The Mickee Faust Club News/Blog

Skill Development at the Mickee Faust Academy

Jessica Tice — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 15:35:01 GMT

Ever wished you could learn or improve upon a creative or professional skill? Then why not participate in collaborative learning with your favorite Faustkateers?

We are developing a series of classes to enrich the skill base in our community, and we would like your suggestions and preferences! Please take a moment to take our brief survey and provide your input into this process: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/DT8MVFC

Thanks!

Best of Faust, Worst of Faust Cabaret is a Blast from the Past

Susan Gage — Sat, 14 Apr 2012 22:31:12 GMT

No, seriously: what a treat to perform in some pieces that have not been trotted out for years!! And sadly, the political commentary they make is just as relevant today. Who'd have thought a song from 1995 would be even MORE relevant in 2012?!?!

And it's been tremendous fun to act along side some of the Faust alumni, especially folks like Denis Crawford and Gena Wade who traveled back to Tallahassee this weekend to take part in the show. If you haven't bought your tickets yet... do it now! We have one more weekend to go after tonight... and I'm super excited!!

Mark your calendars: Mickee Faust's Silver Anniversary season is underway!

Sharon Moskowitz — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 13:16:08 GMT

Mark your calendars now for the spring cabaret, Best of Faust, running April 13-14 and 20-21, with a special Family Tree benefit performance night Thursday, April 19.

Faustkateers ranging from returning grizzled veterans to the newest, yet-unjaded (though we'll soon fix that) ratlings gathered this weekend to make their voices heard in preparation for bringing back some of the finest, funniest, weirdest and wildest material to grace the Mickee Faust stage(s) over the past twenty five years. Casting is in progress and rehearsals will be underway soon. Tickets will be available on this site closer to show dates.

Just can't wait that long? We have other events coming up:

Listen in to V89 at 9 PM on Wednesday, February 29, for the best of our original Faust Radio skits.
Mark your calendar for a very special art unveiling and interactive party to kick off the season Saturday, March 24.
Look for First Friday festivities at the clubhouse March 2 and April 6.
And of course, we'll cheerfully accept your cheese and slaverat-er-volunteer assistance at any time, if you want to help make it all happen! Spread the word, check this site, like us on Facebook and send your friends there, too!

Yes, the company has survived twelve times the lifespan of the average actual rat, and there's gonna be a heck of a party here in the sewer!

Tonight on V89: Mickee Faust and the Confundus Confection

Sharon Moskowitz — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 15:34:30 GMT

Mickee's on the radio tonight in a grand battle of sorcery, with the future of Florida at stake. Don't miss it!

Tune in to WVFS FM 89.7 tonight at 9 PM, or listen to the live stream at http://www.wvfs.fsu.edu

Arooga Booga! First Friday Fun at the Clubhouse.

Sharon Moskowitz — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 01:59:10 GMT

Tao Z. Jonz will be doing the Monkey Bungo all night long (or until they stop) with a guest rodent chorus at the Clubhouse this First Friday, August 5. General First Friday festivities, including a variety of food, art, and general gettin' down start all over Railroad Square at 6:00, with music on the main stage in the Clubhouse starting at 7:30.

Fun, fun, fun, and admission is free!

Faust with Benefits Opening Night

Susan Gage — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 21:29:46 GMT

This is it!! Vamping high-heeled boys and the Ballerinas of Bilitis will be strutting their stuff on the Faust stage tonight, tomorrow and next weekend. Amazing amount of work has gone into making this one of the queerest of the Queer As Faust cabarets. And the only way you'll get any more out of me about it is if you go to the link for "Faust with Benefits" and buy a ticket. Come see for yourself why we're truly the community theatre for the weird community!!

What a Faust-filled Weekend!

