The Bazaar

Not a lot to say about this except thanks to all who helped and I promise not to take a copyright fee if you want to copy any of the photos. The final tally of the income for our funds will be posted as soon as I can but we are looking at a figure around 300 euros.

Father Christmas was ready to welcome the throng.

Norma and the two Helens prepare for the rush

Where would be be without Arthur and some woman I vaguely recognise

Margaret Whitters always does a splendid

cake stall

Our vice President and her bottles

December Board Meeting

The December Board meeting was held last Tuesday so things have moved along somewhat since then. We began with a major disappointment as the booklet with stories from the history of the theatre was not in a state where we could expect anyone to buy it. That meant that the bit of a do we had planned for the lunchtime following the meeting had to be called off. That was the least of it though because we had hoped that we could sell the booklet in the run up to Christmas as a stocking filler and this appeared to be unlikely to happen. Since then we have found a new printer and the proofs look to be very promising, certainly of a much higher standard than we had seen from the original printer and we are on course to have it by the middle of next week.
We then turned our attention to the more mundane work we normally get up to - what was that Chinese proverb - please don't let me live in exciting times - well the booklet has proved more exciting than we wanted!

Lunches are proving more popular this year and the one at Casa Dori went well with an excellent turnout. The raffle raised 52 euros. Our Christmas Lunch is at El Brujo where we have been so well treated in the past. We had fixed a provisional price of 20 euros for this lunch but the cost of the food has gone up - they buy fresh not frozen turkeys - and it will be 22 euros. Good value and a 'Cabaret Piece' is promised by our beloved President and his predecessor as a sweet delight (??) at the end of the proceedings. Cars parked on yellow lines are not an acceptable excuse for a quick getaway.

Our trips are still organised by Gina and the one to Granada booked so well we filled the coach. Even with a good stop for coffee and tostado and a more than acceptable lunch we turned a profit of 413.80 euros. Our future trips are:
February 18th - Almond Blossom and Villages
March 18th - Grazalema
April 15th - Guadix

Our Treasurer reported on our finances and it has been a good month. We handed over a further 1000 euros to the theatre with the expectation that at least another 2000 will be handed over next month.

Don't forget that one of our best fundraisers is the raffle that goes with some shows. Already tickets will have been sold during the run of 'A Christmas Stocking' (thanks guys, I enjoyed my evening even though I had a very drunk and noisy woman sitting behind me. Front of House staff did a good job for us all in getting her out before the first half was over so well done them too).

So now my next job is to report on the Bazaar. By a strange quirk of blogging you will probably have read that before you get here. It makes life quite confusing.

Christmas Bazaar

This Saturday December 5th we are holding our Christmas Bazaar on the forecourt of the theatre. (inside the theatre if it is raining)
We shall have all the usual Christmassy stalls. Margaret Whitters has her cakes, Pauline will be running a bottle stall( modesty almost stops me from mentioning the 15 jars of homemade marmalade in my kitchen using Seville Oranges from Pueblo Lucia in the heart of Fuengirola) and there will be a White Elephant stall, David's cards and Norma will be looking after a book stall. you can buy tickets for the current Christmas raffle too.
It occurred to me that some readers may not know who is on the Board of FOTA - sounds grand until you realise it means lugging the trestle tables and clearing up the mess! so this is a list of the Committee and what they do:
President: David Radford
Vice President: Pauline Naylor
Treasurer: Arthur Hill
Secretary: Graham Cherry
The members are:
Helen Young who handles publicity
Helen Tomlinson who organises our front desk rota
Norma Wilson
Pat Suart.
Noticeably not here is the name Gina Foster. SALVA have decreed that nobody can sit on our Board and their Board(sadly the reason we lost Lynn Halliday when she joined the SALVA Board) so Gina comes to our meetings as the liason between the two. That doesn't mean she sits quietly in the corner or that she has stopped organising our coach trips which are an important fundraiser.
anyway now you know come and say hello on Saturday and most of us are manning the desk on Mondays. Wednesdays and Fridays.

The Book

Well, I took my camera in to take pictures of all the beautiful people who belong to the Salon at the launch of the book but to no avail. Sorry beautiful people if you turned up but the print standard of the book was far below the level we had been promised by the printer and the whole batch of booklets were thrown back at him. A new printer is being organised and we now think that the booklet will be available before Christmas so keep a corner of the stocking free whenever you fill one up. I'll keep you posted ( as long as I am kept up to date) and we hope it will be just a little hiccup.

Booklaunch

The Booklet sponsored initially by FOTA with a history of the theatre prepared to celebrate ita twentyfifth anniversday next year will be launched at 1.30 after the Board meeting tomorrow morning, December 1st.
We hope to see you there. If you can't make it we will have it for sale at the desk and with David's cards in the theatre bar.

The Booklet - Latest news

Further sponsors have agreed to donate 100 euros to the publication costs of the booklet - they get five copies in return but this now means that with the advertising revenue we have covered the cost of production and the full revenue from each copy sold will go straight to our funds.
The booklet will be launched shortly and will be on sale at the FOTA desk and the Bazaar at a cost of five euros.
To the list of sponsors in previous posts should be added;
D.Evans
Christina Backlund-Wall
Marie Mason

The History Booklet

Great news. Individual sposors of the booklet (see main post below) have now increased to 9. The new sponsors are Terina Jager, Toni Devenish, Syd Wright and Brian Hindley.
We understand that the advertising revenue should reach 800 euros and this means that the cost of production has now been met so the full revenue from each copy sold will go to the theatre's funds.

