Talon Salon
A$4,450
of $4,380 targetyrs ago
Successful on 11th Nov 2011 at 3:00PM.
Talon Salon
Second development, November-December 2011
Key artists: Michele Lee (writer), Brendan O'Connell (director), Alan Nguyen (sound designer) and Clare McCracken (visual designer)
Want to help sharpen our talons? We need your support in our second round of development, the final step in our development phase before we start work on presenting the Talon Salon project in Melbourne in May 2012.
WHAT IS TALON SALON?
Talon Salon is an audio theatre work about nail salons and experienced in a site-specific venue - actual nail salons. It's been a part of the Next Wave Festival's 2011 Kickstart program, which is an artists' development program. The projects selected to be in Kickstart are developed for the inclusion in the Next Wave Festival 2012, a national cross-artform event that is one of its kind in Australia and happening 19-27 May next year. And that's exactly where we're headed with Talon Salon.
In our project, we're creating an experience where a person can get their nails done while listening to evocative yet thought-provoking audio theatre pieces that draw from the world of nail salons. In Melbourne, the growth of nail salons has been largely thanks to the migrant Vietnamese community. We're working with two nail salons for the festival, and when the audience member arrives, they choose one of five pieces to listen to as they get their pedicure.
WHAT ARE THE FIVE WORKS IN TALON SALON?
Our five pieces are:- Telephone - a niece in Ho Chi Minh City rings her aunty in Melbourne, who is busy working in a nail salon. They keep missing each other. This is a piece about home, and about the modernisation of Vietnam in the last 30 years
- Training - May Lam, born and bred in Australia, has been forced by her mother to attend nail technician training so that she can help out in the family's nail salon.This is a piece about the inter-generational conflicts that can arise between second-generation migrants and their parents.
- The chair - Let Annie, the every-woman nail technician, soothe you, the every-woman customer. This is a piece exploring some of the macro forces that have created an environment where women are expected to look beautiful and beauty services are in high demand
- Husbands - Meet the men in the nail salon, Chin, the nail salon's husband; Paulo, a regular customer; and Benny, a lost soul wandering the streets outside the salon.This is a piece exploring masculinity in the Vietnamese community and our contemporary world, and how it sits alongside the role of women
- Travellers - Maly, a Cambodian refugee who grew up in Vietnam, and Tari, a Pakistani man, are both studying in Melbourne. For escape, at nights, after school or after Maly has finished working at the nail salon, they spend time being serenaded by a folk singer in a rowdy backpackers' bar. How does one belong in Australia when their daily existence can be defined by the visa they're on. The influx of Vietnamese people has slowed down, but thousands still arrive each year on marriage or student visas.
oooooh...LISTEN!!! - You can listen to the first three works, in draft form:
http://michelevanlee.blogspot.com/2011/10/talon-salon.htmlWHAT DOES 'DEVELOPMENT' MEAN?
This is the first stage of making the whole project - research, writing, trialling, learning how we all work together. This is the time where we can experiment before moving into making the work for the public presentation in May 2012.
We've done one round of development in September 2011. The scripts were written and we worked with actors to rehearse, record and edit together rough drafts of 'Telephone', 'Training' and 'The chair'. We presented these pieces to guests in Paradise Nails, in Richmond, Australia. We got some great feedback and we learnt a lot about working together, casting and working with actors, the recording and editing process, and the audience member's response to the pieces in the nail salon. We feel that we have some strong ideas about how to improve these pieces for the festival in May.
WHAT IS INVOLVED WITH THE SECOND ROUND OF DEVELOPMENT?
The same sort of stuff that we did with the first stage of development.
So with the two remaining pieces - 'Husbands' and 'Travellers' - we'd like the chance to do the same as we did for the other pieces. We'd like the time and money to recruit actors, workshop the pieces with them, record the pieces, and edit them together with some preliminary sound design ideas. And, to pay ourselves!
This second development will happen mid-November 2011 to mid-December 2011. We'll do another little showing at the end of it within a nail salon, and then, like you, we'll kick back for the Christmas festivities.
We look forward to your support!
A big hearty thank-you in our program for the showing. Your name will appear under 'Foxy' supporters. A link to the draft versions of 'Husbands' and 'Travellers', so you can download them and listen to them.
11 chosen
Est. delivery is Mar 26
A big hearty thank-you in our program for the showing and for the festival. Your name will appear under 'Super Foxy' supporters. A link to the draft versions of 'Husbands' and 'Travellers', so you can download them and listen to them.
6 chosen
Est. delivery is Mar 26
A tips card for how to get the best nails as you can. A big hearty thank-you in our program for the showing and for the festival. Your name will appear under 'Super HOT Foxy' supporters. A link to the draft versions of 'Husbands' and 'Travellers', so you can download them and listen to them.
8 chosen
Est. delivery is Mar 26