Raising the Curtain

T@F Artistic Director Elizabeth Hunter
Welcome to Theatre@First! 

One of the traditions here is to have a greeter out front at each of our shows. I like to take that post on opening night whenever possible.  I love standing out on the sidewalk, opening the door for people and directing them to our box office.  It’s a nice way to get hugs from people I know and sometimes to catch up for a minute or two with past participants returning to support a new show. Most importantly, it’s a chance to put a face on T@F for newcomers, to let you know that you are in the right place and we’re so happy you found us.

This spring we are celebrating our 15th anniversary!  We’ve just staged our 50th mainstage show and sometime this year—depending on how you count—we’ll put on our 100th overall production. We have grown and changed so much over the years, but we are still Somerville’s community theatre, creating art and providing a venue for new connections within our wider community.

The 2019 season has a lot of exciting events on the calendar.  We’ve just wrapped up Burning and rehearsals are already underway for The Complete Works ofWilliam Shakespeare (Abridged).  Signups are open to audition for both The Revenger’s Tragedy and our fall production of Hamlet.

And let’s not forget our Special Projects!  We had a great night of theatre games at our first Line ‘Em Up in January, raised over $1000 for Parkinson’s research with Giving@First in February, and hosted a special workshop in March to hone the audition skills of both actors and directors. The BareBones submission window is now open and we’ll be announcing this year’s FirstWorks selection very soon.  On April 23rd we’ll be celebrating Shakespeare with a very special Birthday Slam at the Somerville Microtheatre. 

With all of this going on, it’s an exciting time to be rolling out our new website.  Changing platforms has updated our look and given us the ability to make our site more flexible and keep up with the rapid pace of our many projects.  Our amazing team have updated our Past Projects section, streamlined how you can navigate the site, and made it easier to find the information our patrons and participants need.  We will be continuing to enhance the site and hope you will enjoy new features throughout the year.

For the first time, we’ve also added a blog.  I’ll be sharing this platform with key voices from inside Theatre@First. Each month we’ll have different perspectives on our productions, a chance to peek backstage and hear about works in progress, and the opportunity to get to know more of the people who make Theatre@First such a rewarding theatre community.    

It’s opening night for the new theatreatfirst.org and it’s my privilege to stand out on this virtual sidewalk.  You are in the right place and we are so happy you’ve found us. Enjoy the show!

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