to deal with the fact that we're not in theater spaces.
There's nothing traditional.
About what we are doing in terms of putting together a presentation for audiences, but we are. We're a professional nonprofit organization.
This year we.
Are bringing in several many other their professional nonprofit actors, theater makers, dancers, musicians, and where we are, as Craig said early on, we're trying to bring to our own backyard things that people would have to go into New York City in order to see, but they'd have to be a little more adventurous and step out of their comfort zone of Broadway. They'd have to go to off Broadway, they'd have to go to a place where a concert was being given, you know, that was not at Carnegie
Hall or at Lincoln Center. And but all of these presentations are really just so amazing. I mean, you know, tonight, tonight's our official launch and one of the things that we've done this year is that because I really think that everybody should take of the cultural events for free.
But we all know that they are not free, Frank, as you have said, professional artists have to eat and rent and everything else, and producing a festival like this is not free, you know, just the bones of it, the structure of it before we put anybody inside, is still cost money, right, mending venues, having the infrastructure of
the people who run the festival and whatnot. But just to give you an idea of how important we think that is, is that this year we are presenting two free to the community.
Productions in Memorial Park and we were hoping to get a large single sponsor to sponsors who would pick up the costs on this. They are not.
So we're already losing money because we do have to bring pay the companies to bring them in. So you know what, let's as if there's I just want to jump in because let's do a little bitch here.
Why not? It's my program and we're allowed. What kind of sponsorship? How can people? I know they can buy tickets, but if individuals might be interested or a small what would a sponsorship package like what you just mentioned in that venue? What kind of money are you talking about?
Well, we have sponsorships available. They started two hundred and fifty dollars, you know, and they go up to five thousand dollars for a gold sponsorship for the For the sponsorship of the two performances at Upper Memorial Park, we were looking for seventy five hundred each, so fifteen thousand for both and even at that that we're still going to run into difficulty with that, and we didn't find the sponsor wanted to do that.
It's one of the things.
That we've learned a little bit, you know, in the three years, is that I over all overestimate individual contributions because we've moved, we've moved into rockland Niak when we're used to New York, and slowly we're getting to a place where I you know, we're getting better at that and that's just part of the culture with this.
However, can I interrupt you just want to answer, Frank, is that you know something that like an individual can do say they you know, they can't do a two hundred and fifty dollars sponsorship. And there are some people who are doing this. When they're making their reservations to see Twelfth Night in the Park, they're donating five dollars.
I mean, every little bit helps, So I just you know, I just want to be clear that every level of donating and sponsorship helps to bring this bring this festival here,
and bring these free events to Nayak. And I truly believe that, you know, in my heart of hearts, we should live in a country where there is the kind of funding that makes it possible for artists to live and for people to partake of dance in theater and music and every and museums and everything without it being stretching their budgets.
You know, I have a quote from Laurence Olivier. So, Laurence Olivia you may be familiar with that. I always kind of close the show with a quote. I've got to bite my tongue not to use it here because it would be perfect at this point, but file it away for when, for when you hear it. It's very appropriate to what you're talking about. The quality of a society of a place is in its arts. But he says it better than I certainly could. I mean, but please finish your thought. It mean to interrupt, no.
So you know, I just you know, so that is very important to us. We lowered our ticket prices this year again for the same you know, it doesn't.
It doesn't help us in ours side of things and trying because we're trying to break even.
Right, people need to know we're not a commercial venture.
We are a nonprofit arts organization that is also an education organization. We are full time in a New York City Title one public school where we teach classes four days a week, year round to students. So we're you know, we really we put our resources where our hearts and our ethos are. You know, if anyone thinks that we are somehow we have come in and we're making big profits on things, we're not. We lowered our ticket prices. We're still offering discounts even though we kind of went, well,
we won't need you know, we shouldn't discount. We're running several buy one get ones for a three day period of time. People should take advantage today, they should take advantage before it ends. A buy one get one for a Trojan Woman, which is amazing solo performance at the nine Center, happening this weekend on the fourteenth. We have another one running for A Boy My Greatness, which is
also at the Nayac Center. We have another one running for the Autumn Serenades concert and for the emotions, physical theater, dance performance. Those are all buy one get ones, so that's buy a thirty five dollar ticket, get.
One for free.
When those promotions run, people should grab them. We're really doing everything we can to make the arts as accessible as possible for people in the community and also for bringing the tourists into the community so that they will come and spend their New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Massachusetts and by the way, we had international visitors the last two years that they will come here and they will spend their dollars in the restaurants and shops and hotels.
