One Actor - Another Show

One's Company has just been jury selected for the LGBTQ Unbordered International Film Festival in Delaware U.S.A. The on-line Festival will be in early 2022. Although this "selection" is in itself an achievement, it does not necessarily mean the film will be screened at the festival.  My previous and first time film, Fiddelity , did win an Exceptional Merit Award at this festival in 2021. The current film has been previewed by several hundred people to date and has received favourable reviews, but it has not been released publicly to date.  Although the central character in these two films was himself gay, the stories are really intended to be universal.

Paul Rapsey performed his one actor show, One's Company,  at the Community Hall in Granville Ferry, Nova Scotia last night and the audience loved it! One audience member wrote:  "Stellar performance. Beautifully written. Beautifully performed."  The show sold out in less than a week. Had there not been occupancy restrictions in place due to Covid-19, the sell out show could have accommodated many more people who had been unable to purchase tickets. The show raised over $400 for the Hall after expenses, which Rapsey kept to a bare minimum. A movie version of the play will be released publicly in the near future. Rapsey says the film and stage plays are quite different, although both use the same script. "A live audience ignites  an actor and both play off one another," says Rapsey. "It is both exhilarating and terrifying to stand on stage alone for over one hour." He was humbled by the response. Rapsey is not sure what his next undertaking will be. He s...

Theatre on a Penny Budget will be presenting Paul Rapsey in a live performance of his new one-hour monologue, “ One’s Company ”. It will be a benefit for the Granville Ferry Community Hall at the Hall, 5352 Granville Road in the Village on Friday, September 24, 2021 at 7:00 p.m. (Doors open at 6:30) Seating at the Hall is limited. Tickets are $15 and may be purchased in advance at Baintons Books and Tannery , 213 St. George St., Annapolis Royal.   Paul wishes to perform his play  in his home province of Nova Scotia before he releases the filmed version. 

I am not a filmmaker. But Covid has forced me to become one, to a degree. I decided to turn this stage play into a one-hour film in the "talking head" genre. I have not decided what if anything I will do with this film other than make it available to my few fans on YouTube. I am not sure exactly how to categorize this film. At 61 minutes, it seems too long to classify as a "short", and too short to classify as a "feature". As was Fiddelity , the film is made with no budget and very basic equipment. I am, essentially a story teller in the old sense. It is the words and the way I use and express them that are intended to ignite the imagination of the audience, rather than reliance on pyro-technics and the like. I was particularly touched by this comment by one viewer: " I watched One’s Company last night and loved it.  A graceful insight into alone-ness.  Am I not being understood….or is it I who misunderstands?  Small worries looming large.  The growth...

The first live performance of my recent monologue, " One's Company ", took place in August at the Dickinson Island Summer Theatre to a small but appreciative audience.  I was feeling hesitant about this show after the success of my previous work, " Fiddelity ". But it takes an audience to bring a play alive. I feed off an audience. They are either with you or against you.  The play has been tweaked this summer while we have been at our rustic summer cabin on Blackwater Lake in Ontario. I would describe the play as being a "whimsical drama set in the time of Covid". The play runs about 55 minutes.

The Municipality of Trent Hills is a rural municipality in the Northumberland County hills in Ontario. It includes the Village of Warkworth, outside of which we lived for twenty-five wonderful years.  It was there that I returned to theatre after a long hiatus. This article appeared in the May 2021 edition of the Trent Hills Tribune. 

They say there is no bad press for someone who depends on publicity. But Oscar Wilde wrote more than a Century ago that "In the old days we had the rack, today we have the press." So, when one is contacted by a journalist to do an interview, one is always a little nervous. This is even more so when the interview is conducted over the telephone. How will one's words be interpreted? What might be written that is out of context? What will the editor do with the draft article submitted by the journalist? But, I confess, this article is very flattering.