Stacey Hallal

Comedy Performer. Writer. Teacher. Director. Showrunner. Founder and Artistic Director of Curious Comedy Theater. Founder and Artistic Director of All Jane Comedy Productions. Other stuff, too. Busy.

[staceyhallal]

Evolution is Vulnerable and the Importance of Gene Wilder.

It’s hard to update about a project when you are deep in the middle of it. But I wanted to get this story down before I forget.

Here we are smack dab in the middle of everything - construction, fundraising AND festival preparations. All at once. It’s crazy.

Because it took us six weeks to find a contractor, everything ended up stacked on top of each other. As a result, the past few weeks have been intense. However, everything is in full swing now. Despite a few minor delays here and there, everything seems to be on track and looking really, really good . Honestly, things are looking even better than I hoped or imagined. Best of all, we’re working hard and definitely we’re tired, but we’re having fun. We have the best team I could ever ask for.

The biggest surprise in the whole theater transformation process has been the melancholy and nostalgia I’ve been feeling this weekend. On Saturday, after we demolished the old stage, I was working on the mezzanine floor when my friend Michelle Kopper sent a message. She said, “evolution is vulnerable.” As soon as I read it, I started to cry. And once I started, it seemed I couldn’t stop. I just continued laying floor while tears streamed down my face. Now I truly have literally put my blood, sweat AND tears in that theater.

There are the concrete fears - will we raise the money we need? I am probably most anxious about the fundraiser. I’ve never done a large Kickstarter. It’s so nerve-wracking. Especially because I’ve never been comfortable asking for money. Good thing I went into non-profit leadership. Ha. Ha.

But there are others as well. Are the decisions I’m making going to make life easier for us? Or will I wish we had made the stage a different shape or the walls a different color or will we want outlets or cameras in different places? 

But what makes me feel so vulnerable is different. Curious was not falling apart. We didn’t get kicked out of our space or have a financial emergency. On the contrary, we were just getting our legs solidly underneath us. The depth, quality, and morale of our talent pool were better than ever. We have been finally making ends meet consistently. Our audiences and student numbers have been growing by leaps and bounds. Our management team is solid and happy. These are the reasons we were finally awarded this grant.

But, when I read Michelle’s message, I finally knew what has been terrifying me most. When there is a crisis, making a big change is necessary and immediate and obvious. But when things are going well, deciding to make big changes IS TERRIFYING. When you have fought so hard to get to a place of “not panic” and “not struggle” and you are just starting to feel safe and comfortable, it’s very easy and very tempting to set a status quo - to lock everything in place and, like a normal person, to want to relax - to stay safe and comfortable.

But this grant gave us the opportunity to grow from something great into something awesome, something unlike anything else that we have seen anywhere, something I have been dreaming about from the beginning. We have to risk what we already have, what we already know, what we already love to evolve into something else - even if it’s something better. And THAT is truly terrifying.

But we’re doing it. And it’s thrilling, too.

I hope that these changes will enable us to thrive even more as a happy, healthy community growing as artists and people, creating work we are proud of and making each other feel loved and supported and valued. I hope these changes will allow us to pay our performers, staff and teachers more sustainable wages, maybe even provide health insurance someday. I hope these changes will bring more students and audience members into this world of improv that I love and believe in so much. I hope these changes will empower our outreach programs to improve more people’s lives. I hope we will create great work that is funny and meaningful and makes the world at least a little bit better of a place than it was before. These aren’t crazy, outrageous things to hope for. So why is it so scary?

We took a lunch break while I was still crying a bit. We ordered our sandwiches and sat down to wait. Chase, knowing that Gene Wilder has meant a lot to me, tapped me on the shoulder and pointed at the TV screen where Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory was playing without volume. I looked up and said, “Holy shit, It’s even exactly at THAT point in the movie.” Chase asked, “What point?” It has been my guiding principle my entire adult life. It’s been on every office wall I’ve ever had, it was my motto on my MySpace page, I even quoted it in the current Kickstarter campaign. Chase and everyone at the table watched as I said the words Gene Wilder was mouthing on the muted TV, “We are the music-makers. We are the dreamers of the dreams.”

I feels like it was a sign. Right when I needed it most.

[staceyhallal]

The day I spent $172,000 and other Curious Comedy updates.

When the $172,000 of grant money appeared in the bank account, Lesley and I stared at the balance total with big eyes. For an organization that struggles to keep our cash flow positive, it was a powerful, exciting and magical moment to see a huge number like that staring back at us.