Time to put Thomas back on the hot seat. Now, what more? I know you're doing a lot. What more can your organization do? Well?
From our side, you know, we have a weekly newsletter which goes out every Thursday, which basically promotes all the things going on in Nike, and obviously we have been promoting for many weeks the Phoenix Festival. We have been also helping with getting the word out with organic social media. We help with providing these a frames you see in the village in the front of a couple of our different stores, which has a very nice overview of all
the different events at least already mentioned. So we were involved in getting the lawn signs out around town here, so when you drive around, especially at the exit points that a lot of people hopefully see that sign, we're involved. We have our own graphic designer and at the Inchneida, who is phenomenal. She put together postcards and the posters you see, so we did a postcard campaign in Nike, but also in surrounding, so there was a whole marketing
you know, plan and visit. Nayak and our team we're very involved because I have a PR person, Elisa Rome.
She was helping him putting press releases together. So it was really a team effort, I would say since probably we started to meet on a regular basis, I think back in May April May of this year, and uh really started in June to have weekly meetings where we just sync up and you know, one thing we have to realize we all volunteers, the Phoenix team, the visit Nike teams, so sometimes a little difficult to keep everything synced up as we have many moving parts here and
so these these weekly meetings and a Google Google sheet. She had Google sheet are really key to making sure everybody knows what's going on. What the are the next things.
We have to do? Yeah, and maybe a podcast like Being Frank and so we can talk about it. And then we are going to give more specifics too. We've got to take a quick break when we talk a little bit, when we come back about some of the challenges that COVID presented to theater. In general. It's come back in a big way, but has it come back all the way? What can we do in a broader sense?
I want to do a little more detail a festival lineup and how people can get more information to get these tickets and possible sponsorships and so we can do all of those things. But we remember we talked about feeding the bulldog if you will. You know, our engineer Neil Richter makes so much money on these shows. We have to have a commercial break just just to pay his enormous salary. I'll pay for this, by the way, guys, it way. But this has been terrific, and we've got
more to discuss. Really, I appreciate your time. Craig Smith, at least Stone, Thomas Schneck, we're talking everything Phoenix Festival here in the wonderful Hamlet of Nayak, New York. This is Being Frank, the Intelligent Conversation Podcast. Asked. I'm your host, Frank Lobano will be right back after these brief commercial messages. Please don't go anyway. This is a lot of fun.
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Welcome back to Being Frank, the Intelligent Conversation Podcast. Thanks for staying with us. I'm your host, Frank Lebonna. We will reintroduce our guests in just a minute, but I want to remind you we bring our audience a fresh topic every week and we stream from Hudson River Radio, located in beautiful and historic Stony Point. But remember you can catch any Being Frank anywhere you get your favorite podcast that includes Apple, Spotify, iHeartRadio and all the others.
Remember we are archived. That's why one of the reasons we give you the date, Because you can listen to any show at any time. You can find the link to Being Frank on the Hudson River Radio Facebook page or at our website Hudson Riverradio dot com. Just click and you're there. Okay, back to our show, our guests Craig Smith, Lee Stone, and Thomas Schneck. We're talking everything Phoenix Festival, live theater arts in the beautiful Bucolic Yeah, I can say that Bucolic hamlet of Nayak, New York.
I never My friends tease me all the time and Brad always bragging about this place. But you guys are here for the same reasons that I am, and we like to share it with people in One of the ways to do it is to share it with live arts like the Phoenix Festival. But I teased it a little bit before the break. I want to talk about live theater in general and the huge hit that it took during COVID, which everything and everybody did. I don't even know if Niak is in full recovery since COVID.
Mostly I think is a fair estimation. Fully is subject to opinion, I think anyway, So i'd like yours, particularly general, how to affect theater? Are we back? Will it ever return to the same levels? Has theater changed for good? Has media multimedia changed it? Probably a topic for another show that we got to cover in fifteen minutes, because
I also want to talk specifics about the festival. So why don't we start from where where where I can see you guys visually, and Craig, you're at the top there, so why don't you start with that? Yeah?
