Callboard

www.tanys.org Callboard - Volume XVII • Issue 2 • Fall 2020 Page11 There is no 2020 TANYS Festival, so sad. No winner of TANYS going on to represent NY state at the Regional (ESTA) Festival. No winner of ESTA moving on to the Nationals at AACTFest; all because of the pandemic and the fact that our theatres are dark, as are theatres across the nation. Well, AACT (the association that represents community theatres in America) is determined to still hold the National Festival but with a different process. The following is from the AACT website- The American Association of Community Theatre is restructuring the AACTFest festival system in response to the COVID-19 pandemic—and to better support the mission of the National Festival, scheduled for June 14-19, 2021, in Louisville, Kentucky. AACTFest is where we'll gather to learn, trade stories, and see compelling theatre from across the nation. The new structure has been put into place because the state-to-regional process that normally chooses 12 productions to be featured at nationals—has been compromised because so many state and regional festivals have been cancelled or postponed. And while some festivals may be possible, the cost of producing a festival and/or participating in one may be prohibitive for many AACT-member theatres. To search the nation for outstanding productions worthy of sharing at a national festival, AACT will use an invitational system to choose the 12 featured productions at AACTFest 2021. Any company of any size can apply! There is a comprehensive application to fill out but there is no cost to apply for an interview. You can find more information at https://aact.org/aactfest-2021-invitational. AACT 2021 News From Bob Frame NOTE TO OUR ORGANIZATIONAL AND INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS Dear 2020 TANYS Members (You may have gotten this already in your company email), As many of you know already, TANYS is planning TANYS Tough: The Power of Theatre – 2020 Virtual Festival. We would love to feature your company at the event! So before November 1st: 1. Can you submit a 5-10 minute presentation and/or video about your member company? This can be something from a show you did or some other promotional material. If you include a scene or snippets from a show, you must assure TANYS in writing that you have secured the rights to use that recording. We would LOVE to feature your company as we plan to take a few minutes out of your video to be presented virtually during breaks. And, we will upload your full-length video to our new TANYS YouTube channel, which will be promoted to the general community after the event. If your submission is large in size (and it is expected to be) send a link with download and shared permissions to tanys.admim@gmail.com via Dropbox, Google (preferred) or YouTube. 2. Can you send us some pictures of your 2020 Merit Award winning show? TANYS is planning a virtual Merit Award presentation during the Festival. As such, I need pictures of every show/company who won Merit Awards to create this presentation. I am looking for 2 miscellaneous pictures (action shots from the show) along with action shots I can use for each specific Merit Award listed on the TANYS web site (http://www.tanys.org/2020-Merit-Awards.html ). If it is a Merit Award for a director, costumes, props etc. please do your best to provide a representative picture. If there are multiple people in the picture, please be sure to let me know which one won the award. If the pictures are large in size, send them as indicated above. 3. How about participating in our virtual BMI design completion? TANYS would love to receive virtual BMI entries from a show you produced between Nov. 1, 2019 and Oct. 31, 2020. Details and slightly revised guidelines are in this TANYS Callboard. They are also available on the TANYS website ( http://www.tanys.org/BMI-Design- Competition.html). 4. Lastly, would you like to have one of your very active theater colleagues honored at this event? Go to the TANYS website and nominate your peers for a TANYS award (http://www.tanys.org/awards.html ). We would love in this pandemic to honor MANY of you who have stood by your companies and TANYS this year. The deadline is listed as September 30th on the website but has been extended, as it was last year, to October 20th (not Nov. 1). Unless they are large files, all things requested here need to be sent to info@tanys.org by the due dates to allow TANYS to then prepare these items for our virtual Festival. Looking forward to receiving your items. Questions can be sent to this email address as well.