Susan Gage — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:32:15 GMT

Many thanks to all who stopped in and took a seat to watch some of our skits for the upcoming "Faust with Benefits" performance in rehearsal. It not only gave the audience a snap shot of what to expect at the shows, but it gave the performers an opportunity to practice in front of the "live studio audience" and see what works and what needs some tweaking. We've spruced up the rathole, did a some yoga stretching to let the money flow a little easier into the Faust coffers, and made the material of this cabaret "broadcast-friendly" for the "Mickee Faust's It Gets Better?" radio show on the 29th. Rehearsals resumed this afternoon: closeted queers, dancing dykes, and high-heeled boys. Intrigued? Get your tickets now for June 17, 18, 24 or 25.

Sexy, Silly and Seditious: must be Queer As Faust!

Susan Gage — Mon, 23 May 2011 21:34:24 GMT

I find myself spending many hours of my waking moments in the day replaying and rethinking blocking for the pieces in the "Faust with Benefits" cabaret. Things are going well in the pieces I'm involved with, both as performer and director. But it is an odd experience to find yourself wondering, "How do you make a vulva puppet shoot laser beams and become a character separate from the puppeteer?" You'll just have to see it to believe it!

Spring has sprung. Time for an all-new cabaret!

Sharon Moskowitz — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 12:00:26 GMT

Cirque de Faust, the Mickee Faust Club's spring cabaret, opens April 1!

Yes, rats, mice, voles, shrews, rodent-curious, and allies, spring has sprung, and there have been major doings at the Clubhouse:

Guest artists Elizabeth Whitney and Lea Robinson passing around the Southern Comfort during their show, "Syrup in Our Shorts."
Yet another stage of construction work done in the Adelaide Schnittman rehearsal hall, with more to come.
Writers' meeting kick-offs for upcoming radio shows and this summer's Queer as Faust 4: Queer Quatro.
A lovingly re-organized costume/prop space (rapidly disorganizing itself, even now, in the name of . . . )
Writing, costume- and set-building-, and mad, mad rehearsing for Cirque de Faust: The Most Obsessive Show on Earth!

With the arrival of a new governor and a brand-new legislative session, Faustkateers thoughts, naturally, turn to getting the heck out of Dodge. What better way than to run away and join the circus?

Unfortunately, the circuses we contacted were not interested in trained rat acts. (They spook the elephants.)

So naturally, we decided to put on our own show, built around our own personal obsessions. All-new material: music, sketch comedy, original monologues, and less-easily-categorized Faustian madness from the most sideshow-worthy reaches of our slave rat minds. Don't miss it!

Mickee Faust presents

Cirque de Faust:
The Most Obsessive Show on Earth

An all-new cabaret

April 1-2 & 7-9, 2011

Curtain at 8 PM.

Join us in the backyard at 7 PM for live music with Eclectic Acoustic.

General Admission - $15.00
Students, Retirees, and People with Disabilities - $10.00

The Republicans Are Coming!!

Susan Gage — Sun, 02 Jan 2011 21:41:43 GMT

OK, so the Republicans with the support of the Mad Hatter Party, scored big wins in elections all over the country. Now what will they do? Tune in Wednesday night January 5th to WVFS-FM 89.7 at 9pm and listen to what public radio might sound like with Republicans running the show! It's a re-working of the 2005 Mickee Faust's National Privatized Radio, with such classics as Words for the Wise Guys, Creation Science Friday, and Endangered Species Splendid Table. Laugh now...before it becomes a reality! Wednesday, Jan. 5th 9-10pm. If you can't listen on the radio, tune in via the web: www.wvfs.fsu.edu.

Christmas Corruption Accomplished!

Sharon Moskowitz — Sat, 04 Dec 2010 14:51:39 GMT

Last night's First Friday twisted carol singing at the Clubhouse was a blast! If you have pictures, recordings, or video of the event, please send them to sharon@mickeefaust.org, and we'll post them here.

(Alternatively, you could send them to the folks in the pictures, recordings, etc., point them to this blog entry, and wait for the hush money to roll in.)