However, as with most magical things in life, it was but a fleeting moment in time. The next day, we wired the money to our two equipment providers so they could begin the process of ordering and collecting all of the items for our project. And just like that, the money was gone. We transformed from princes back into toads. Once again, we were counting our pennies and biting our nails to make sure ends meet.

But, the great news is that money will come back to us in the form of lights, sound and camera equipment that will open more doors than we can even imagine for both the talent we host and record with it, and for the theater itself. It’s so freaking exciting I’m having a hard time sleeping.

At the same time, we’ve been working to get the theater remodel designs completed and approved by the city. This is the part of the project that we have to fund entirely. This is also the part that nightmares are made of - or at least Kafka novels and Terry Gilliam movies. We reached out to the original structural engineer who designed the mezzanine in the first place and, after weeks of trying to connect, we were finally able to reach him to design the new stairs. It’s such a tiny job compared to the huge commercial building projects happening in town, it’s hard to get people to make time for us. Luckily, he made time at a very reasonable rate and got the drawings and calculations done pretty quickly.

But when we went to the city, it wasn’t enough. They wanted architectural plans as well.

The first architect I talked to said it could cost “as low as $10,000” just to do the code research and drawings. When I balked at that price, he said, “well, it could be as low as $5000″ to which I said, “are you just throwing out random numbers to see what sticks? And I need to know the maximum, not the minimum, that it could be.” With the limited funds we have, I was panicking that it might all be spent before we even could begin actually remodeling.

But, we got lucky when my friend Joel connected me with an architect who cares about the theater and made the architectural designs and drawings for us at a deep discount since we’re a non-profit.  Important note, he has also been so gentle and patient with me when I get stressy and intense. What a dream come true! If you need some work done, check out www.bblarchitects.com. Seriously. No. Joke.

We didn’t know if the city would approve our project “over the counter” or have to “take in” the designs which could take weeks. Because the Portland construction boom is at unprecedented levels of busy, we couldn’t get bids until we knew we were approved for permits. So, this has been another point of stress as the permitting/bidding/building process is creating a bottleneck which we have to squeeze through before the new equipment can be installed.

Last Friday was the day. I had the final drawings all printed and headed into the city and was sent to all the different people for an “over the counter” approval. It was quick, painless and totally pleasant. Right at the end, there was one concern in the structural design that I need to get more detailed, but they said if I did that and brought it back, we’d be good to go. I was so thrilled!

Monday and Tuesday we made the required changes, printed the revised plans, and then Wednesday I returned to the city permits office. This time, I was brought back to the desk of a woman who not only questioned everything that had been approved on Friday, but began QUESTIONING EVERYTHING THAT HAD BEEN APPROVED EIGHT YEARS AGO! IT WAS INSANE! I was there for hours.

I think my Dad would have been laughing laughing if he were watching that interaction from beyond. When I was a kid, anytime I asked for anything, my Dad would say no. Then I would argue and argue and cry and go away and then come back and argue more. He would get so mad and say, “why won’t you take ‘no’ for an answer?” and I would say, “because if I took ‘no’ for an answer I would never get to leave the house!”

It was those skills that my old school Dad inadvertently made me develop as a teenager that came in handy in that office. I kept saying to her, “you can’t just keep giving me different hurdles to tackle every time I come in here! I don’t have an infinite amount of time, money and energy to go back and forth making an endless sequence of changes.” Of course, they actually can and often do just that as they make people jump through their hoops. But I was stubborn and my Dad would have loved it. Especially because it wasn’t directed at him.

We eventually came to an agreement that if I could prove that the previous buildout was permitted, she would sign off over the counter. Chase - who had been throwing me support from the waiting room the whole time - and I went home, and miraculously found the permitted drawings from 2008 almost immediately. I scanned and printed them, brought them back five minutes before the office closed for the day. The woman I had talked with was gone for the day. I ended up being helped by a Wilfred Grimley look-a-like who immediately understood what was happening, carefully and skillfully put everything in order as it needed to be, and gave us our stamps and permit.

We’re ready to build! Except now, I need to find general and sub-contractors who aren’t booked through February.

