Alysha Herrmann

What are we doing?

A small team of South Australian theatre-makers are producing Jessica Bellamy's play 'Sprout' and touring it to regional venues in September/October this year.

This project came about through a desire of mine (Alysha's) to share the beautiful story of Sprout with some of the community I love, at the same time as investing in South Australian emerging talent. I was lucky enough to be the recipient of the 2015 Kirk Robson Award earlier this year and decided that I wanted to use the award to reinvest in my communities and in arts experiences for others - especially emerging artists and audiences. Some of the Kirk Robson Award has gone towards the beginning of a new multi-year project in Berri (Manifold Portrait) and the rest towards bringing Sprout to life in some of the communities I know and love. 

I approached emerging Adelaide director Hannah Fallowfield to direct the play after seeing some of the work she was doing last year through my involvement with Urban Myth. I was really impressed and interested in the 'artistic eye' and passion she brings to things and wanted to foster further directing opportunities for her. I also had a feeling that she'd love Sprout as much as I did.

Sprout is a play by the very excellent Australian writer Jessica Bellamy, who I met through the equally excellent Australian Theatre for Young People. Jess and I both had work produced by ATYP as part of their Voices Project (Jess in 2011 and myself in 2012). Jess has been incredibly supportive of my desire to bring Sprout to life, including facilitating an opportunity for Hannah to hang with Jess and some of her collaborators in Melbourne while they were producing a radio version of the play earlier this year.


The cast with Hannah at a reading of the play at the Port Noarlunga Arts Centre earlier this year.

Specifically we are touring Sprout to
Port Noarlunga,
Bordertown,
Lameroo,
and the Riverland
We're also hoping to present a night in the Adelaide CBD (pending us sourcing an in-kind venue!)

*Please see update below re: tour dates*

Sprout is a play set in an Australia of the future, where everything has dried up, run out, or fled. In this world, human beings live in skeleton cities, or out in the wild, with only the barest of necessities for survival. One thing unites these fragmented souls: a self-appointed prophet on the radio, the Weatherman, who shares classic poetry with his listeners – his way of making their fear and desolation more bearable, through the beauty of language. And in this world full of endings, four people start new beginnings. Curiosity, romance and new life continue to sprout.

Hannah has done a fabulous job of convincing some of Adelaide's best talent to join us, including designer Olivia Zanchetta and composer Tristan Louth-Robins - join us as a supporter for all the warm fuzzy feeling of knowing you've contributed too (+awesome rewards) and we hope to see you in the audience!

Here's a sneak peek at the lovely design Olivia has developed for us (overseen by #WheresReggieRhino):

Many of of the team are working entirely for the love of it and won't see any financial return, but there are things we do have to pay cold hard cash for, including:

Insurance
Set materials
Costumes
Fuel (this is a tour to regional venues!)
Printing collateral (like posters so people actually come and see the play!)
Artists fees -  people still have to eat and pay their bills - in particular this crowdfunding campaign will go towards design & composer fees

We're also asking our crowd to help find us beds in each of the places we're visiting so that we don't need to worry about $$ for accommodation. If you can help with a bed for one or more of the team while we are in your town please email Alysha on [email protected].

We also need to borrow a trailer to transport our set and equipment. For obvious reasons it needs to be waterproof and lockable. Let us know if you can help.

The biggest obstacle for this project is getting the word out to potential audience. This is a beautiful and special play with a message we really want people to see so getting the word out to the right people in time is super important! 

Hitting our Pozible target early will help with this by getting our promotional material out asap (if we know we can cover it, we can put the order in and pay ourselves back).

We're also tapping into networks Alysha developed during her time living and working in the communities we are touring to and getting the word out via word of mouth. If you have additional ideas of people we should talk to - please let us know!

We are already rehearsing and we are committed to making this happen with your help to cover our non-negotiable costs.


*IMPORTANT UPDATE* 18th August 2015

Last week we had a spanner thrown into the mix with an actor withdrawing from the project. As you can imagine, pretty stressful and frustrating so close to the tour and in the middle of a very public crowdfunding campaign. Fun times!

Although not a highlight of any project, this experience has been a fantastic catalyst for Hannah and I to take stock of where we're at and reaffirm our commitment to the project and to our ‘why’.

In light of this change and the reality of all of us trying to achieve this little indie project around significant other commitments, we've made the decision (with the support of the rest of the team) to postpone the tour dates.

We're still in rehearsal. We're still building the set. We're still composing the sound. We're still about to start rolling out marketing (with new dates). We're just giving ourselves a bit of breathing space to really honour the intention behind the project and not kill ourselves in doing so by trying to stick to our initial timeline.

But otherwise - onwards! And thank you again for making the decision to be on the journey with us.

We're halfway to our Pozible target with just 13 days to go so if you know anyone we should tap on the shoulder and ask to contribute, do let us know!

*UPDATE* November 2015

Tour Dates confirmed for December, due to some venue clashes we're heading to

Monash 14th December
Burra 15th December
Victor Harbor  17th December and
Port Noarlunga 18th December

and you can purchase tickets right now, right here: http://toursprout.eventbrite.com.au/