Well, thanks Rank. Yeah, COVID was kind of a disaster for us, and I think it was for most small businesses, you know, in the Hudson Valley and all over the entire country. The rule of thumb in the arts is that it was going to take fourteen to fifteen years for an organization and organizations to fully recover. Well, once that the shutdown stopped, you know, people didn't realize that. They thought, oh, well, we're going to go back to performances and everything's going to be fine. But the hits
that we took, we took there was attrition. Certainly, there was attrition of our artists, our artists, you know, they rely on a gig economy, and that those gigs were not there, so a lot of them left the profession and they were very, very talented and they're doing something else because they just went on too long. And then there was attrition of audiences as well during that period, and with audiences goes contributions. So you take all of
that together. That was very difficult and that was something I think we could understand. The thing we could not understand is that people got used to staying at home. They would they were at COVID, they would sit and they would watch television, they would watch Netflix, they would watch tars you know, or Prime Video or whatever it was, and they would say, oh, well, let's just stay home.
So getting them to get out of the house and back into the theater is a significant challenge and a challenge we still have not we haven't addressed yet.
Now.
At the same time, the pandemic lent us some handholds into the future, and that is that Okay, they're not they're going to come out of the house. What are they going to come out of the house for it? If they're not going to come out of the house to go to a theater and see just a play for two hours and go home. Again, that's not enough. It has to be a bit of an event around it.
So that's one of the things that we started doing, and that was one of the things that's started about the festival is that, yeah, you can see some really dynamic, wonderful theater by award winning theater companies in this beautiful bookholic Picturesque Hamlet, and then at the same time you can have an event. You come into this village and you go into historic places and you see a play there.
So it becomes an event, a thing to do. And as Thomas said, the thing that Nayak has, it's got all the restaurants, it's got the bars, it's got the walkability, it's got all of that stuff. And it's relatively easy to get to from the city. Certainly if you're driving a car, it's very easy, and even by public transportations it's not too hard. So those are the things that we are experimenting with. Then at the same time we have to take a look and say, okay, is our
traditional programming doing enough to get these audiences back. The truth is, for our theater company and for every theater and performing arts company around the country. Is they all look like me. They are old white men.
And it was just saying that, yes, well, what a great point, right, And that's.
What it is, you know, and that that's been going on for like a long time. Everybody's we've got to find the new audiences. Well, if you're going to do the new audiences, you have to do something that is going to attract them. And and this is where, you know, the kind of the experimental work, the immersive we've we've done.
So we did a COFCA play, We did Metamorphosis COPPCA play, which was done like a business corporate retreat, So you came in and everybody had headphones and everybody played games, you know, those stupid games you have to play when you go to a corporate retreat kind of thing. And it was incredibly exciting and and this was and was a new experience for our audience members, certainly for our older audience members, and it attracted a new younger audience.
So those are the things that we're experimenting with. Is that we cannot go back to where we were in twenty eighteen twenty nineteen and expect everything's going to everything's going to work out.
It's not even.
Broadway is having difficulties with all of this as well. So it's not just us. This is around the world, and I think that the festival is doing what we wanted it to do.
Yeah, Thomas, you want and then we'll get at least's perspective as well. Everybody gets a chuck ahead.
Yeah.
I just want to build on that what Greig just said, because I think there's a real interesting parallel when it comes to the retail and restaurant on world when we talk about recovery from COVID, So these changes in behavior Greg was talking about, you know, when it comes to theater and maybe now we have to challenge to people or we're comfortable with watching more Netflix or TV in general into convincing to go back basically to a live theater is very similar. You know what the restaurants and
the rest and the retailers are facing. You know, we obviously during COVID we're all, you know, for to buy online and we were forced to order online at the restaurants and that was pretty comfortable, right, and so we're still recovering from that and we as a visit Nayac we have a job to do from our side also to change that and bring people back and experience live
shopping and life restaurant. And that's where I see also the synergy at work between Phoenix and Visit Nayak, because this is one of these special moments where before performance, maybe I go a little bit shopping, and after the performance, I go for dinner or go for a drink, and that's very hard to replicate in an online environment. So in that sense, we really help each other making this
special again and really building this really great experience. And again that's why the Phoenix Festival is so strategically important for us.
Great perspective, at least yours your perspective.
Yeah, So this behavior we were forced into, and I'm sure it's starting to feel a little like a distant memory to people, but when we were first forced into locking down in our spaces alone and not having human contact, that was really horrible for most of us, even those of us.
Who are introverted.
How extended that became, you know, because it stretched out beyond two weeks of all, I have a two weeks I have to stay home and not go anywhere. That stretched out and us being humans at some point we adapted to that, as Thomas and Craig had said, and people got used to that behavior, and so because it went on so long, that became the behavior.
