Kate Danley's Blog

CUE in London

 

CueKDC THEATRE“THE PLAN”

Location: Drayton Arms Theatre
153 Old Brompton Road, London, SW5 0LJ
Dates & time: Tues 25 & Wed 26 June 2024, 7.30pm
Ticket prices: £16.50 / £12 for KDC members (15% discount if you book for both shows)
Run time: 90 minutes, plus interval

If you're in London at the end of June, swing by KDC Theatre and catch my short, Cue. It was one of those silly little plays that leaped out of my fingertips and I am absolutely delighted it has found likeminded artists both at home and abroad who have wanted to bring it to life!

And just a reminder, all of my plays are available for license. You can reach out to me or my agent if you'd like reading copies of the scripts - https://www.katedanley.com/playwriting

2023 Playwriting Year in Review

As I think about 2023, I am struck with all of the incredible people who came into my life this year and am filled with gratitude for all that they did to bring my words to life.  It seemed fitting to give a shoutout to all those souls who saw something in my plays and said, "I'm willing to give my time, energy, and talents to bring this to life!"

February 2023

Building Madness, Parson's Nose, Pasadena, CA

Working for Crumbs, Freed-Hardeman University, Henderson, TNMarch 2023Late Shift, Encore Theatre, Birmingham, ALMadam(e), Bellingham Theatre Works, Bellingham, WA

Building Madness, Harlequin Productions, Olympia, WA

April 2023

Working for Crumbs, The Space, London, UKMay 2023A Spirited Manor, Bellevue College, Bellevue, WAJune 2023The Interview, Brian Harnetiaux's 33rd Annual Playwrights' Festival, Spokane Civic Theatre, Spokane, WASocks, Drunken Owl Theatre, Seattle, WAStaging, Drunken Owl Theatre, Seattle, WAJuly 2023Working for Crumbs, Theatre33 at Willamette University, Salem, OROctober 2023Dating's a Beast, Drunken Owl Theatre, Seattle, WANovember 2023Building Madness, Los Osos High School, Rancho Cucamonga, CADecember 2023Two Owls Under a New Moon, Victorian Christmas Cards at Latitude Theatre, Seattle, WATrue Meaning of Christmas, Theatre33's Holiday Shorts, Eugene, ORWar on Christmas, Theatre33's Holiday Shorts, Eugene, ORSpeaking of A Spirited Manor, Smith & Kraus, one of the best known theatrical publishers of monologues and shorts, picked Norman's monologue for the Best Men's Monologues of 2023 anthology.

Here's to 2024 and may success be granted to all who hack away at their keyboards in pursuit of a dream!

Working for Crumbs CANCELLED

Well, that's the way the cookie crumbles, as it were. 
I'm afraid that one of the cast members had a potential Covid exposure, so the show has been postponed until July 22nd.  More details to come.
But in the meantime, we wish the cast and crew health!  And apologies to anyone planning to come out.  It will live again, but not for a couple more months.
 

Working for Crumbs LIVES!

 February 2020, I had a dream.  

I had this play called BureauCRAZY, which I had written to showcase the funniest women I knew, and it was getting raves wherever it took the stage.  It got a a world premiere up at Grande Prairie Live in Canada!  It had readings at the Women's Theatre Festival in North Carolina!  It had a reading at the Lyric Theatre of Oklahoma with Ignition Arts!  It had a place of honor at the Page to Stage Project LaFemme festival and was licensed on the spot for TWO productions.

And I thought, "Self?  You've been training in Broadway producing...  I wonder what would happen if I took this show to New York..."  So, I did!  I flew out friends from Los Angeles and joined with friends in New York and we put on a reading...

And after a lunch at Sardi's with some producers (who would soon become fast friends), things were in the works to return in just a few short weeks to put on a backer's audition (that's where folks show up with their checkbooks)...

And a week later, the world closed.
When we talk about what Covid stole from us, this was it for me.
But from the oatmeal raisin cookie crumbs, the phoenix rises.  For BureauCRAZY has been renamed Working for Crumbs, and IT LIVES!!
Vashon Repertory Theatre has opened their heart and their home to my little play.  They paired me up with an incredible director named Christopher Kehoe, who happens to have an MFA in physical theatre from Dell'Arte International School of Physical Theatre (which, if you ever caught Working for Crumbs is ALL about the physical comedy.)  I mean... this is like a dream come true!!  

If you're around the Seattle area on May 16 at 7:00 PM, hop on that ferry to Vashon Island and head on over to Vashon Repertory Theatre for a reading of Working for Crumbs!  Tickets are $10 and it should be a ton of fun!  I'll be there!

London Independent Film Festival

 

LONDON INDEPENDENT FILM FESTIVAL

Are you in London and looking for something to do this Sunday, April 3, 7:00 PM? Head on over to the London Independent Film Festival and grab a ticket for Short Block 4, featuring my short, Stay Outta Sight!

