Performances – THEATER ViSiONS – Sofia's English Speaking Theater

Recording in Progress

August 22, 2020September 16, 2020by THEATER ViSiONS - Sofia's English Speaking TheaterLeave a comment

The cast is in place, recording is well under way and we are excited that next month we plan to bring you our first audio drama. For our first podcast we selected an old-time radio show from the tail end of what is known as the Golden Age of Radio and we are presenting it intact including commercials from their sponsor, Autolite. Our recording process has been one of experimentation so it will take a bit longer, but we hope the results will be worth the wait.

You may recall our blog post last month (Audio Theatre Coming Soon) announcing the results of our poll where voters selected mystery as the genre. We are recording a broadcast from an original American radio drama known as Suspense. It was a premier program as it was on the air for over 20 years and, because of the superb writing, had a knack for getting some of the top name talent of the day. The episode we are recording is fittingly know as Summer Night and back when it aired in 1948 featured Ida Lupino as its star. You are probably not aware of the name Ida Lupino, but she began her career in England onstage and later became a prominent Hollywood movie actress. She had a keen eye and used her down time to watch aspects of filmmaking which benefitted her greatly as she went on to direct features for studios as well as for her own production company. She was even the first female to direct a film noir when she helmed The Hitch-Hiker in 1953.

We have other ideas brewing so join us on this foray in what we hope will be a new avenue for our company. We greatly value your support and aim to ingrain ourselves in the artistic and cultural scene of Sofia. The best way to do that is to know what you would like to see or hear in the future. Contact us to let us know what you think and help steer our programming. In this new world some things may take longer to come to fruition, but we greatly value your input.

Over the next few months look for some guest blogs from people involved with the company. We are also investigating other performance opportunities and hope to relaunch our some of our educational programming. If you would like to get involved there are numerous ways to do so. You can tell your friends, share about us on social media, or check our website for more possibilities.

Audio Project Brief

July 31, 2020September 16, 2020by THEATER ViSiONS - Sofia's English Speaking TheaterLeave a comment

Socially-distant theater. It, honestly, is sort of an oxymoron for me. Theater is vital and visceral. Socially distant, well, it’s neither of those things. We put our annual family summer show on hiatus so… now how can we do an interesting theater project and be socially responsible? I love old-time radio dramas so the idea occurred to me to produce some for the theater company. I have some experience with sound effects creation, sound editing and voice over work so this seemed like a great fit. Then, at the last Advisory Board meeting, the board members suggested to marry that idea with some educational content. Bam! A new an improved reason for doing a radio show!

What will the process look like? We will attempt to record the podcast online. In order to accomplish this the script is broken up into small segments to keep the time commitment small for the voice actors. Many of the sound effects and music will be added after all of the voice recording is done. Since it is our first effort we do not have funding and will be working off of the company reserves. If the project is successful we will then look for funding for future radio drama podcasts.

Educational content related to the script will be added to the website once the podcast is uploaded. We hope this will be a fun way to listen to some classic old-time radio dramas and digest some quality educational content which we will create to accompany the radio play.

If you are fan of old-time radio, never listened before or perhaps just want to brush up on some English language phrases, then check back towards the end of August as we hope to have the podcast and support material ready for you at that time.

Audio Theater Coming Soon!

July 10, 2020October 25, 2020by THEATER ViSiONS - Sofia's English Speaking Theater2 Comments

Recently THEATER ViSiONS held a poll to select the genre of our first audio theater presentation. The choices were science fiction, detective, mystery/ suspense and western. The results were a resounding “yes” for mystery/ suspense with over 60% of the vote.

We have already begun reading scripts, checking copyright status, testing our recording equipment, refreshing our sound effects library and preparing our foley studio (also known as Mark‘s kitchen). Soon we will be recruiting voice actors for the podcast, however, please be aware that these are unpaid positions as this project has no funding at this time. If you are interested, check out our WoRK WiTH Us page for more details as they become available.

In keeping with our mission, we will be creating some English language downloads and resources to go along with the podcast to assist any English Language Leaners who would like to build their understanding and context competence. The podcast and support materials will be made available from our website as they are made ready for release. We hope you will join us as we begin our new venture into podcasting!

Summer Solstice

June 22, 2020October 25, 2020by THEATER ViSiONS - Sofia's English Speaking TheaterLeave a comment

We have successfully navigated past the longest day of the year. That may seem like no big deal, but for me during the last few months many days felt like the longest day of the year. So let’s rejoice that perhaps, here in Bulgaria, the tide is turning. The weather has been good, the skies blue, the mountains a patchwork of green, and the air is clean.

What good news is coming up for THEATER ViSiONS? First off, we are gearing up to do our first Audio Theater podcast. If you haven’t already, go to our Home page or Facebook profile and vote for what genre we should start off with. Your choices are Mystery/ Suspense, Western, Detective, or Science Fiction.

Also we have been hard at work on building our website to best represent who we are and what we hope to achieve as a company. There’s lots there already with more pages coming soon. Take a look to find out more.

Also in the works are potential offerings for the fall and winter. We can’t announce anything yet because things are very indefinite about how groups can gather. When we are able to we will provide the details. Be sure to sign up for our blog to be the first to get the information when it becomes available.

That’s all for now. Whether you prefer the mountains or the seaside, get outside and enjoy your summer!

Covid / Summer Update

May 24, 2020October 25, 2020by THEATER ViSiONS - Sofia's English Speaking TheaterLeave a comment

Less than two weeks ago the Bulgarian Government ended the quarantine and posted precautions about how to move forward. Largely, I believe the situation has been handled rather well and the communications pretty clear even through translation. These are huge, unprecedented decisions that are being and have been made so we want to extend a “thank you” to the medical officers, health care workers and politicians who have been doing their best under extraordinary circumstances.

With the knowledge of these extra precautions and public health concerns, we, as a company, made the decision that we have been expecting to announce for weeks. This summer, THEATER ViSiONS will NOT be staging our annual family summer show in the park. We are disappointed, but know that this is the right decision. We are a small company and attempting to implement appropriate precautions for our audiences as well as our performers would make it extremely difficult to adhere to these guidelines. So in the best interest and health of everyone concerned we won’t be staging an outdoor performance this year.

That does not mean we will be dormant, however. Keep checking our website for future developments. We have been researching, planning and making preparations not just for next summer, but hopefully some exciting announcements coming very soon!

Why THEATER ViSiONS?

April 20, 2020October 25, 2020by THEATER ViSiONS - Sofia's English Speaking TheaterLeave a comment

Sofia, Bulgaria is a bustling, scenic, international, capital city. It’s easy to fall in love with the city and the country. With many global corporations and businesses and a vibrant arts and culture scene there are many options…in Bulgarian. At THEATER ViSiONS we embrace Bulgaria and it’s culture, but we offer programming in English. We stage our own productions, run a variety of workshops and classes, develop educational tours and serve as coproducer or presenter for English language performances.

Our ViSiON is to be a hub for English speakers living in Bulgaria. We invite you to attend our performances, get involved with our lively, interactive language workshops, our intriguing acting classes, request our educational school tour (in development) or come out / join our play reading group. We also aspire to promote Bulgarian culture to new audiences by offering Bulgarian plays in English.

THEATER ViSiONS also aims to assist in unifying the English language artistic offerings in Sofia by providing a cultural calendar, so submit your information to us.