But because of that isolation, you know, I.
Think we also have an epidemic of loneliness and disconnect with other human beings, which is why coming out out and partaking of meals with your friends in a restaurant or going shopping where there are human beings that you can talk to in retail spaces and the shopkeepers. So it's really you know, the thing is is that isolation and loneliness and that ability for us to adapt to that environment and how hard it is to bring people back out.
Is that we actually need.
Those connective moments of community, which is what live performance, live theater, music and dance and more. Is what I like to say about the festival, because we have live theater, music, dance and more. Things that come outside of that box are so important. We need to be together in community. We need to reconnect as human beings in these of shared experience, and we need to We're human, so we
are communal. We are a communal species, and it is healthy for us to laugh and cry and experience together, to shop together, to eat together. That is actually our normal default setting, and we're way out of whack of that, which means that we have forgotten actually how to be kind to one another and civil to one another because we engage in all of these very anonymous online spaces.
We need to come back together because when you are face to face in a room full of human beings, you remember that you're human beings.
And as I always try to remind people, scientifically, it has been proven that we when we partake of a piece of theater or dance or music together, we actually start to synchronize our breath and our heart beats with one another because we are not a separate thing. We
are a communal organism altogether. So I think it's just incredibly important that people come back out and enjoy dinners together, and shop together, and meet the people who own the shops in their town, and go to the libraries and the museums, and come to performances at the Phoenix Festival.
Yeah. I'm no luddyite, but I still like shopping in person because there is an experience. This is an out dining. There's a vibrant music scene here in Nyak and Rockland County in general. And those are all things that are are communal. And you mentioned the sense of community is important.
In the time we have left and we have a few minutes, I don't think we can talk about each and every single event, But why don't we mention what you believe the highlights of the fat fulsome you know, no miss And then then let's give websites where people can really get all the information they need as in terms of times, dates, costs, all of those things. So let's start with the like two or three guys, what do you think where the you know, what you might
see as the real highlights of the festival. I'm sure all of it, but is there one or two or three that she can can really point towards.
I think one that gets overlooked is going to be the concert at first First Performed Church on Broadway, and that's Ella Mendel and Jessica Crandall. Ellen is a very accomplished composer and she uses as her springboard the poetry of Cummings, Samuel Beckett, Shamus Hainey, Glenn Maxwell, et cetera, and also the paintings of Edward Hopper, and she writes these incredible songs. And there's some.
Too, Edward Hopper, we should mention as so great connection there too, least to give the interruption.
Exactly, and and and and Jessica has this amazing voice, and it's done in the church. The acoustics of the church are just like for this are just incredible. So so the space itself just lifts the entire thing. And it's a it's an unforgettable experience.
Uh.
And it's in danger of being overlooked by a lot of the theater because it's a concert. They want to see the plays, they want to see this, but they should go see this concert because it is exquisite.
At least you're you're what what what? What? One or two you might point towards that you really are excited about.
I'm excited about everything, of course everything. But I do think that.
The the chance to see a Trojan Woman on the fourteenth, if people can get to it. It came via the Interbalkan Festival in Athens, and it has made its way to the festival on its way to Belfast. You have like one chance to see that here. I think it's just an enormous piece of theater. It is a one woman show telling the story. That's why it's a trojan woman telling the story, and I think it's rather phenomenal.
I hope people will be able to come out to see that damas.
Well.
I would just say check out the website Life Life Arts in Nyac dot com, one word Live Artsinnaya dot com. These are all wonderful performances and you will see all information on there. Maybe just one more thought, we have time yeah from a visit Niac standpoint, which really shows again how much on brand really the Phoenix Festival is when it comes to Nayak. We just finished a survey.
We asked over two hundred people what they love about Nayak and the number one thing which came out was walkability. So the idea that you can walk around Nyack and everything is reachable. You know, it doesn't matter if you want to go to the river, if you want to go to a restaurant, you can go up to a mountain, you can reach the hotels. And this is exactly also
how you can experience the Phoenix Festival. You can stay here for a couple of days, park the car somewhere, and then any of our three hotels we have in Nayak. The actually our gold sponsor is Hotel Nayak. But from there you can just walk into town to all these different non traditional spaces and enjoy live performances and before and after really enjoy retail shopping and all the different
restaurants we have. So again it's only Nike that you can do that without really having a car or anything else.