(Please note that parenthetical remarks are intended as satire, and not actual suggestions to take up illegal activities, which we would never, ever condone. But seriously, send us the pics.)

Mickee's IRRegular Rodent Rant

Terry Galloway — Sat, 20 Nov 2010 15:57:17 GMT

Yet another has bit the dust! But not without first taking in a nice haul of cash and pleasing that fickle little entity known as our audience. If you missed it, you'll want to choke on your own envy and die. It was best show we've done in over a decade. But then I say that after every damn show.

Anyway, we're closing down for the -- or rather we're being frozen out. In the meantime join us for one last sheebang-- the

This year we'll have live music AND a machine. Whet those vocal chords and come join us as we do our own X-mas brand of caroling. Absolutely free of course!

tty

Mickee Faust vs. the Multi-national polluters

Mickee Faust — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 10:01:45 GMT

GIVE US YOUR BEST NEW SLOGAN FOR BP; WIN A WEEKEND ON THE GULF COAST

Beach Polluters? Bothered Patrons? Bastard Pigs? Broken Promises?

In the wake of one of the country’s worst man-made disasters in history, the Mickee Faust Club, those rascally rodents of Railroad Square, is offering up a spankin’ fresh twist on the much lamented BP Gulf of Mexico oil disaster:

Give us your most provocative, outrageous ad slogan spoofing our friends across the pond, British Petroleum. In exchange, we will give you two free tickets to our fall cabaret show, “Apocalypse Faust” and a can of anchovies (yes!)

“The BP oil spill is Beyond Pardonable,” says Terry Galloway, artistic director of Mickee Faust who plays the company’s disreputable rat leader. “We’re throwing down the oily rag and challenging the Tallahassee community to come up with their own skewering slogans for the oil barbarians.”

Four finalists will have their slogans featured in a skit during the upcoming “Apocalypse Faust”. This fall cabaret show is a darkly comedic look at the very best in disasters past, present and future done as only Mickee Faust can do: with wicked humor, rancor, and general weirdness.

The finalists will get the free can of anchovies, two tickets to one performance, and the thrill of having their slogan included in the show. They will also be eligible to win a grand prize: a grouper and weekend stay for two in Franklin County with accommodation at the Sportsmen Lodge B&B in Eastpoint, FL.

Entries must be received by 12 P.M. November 3rd. Send entries to contest@mickeefaust.com or drop by or mail entries to the Mickee Faust Clubhouse.

“Apocalypse Faust” will be performed at the Mickee Faust Clubhouse, 623 McDonnell Drive in Railroad Square at 8 P.M. on Friday and Saturday November 5-6, and Thursday through Saturday, November 11-13.

Rewired documentary in the works!

Mickee Faust — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 14:35:37 GMT

“It’s the way I make meaning. It’s the way I make me.”
Terry Galloway

Is art only for the able-bodied, the beautiful, or even the talented? Or is it an intrinsically human activity, central to our understanding of ourselves, others and the conditions in which we live? How do our individual narrative threads weave into a community of meaning?

Shakespearean characters who soliloquy in a dirt-floor barn, a paranoid agoraphobic, a smartass gumshoe, a bitter, disheveled, maniacal rat -- all these are characters inhabited, and created by, Terry Galloway. She’s mean, she’s deaf, she’s queer, and everywhere she goes she creates a ruckus, bringing along as many co-conspirators as she can muster. She encourages them to find the characters within themselves, and to be characters.

Terry lost her hearing over the course of her childhood and early adulthood, and by the time she was in her twenties her hearing loss was profound. She did not learn to sign. She learned to read lips. She fought to perfect the clarity of her speech when she could no longer hear her own voice. And despite advice from mostly well-meaning high school counselors and others, she pursued her dream of being a performer. If there was no stage she would make a stage, and provoke the laughter that she could not hear, and earn the applause that she could at least see. Most of all, she invited the participation of others. No, she demanded the participation of others, of everyone she could reach, able and disabled, queer and straight, or just plain weird and alienated.