Starring: Anya Sayadian & Liam Scarth

Directed by Simon Fisher

Written By Kate Danley, Mitch Day, Carol Cooper

Director of Photography/Editor: Andrew McDermott

Produced By Simon Fisher & Heather Ward

Associate producer: Anya Sayadian

Stay Outta Sight - First-Time Filmmaker Sessions

SOS - Stay Outta Sight, co-written by yours truly, Mitch Day, and Carol Cooper, and produced by Simon Fisher & Heather Ward through The Directors Cut film making club is LIVE on the First-Time Filmmaker Sessions by Lift-Off Global Network at Pinewood Studios.

You can support independent film makers and watch 100+ short indie films (including ours!) for a small fee of around $12. (Yes, for $12, you get a pass to see almost 150 short films from new filmmakers.)

And YOU, yes, YOU! get to vote for your top two films to move on to the next round! (You will be sent two separate emails, one to login and watch and one to vote!)

Stay Outta Sight is film 111, program 3.

Please watch and vote for us!

And as you get the chance to vote for two films, please also consider 'Strange Waters' (which features several of my friends from Director’s Cut.)

Click here to support indie filmmaking!

Starring: Anya Sayadian & Liam Scarth

Directed by Simon Fisher

Written By Kate Danley, Mitch Day, Carol Cooper

Director of Photography/Editor: Andrew McDermott

Produced By Simon Fisher & Heather Ward

Associate producer: Anya Sayadian

Show at the Southwark Playhouse

 

Join The Director’s Cut Theatre Company Monday, February 28, 2022 at 19:00 (7:oo PM) at the Southwark Playhouse in London for Write to Right. They will be reading 10-minute selections from two of my pieces, A Spirited Manor and The Grand Delusion , as well as an evening of other playwrights' work in development.Your feedback will help shape the forward movement of my plays and help this writer to get it right!

A look at the history of the O'Hare House Mysteries

I hope all of you have picked up your copy of The O'Hare House Mysteries (did I mention you can now get the WHOLE SERIES for only 99-cents!) and are currently having a grand ol' time pouring through the pages!  

I thought it might be fun to share with you the evolution of the covers over time.  Tastes change, graphic design has evolved, budgets got bigger, genre standards have shifted, and branding was brought to the industry.  (Can you believe that when I first wrote the O'Hare House Mysteries, even the term penny dreadful was new to the zeitgeist?  Folks were VERY confused!)  But it is really fun to see how things have evolved.  These are presented in no particular order.  Enjoy!

 



Hope those gave you a smile and (in some cases) a laugh.  Oh that Spirit of Denial blue dress one is a treat... Some of these I'm still quite fond of, though.  However, they all led to the evolution of where we are now.  And where is that you ask?  Well, take a look at these branded beauties!

To check out the whole series, hop on over to my O'Hare House Mysteries page on my website!

O'Hare House Mysteries 99-cent Sale!

 For the first time ever, you can get the ENTIRE O'Hare House Mystery series for only 99-cents!  That's right!  THE WHOLE ENTIRE SERIES!  The shebang!  The enchilada?  You get all of it!  Not just a piece of the pie, the WHOLE pie.  Grab it today!

Apple BooksGoogle PlayKindleKoboNookAll Others

Week in review

 The busy-ness of life came to a screeching halt as piles of snow dumped on our region.  The weather is pretty mild, but we usually get about a week of snow.  Our area doesn't really deal with it.  Figures it will be gone in a week so.... * shrug *

But that meant plenty of time to settle in with my lapdesk and knock out a couple projects.  Why a lapdesk?  Well, I managed to break my foot and am doing my best Jimmy Stewart in Rear Window impersonation.  In other news, take care of your bodies and take care of those bones, kids.  Because when they break, it is a real bummer.

So, the New Year's resolutions was to see what life was like without sugar or flour (it's pretty good, I gotta say), unplug from social media (still rough, but working on it.  I highly recommend the Freedom app if you need a hard intervention), unplug from the news cycle (my favorite form of procrastination), and rediscover the joys of writing.

Part of this was stepping back from the pressures of playwriting.  If you could see the number of rejection letters in my inbox right now... And I know that part of it has to do with my writing being very physical and with large casts.  They just aren't feasible in the world as it currently is. But the rejection letters still bite.  So, am putting all that on the backburner.

And, instead, I'm focusing on the page.  This week, I wrote a short story of an upcoming fairytale anthology.  And I gave myself the freedom to dive into the more poetic side of the written word.  There is this... high?... that comes digging through a thesaurus and finding a word that is just so much more than the word your brain would normally have chosen.  Perhaps the closest analogy is putting together a puzzle and finding the bits that fits.

I'm also playing around a bit with suspense writing.  It's still in its infancy but, again, it is fun to create something for the sheer fun of trying something new.

But in the midst of this, I got an idea for a new Maggie short story, so I'll be spending the week getting that onto the page.

Snowed in with nothing to do but write, I also spent some time vegging out, and my weekly show recommendations are:  The Great Interior Design Challenge (think The Great British Bake Off, but with furniture.  I loved how sweet it was and how they really wanted people to do well) and Miss Scarlet and the Duke (Victorian detective show with some really great acting turns).

Onward into the new week!