You know. And it's very interesting and we won't get into it today, but we'll bring you one another time. The biggest complaint about Naia too is the parking, which is absurd. There's plenty of it. You just got to walk a little bit and it's worth walking.
We have some good ideas about that as well, as we.
Can discuss that another time. But Craig, I know also tonight and we're taping it because this is archives and people may see it sometimes somewhat after, but you will also stream this evening and you're opening tonight. Tell us a little bit about tonight, the twelfth of September. Again, if people are listening today, they can join you at the hotel. Tell us tell us about the opening and.
It's at Hotel Nayak and it's they are a Gold sponsor, so they offered the speakeasy bar to us and it's a wonderful facility. We're going to have some Irish music by traditional Irish music with an Irish music band by Matt Stapleton who's a member of our ensemble and his friends are going to be there. We're going to have a champagne toast. There's going to be a cash bar. We're going to have some speeches. I'm going to say some thank you Joe Randa Mayer is going to talk,
Elijah's going to talk as well. Elijah's also on our board, and we're going to have performance, some preview performances from Dorothy Parker. Uh Margo Avery has come up and she's going to do this as the International tour and she's going to do a piece from that as well. And then at Lease and Karen case Cook are going to do a piece from Vida and Virginia Vita and Virginia Wolf, which is going to be done at Big Red Books, and we're looking to you know, it's it's it's casual.
It's not like a regular gala where it's it's after work. It's six thirty, so we want people to be comfortable, and we want people to just really have a good time, and we're going to be talking about the festival and we want people to come and and and and enjoy it. You know, That's that's what we are.
Well, if it's anything like the conversation we had today, they should certainly enjoy I certainly did. This was really really a lot of really a lot of fun, informative light and and good people doing good things for the right reasons. That's kind of kind of what we're about. It kind of what Nike is about, isn't it gay? A lot of people titled right? Yes? Do we have a lot of friends? Last websites? Quite where now? And at least, where where can people get the most information
about tickets dates? We go from the twelfth through the second, twelfth through the twenty second. I know I wrote it down somewhere. I always do that. Now I can't find where I wrote it down. Wonderful to twelfth through the twenty second. But where's a website that people can go to and get all that information right in front of them?
You can go to live arts in nyak dot com Live Arts Nayak dot com.
Even I can remember that without so much information there.
There's so much information there, but the quickest and easiest thing click on the get tickets and you will you know, the our calendar will also come up there and you can directly click on the buy button for whichever show you want. But we have so much information on visiting Nayak, where to stay, suggestions of things to do while you're here, and we also, because we are very community minded, have included other events that are happening outside of the festival for.
People who want to explore beyond that.
So Greg Smith, you.
Can also google Phoenix, you know, the like the city Phoenix and then Nyack. Just google Phoenix Nayak and the festival will pop up.
You just have to know how to spell phoenix. You should see me. Oh my god, it's horrifying. I'm not even dyslexic and i still can't spell it. But that's that's part of being Frank. I want to thank you all so much, my fellow Nayakers. You know, we share the love for this village and the people in it, and you've made it a very pleasant being. Frank, thank you so much, guys for joining us here. Really appreciate it.
Thank you so much, Frank.
Thank you for and of course we like to offer special thanks to our listeners. We take the time to give us a voice in there lives every week. You know, we offer a fresh topic every week and you can catch us wherever and whenever you get your favorite podcast. It includes Apple, Spotify, iHeartRadio, and all the rest. Check us out on the Hudson River Radio Facebook page. You can leave us a comment and we hope you consider
sharing Frank with others. As is my tradition, I leave you with two things and now the quote that I promised you guys from Lawrence Olivier, and I think it's I try to choose one that's appropriate, and here it is. I believe that in a great city, or even in a small city or a village, a great theater is the outward and visible sign of an inward and probable culture. One rather long sentence, but just one sentence says it all. And I want to leave people with something that's very heartfelt.
This week, the very vibrant music scene in Rockland County lost its beating heart. Mister tim o'donniue a troubadour in the truest sense of the word. His music and his very being spread a legacy of everlasting love. The tremendous outpouring of affection was very much an evidence in the tributes that poured in at the word of his passing. So let's honor him by having way too much fun. And if you know Tim, you'll know exactly what that means. With the music he left behind. Here's are my thoughts
with you. I'm Frank Wagono and I hope to see you on the next being. Frank, We'll see you next time.
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