As a college student, she found an eccentric professor, a doer, who took the little deaf girl and a bunch of other college students to a barn, where they performed Shakespeare with sweaty, delirious enthusiasm. This was Winedale, a formative experience in Terry’s career. She went on to become a founding member of Esther’s Follies in Austin, Texas. When she met Donna Nudd, the love of her life, and found herself in Tallahassee, some of her cohorts from Austin tagged along, and it was in Tallahassee that the Mickee Faust Club was born, a mixed-ability company that has performed original cabaret material for more than 20 years. She continued her involvement in Austin, leading a group of performers with disabilities in a company called Actual Lives. These companies are all still in the business of entertaining and enlightening live audiences, and The Mickee Faust Club, in branching off to include radio and video production, has set its sights on “World Media Domination.”

Terry describes art as a survival mechanism, a way of shaking the feelings of dependency that disability inevitably creates. In theater, as in all collaborative arts, everyone is dependent on others to make the magic happen, and style must submit to story. Through Terry’s story, we explore the intersections of art, disability, identity, and community. On May 3rd, 2010, Terry underwent a procedure that bypassed her ear and installed a device known as a cochlear implant. Since the device was turned on a month later, Terry has been gradually learning to hear again. This dramatic transformation is central to our story, and the mechanism through which we explore our questions.

Through archival footage, images and interviews with friends, family and collaborators we will explore Terry’s early career and her stints at Shakespeare at Winedale, Esther’s Follies and Actual Lives in Austin Texas, and The Mickee Faust Club of Tallahassee. Scholars of disability and performance discuss the significance of Terry’s work as an individual and as an organizer of her own unique brand of community theater. We will hear from dedicated performers, who go beyond offering the clichéd “we found a voice” and explore the complex questions of performance, identity, and disability. Brief interviews with the surgeon and audiologist will describe the procedure and the process that is restoring Terry’s hearing. And we will be there when she reunites with her former collaborators in Texas at a Shakespeare at Winedale reunion.

A documentary about Terry could not be a standard, talking heads discussion of her life. Rewired will include plenty of performance footage from the past, and from the present, as we present an animated interpretation of an excerpt from Terry’s acclaimed memoir, Mean Little deaf Queer, titled “The Performance of Drowning.” Furthermore, some of Terry’ collaborators in performance will be asked to perform their interpretation of their friend, rather than just talk about her. Terry has been interviewed three times so far, and as her hearing is returning gradually, the same way it left, we are documenting the changes. She immediately began learning to play the guitar, yet another example of how she understands the world through performance.

We are shooting in HD video format, with animations created in After Effects. Archival stills representing three decades of performances and rehearsals will be scanned and animated, including photos and footage of many of our interview subjects interacting, and performing, with Terry. We will have footage of Terry directing her creative communities both before and after her surgery.

Funky, irreverent, irascible, and brutally honest, Terry and her collaborators limp, roll, and shout their stories in a space where imperfect bodies demand the right to dance on stage, the blind wear codpieces and engage in swordfights, and a deaf rat sings. Although our subject has been instigating such activities her entire life, both she and the audience will hear the laughter that ensues for the first time, together.

we are mighty busy rats

Jessica Tice — Wed, 28 Apr 2010 09:23:41 GMT

Literally hours after the close of one of our most successful shows ever (Sex, Beer & Shakespeare) our insatiable rats, err... "Faustkateers", started gearing up for the next glorious adventure in the sewer: Queer as Faust III. The writers meetings are wrapping up, which means the next step is a call to all interested in performing, directing, or tech-ing (is tech-ing a word?) for the upcoming gender/queer themed show this June. So, be clearing your busy social calendars and scaling back your other evening and weekend commitments, because we need to see all your happy shiny faces on stage in about 7 weeks!!!

peace, love & cheese... Jes