Tomorrow, Curious has our big fundraiser - our first time doing a fun and weird Carnivale instead of a fancy gala. The All Jane Comedy Festival line up and headliners need to be chosen, confirmed and announced. We’re going to have to kickoff an on-line fundraiser once we know how much everything will cost. Plus, several other cool opportunities for me to perform have cropped up meaning I need to remember how to write and perform comedy.

These are exciting times. Busier than I intended when I made the New Year’s resolution that this year would be about doing fewer things, better. But, my heart leaps when I think about how once this is all done, I will finally have built the playground I have always wanted to play in. I hope and pray that I will get to shift the energy I have invested into building the playground into playing in it. The artist in me is ready to dominate my time and heart and mind and PLAY HARD.

Thank you all for all you do for Curious and for me and for the Curious community. This is quite a journey. Xoxoxox

[staceyhallal]

BIG GOOD BIG NEWS

I’ve been meaning to start a blog for a long time, so why not start with some big good big news?

Unlike many of my peers who have a theater background, I came to comedy through TV and film production. I discovered my love of media production in high school where we had a public access cable station before going on to college and getting a degree in Radio, Television and Film. Later, I read somewhere that if you want to write for TV/film, you should take an improv class. I already loved improv-based films like Mike Leigh’s Secrets & Lies and Life is Sweet, as well as Christopher Guest movies, of course, so I sought out improv theater in an effort to make movies like my heroes someday. As a person who suffers from extreme stage fright, improv was the hardest thing I had ever done - so I became totally addicted. I have been doing comedy constantly now for over 17 years and eventually founded Curious Comedy Theater and the All Jane Comedy Festival. Improv has made me not only a better artist, but a better person in almost every way.

Today, everything comes full circle.

Curious Comedy Theater has been officially awarded a grant for $172,000 of lights, audio and video equipment from the Mt. Hood Cable Regulatory Commission! Considering that our entire build out from empty concrete box to theater and bar cost about $225,000, this incredible amount in technical equipment alone will no doubt transform the theater in a dramatic way. We will install 4 robotic cameras, 2 handheld cameras, a live switcher with live streaming capacity, a full editing station, as well as state of the art audio and lighting equipment effectively making the theater double as a professional TV studio. We aren’t totally sure, but it is quite possible this will make Curious the most technologically equipped comedy venue in North America. What?!?!? We’re pretty excited about it.

So, why is someone giving us all of this awesome stuff? Great question.

Cable companies run cable like utilities even though they are privately held. In exchange for this privilege, they give back significantly to the community each year through programs like this, and through public cable access stations like Portland Community Media, who have generously agreed to be a partner in this project with Curious. All of the content we create will be provided to Portland Community Media to air on their channels as part of our agreement.

This grant is specifically for what we named the All Jane Video Project. We will use the equipment to shoot five comedy specials a year featuring previous All Jane performers as headliners and one or two local female opening acts. We will also shoot at least one show per night during the annual All Jane Comedy Festival. We will have the capacity to live stream shows as well.  

The professional videos we record will give the All Jane performers the option to release a comedy special and/or have an extremely high quality video to submit to festivals, agents, bookers and other industry professionals. Despite the surge of media attention given to women comedians lately, the actual percentage of women in writing rooms and represented at major comedy festivals still remains absurdly small. We believe these recordings will help women comedians to further their careers and ultimately improve the ratio of women working in the comedy industry.

Additionally, we will run a free training program for women to learn the video production side to help more women work as directors, technical directors and camera crew. By the end of the three year granting period, we hope to have all women behind the camera as well as in front of it.

Outside of the All Jane Video Project, Curious will be able to use this technical equipment in all kinds of ways that will benefit us in our mission to improve people’s lives through the art of comedy. We can better market our shows, create on-line content, become pioneers in the rapidly evolving world of live streaming, and so much more.

We will have our work cut out for us. This grant comes with great responsibility on our part to match the funds through labor and some significant remodeling of our theater space. Prepare yourself to see some major fundraising efforts on our part in the next few months to ensure we can make the most of this magical gift.

We are so incredibly grateful for this generous grant from MHCRC and excited to work with PCM to create awesome content for their channels. Personally, I’m blown away by this opportunity to bring together my life’s passions and skill sets to create what I hope will be innovative and high quality work while also exposing a wider general audience to voices that have been sorely underrepresented for far too long.

I’ll be writing about the transformation of the theater and the journey to discover how this grant will best benefit women in comedy and everything else here on this blog. Feel free to subscribe if you want to follow along.

Thank you, all for your love and support always.

Love, Stacey