November news

Since the last post was October 1st I had better start with news from the October meeting.

Fundraising and Social activities: We had an enjoyable lunch on the port at Fuengirola. As usual there was a raffle and that raised 41 euros . The trip to Selwo had to be cancelled. It seems that in practice we have a cost limit we must work to and the trip at 40 euros a head was just too much. Later on I shall post about our trip for November and the cost target there is 33 euros. If you look in the Costa del Sol News a similar commercial (but obviously not as good trip) is twice as much.

We discussed arrangements for our Christmas Bazaar and if you have a bottle or some item suitable for the tombola lurking at the back of a cupboard - or standing proudly somewhere prominent is OK too - we would love to have it.

Then we came to the Theatre History Booklet. Good progress has been made, we were told, in its preparation and it is on target for a launch at the end of November. More later.

During October our big fundraiser was the raffle we held during the run of Cabaret. It isn't a popular task to sell tickets for raffles but a willing team did a fantastic job with the help of all who bought tickets. We were overwhelmed with the result as we sold 1602.50 euros worth of tickets. With the cost of the prize and the tickets taken off there was 1500 euros left for our funds. Thank you so much for all the support that there was for this effort. We will be repeating the exercise and hope that we can continue to make a very significant contribution from this activity.
I am sure our efforts were helped by the fact that this was a superb production. I haven't heard anything but praise for the performances. Another Peter Mitchell triumph.

So to our November meeting. This time our Fundraising/Social looked to the future only. So get the diary out and mark off November 19th for our trip to the other Granada. Already bookings are so good that we are at break even point so there aren't too many places left for what should be a great day out. I am jealous that I can't go as we have the dress rehearsal of Habeas Corpus that day. I will post some more details for this trip as soon as I can tear myself away from the script and the trauma of learning lines. On December 17th we will have our Christmas Lunch at El Brujo restaurant. We've been there before and were very well looked after. Details from the desk which include how to get there - it's not difficult.

The Anniversary Booklet of the history of the theatre during its 25 years was the next item on our agenda. Since it was originally proposed that FOTA should sponsor the booklet the cost has risen and there were some concerns expressed at the October meeting. By November this had eased a bit as advertising had contributed 480 euros with the likelihood of more to come. Sweelan Ford told us that she hoped that individual sponsors would come forward and immediately the following agreed to sponsor the booklet for 100 euros each: David Radford, Gina Foster, Pat Suart and Norma Wilson to be followed by Sweelan herself saying she would do the same. With even modest estimates of sales this means that the Booklet is unlikely to take anything from Fota's funds.
Enough for now. See you at the FOTA desk on Monday, Wednesday or Friday. And don't forget to book your ticket for Habeas Corpus

the Buzz is back

Last Saturday saw the end of the hot sunshine, at least for the time being. My sunbed had been tucked away out of the rain. At journeys end I came up out of the station at Fuengirola and the sky was quite grey. The rain wasn't particularly heavy so I didn't bother with my umbrella. The theatre makes wet umbrellas unwelcome so I got just a little bit wet on my way the bar. First rains since May. The exit door was open and I could hear 'Cabaret' in rehearsal. Suddenly it seemed like Autumn had really begun. It was an audition day and lots of familiar faces were gathered round the table where Doreen Slater was keeping the chart for the aspirants as we trooped upstairs to be auditioned by Marie Legge. Time first though for a cup of coffee and catch up with the gossip (not a lot, very disappointing) and then the bar filed with a break in the rehearsal. It was good to see the regular musicals casts again as I don't do that many musicals but they are always fun when I do. Confidence was high and it seems that in Andy as the MC and Claire as Sally Bowles the general opinion was that the theatre had a winner on its hands. (October 9th - 18th). Of course there was still some reading from the script and undignified stumbles but at this stage that is both to be expected and was lower in quantity than usual. With the crowd from the stage, the slightly steamy atmosphere from the rain and the chatter and noise the theatre seemed alive again as it can't quite manage to do when it is really the summer sun and heat on offer. There was a distinct promise of Autumn and a theatre season to look forward to.
The feeling of being back in the swing continued when I came in to do the desk on Wednesday morning. This time a lot of old friends and former castmates (is that a word?) were rehearsing 'A Murder Is Announced'. Our Miss Marple will be Doreen Slater and the cast includes David Vincent and Lynn Halliday and other fine regular Salon actors. That will be 30th October to 3rd November. Sales of seats on our first trip of the season to SELWO and then Puerto Banus are not going as well as we had hoped. The cost of 40 euros is good value with the 'extras' that a FOTA trip provides but we have to acknowledge that in these difficult times it can be rather a luxury to spend so much and we are all a bit nervous about luxuries. We'll talk about it at the committee meeting on Tuesday next week and I'll let you know through this blog.
Well. the audition went well. You get the phone call which tells you that you've got the part and you think Mission Accomplished! and then it sinks in that there are going to be lots of hours spent learning lines and working on the character and going to rehearsals and taking deep breaths before stepping on the stage and Oh My God! So if you want to see how it turns out the play is Habeas Corpus by Alan Bennett and you should mark a date between November 20th and November 24th in your diary. The play had a good run in the West End with Alec Guinness playing Dr Arthur Wicksteed so I hope nobody can remember that. There is challenging and challenging! So it is back again this Saturday for our first read through. The committee meeting on Tuesday and I shall be back on the desk on Wednesday. There'll be a lunch for you to book and a trip to look ahead to. See you