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Show "Comedy Tonight" promised in "Forum" production If you've been walking up Main Street recently, and heard a lot of bellowing and singing from the direction of the Memorial Building, it doesn't mean the drunks from the Alamo are out early. It's just the rehearsals for the Intermountain Actors Ensemble production of "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum," which will play for three weekends in the tent on Swede Alley beginning July 10 and 11. Director Jean Piatt faced unusual obstacles in staging this musical comedy. She said nearly two-thirds of the actors auditioning for roles didn't want singing parts. Even Ron Burnett was not eager to play the crafty slave Pseudolus, Piatt said, though Burnett is no stranger to musicals. (He has played the king in "once Upon a Mattress" and one of the fathers in "The Fan-tasticks.") Fan-tasticks.") "He wasn't quite ready to play the lead in a musical," she commented. "He said, 'I can't sing,' but after I heard him, I said, 'Yes, you can' ! " The director gives credit to musical director Margaret Reno for guiding a large group of reluctant singers through a musical. "Everybody "Every-body went in wanting to learn, and people found out they could carry a tune," said Reno. Getting the cast on key is important to her, she said, but in a few cases pure hamminess can compensate for musical quality. Pseudolus, Pseudo-lus, she said, doesn't have to be a Caruso, and never was, even in the original play. "Zero Mostel was no singer," Reno said. "On the soundtrack record, he gets away with some horrendous things." The story of "Forum" revolves around the efforts of the slave Pseudolus to win his freedom by pairing off his young master Hero with Philia, the girl of his dreams. Spence Nelson, as Hero, said his worst problem is finding how to react, as opposed to acting. "When the attention isn't on me, I've got to keep looking stupid, and it's hard not to upstage the other actors," he said. Ruth Ann Fitzgerald as Philia has similar problems. "It's hard to play an air-head," she said. "I've got to keep smiling all the time." She's more confident in her singing than the time a few years back when she was in the chorus of "Fiddler on the Roof," and mouthed the songs for fear of sounding off-key. Fitzgerald appeared last year in "Company," whose songwriter, Stephen Sondheim, also wrote the music for "Forum." "The thing you learn about Sondheim Sond-heim is that he doesn't give you time to breathe," she said. This is the first Ensemble production for Fitzgerald, a Park City Players veteran. "Both companies are good, but the Ensemble is less serious," she said. "We're having fun with this play." Craig Sanchez, who played a pompous knight last summer sum-mer in "Once Upon a Mattress," plays the vain centurion Miles Gloriosus in this play. "I'm a bigger fool no, a better fool than last year," he said. The Newspaper visited rehearsals Monday night, and watched director Piatt deliver costume tips to her cast. She told the barefoot actors to remember they're going to be working much of the time on asphalt under the tent. Piatt also advised her cast to get rid of the modern-style sandals. "That says, 'Southern California, 1978'." The Ensemble is working completely in the round for the first time, and she said the actors have to be coached to avoid throwing their performance in only one direction. "They're facing fac-ing half of the audience all the time," Piatt said. "Since they tend to play to me in practice, I've been making a point of sitting every night in a different spot in the rehearsal hall." Audiences will have their . A - I fill M I L NT'-: V . i h M 5j , " ' i ' I " . ' a , The Newspaper Thursday, July 9, 1981 Page B7 Now open for Breakfast Daily Specials 7:30-11:30 Seven days a week Featuring: Omelettes Potato Pancakes Continental Breakfast Apple Pancakes Bouillon Pork Chops Open for Lunch ? Dinner Seating from 11:30 to 10:00 Specializing in: Fine German Pastries Cappuccino & Expresso 402 Main Street Ron Burnett, as Pseudolus, (left) is thinking fast to fend off the wrath of Miles Gloriosus (Craig Sanchez) in I.A.E.'s production of "Forum." first chance to judge the results on Friday the 10th and Saturday the 11th. The production also plays on July 16 -18, and 23 - 25, at 8 p.m. in the city tent in Swede Alley. Admission is $4.50 for adults and $3.50 for seniors and students. The featured cast also includes John Lehmer, Linda Martin, Randall Gil-maim, Gil-maim, Rob Sykes and Chuck Folkerth. Choreography is by Leslie Lueken. mmmmmmmmmmm Make Your Pledge to KPCW Wfinneiuire I 1, TfT" 3 A Mj lllln IjclllMIttll Sparkling wines part II In the fall of 1980, Chateau St. Jean pressed their first sparkling wine near the town of Graton in Sonoma County, California. The culmination of a four-year effort, the occasion marked a special celebration for Pete Downs, the young oenologist and director of sparkling wine production for the Chateau. Having worked for Korbel Cellars as the director of cuvee development (see Winepress, July 2, 1981), his new position at St. Jean allowed for the comprehensive development of a sparkling wine facility from the cellar up. During the past two years, Downs travelled extensively throughout the Champagne Cham-pagne district of France, examining presses, clarification processes, fermentation fermenta-tion equipment and the like. While some of the French machinery actually comes from the United States, (Racine, Wisconsin is a big producer). Downs eventually chose French presses for the Chateau St. Jean facility. Back in the United States, Downs spent a considerable amount of time with Alan Hemphill, Chateau president, also an expert in the field with 18 years of sparkling wine expertise. The two, working closely, supervised the layout of the production facility and developed careful controls for all the critical processes. While Hemphill's experience has been invaluable, the Chateau eventually plans to place Downs in charge, much the way Richard Arrowood, mentioned in previous issues of Winepress, manages the winery at Kenwood. The utilization of a separate facility to produce sparkling wine may seem frivolous and costly, yet the procedures required in production are vastly different. Those producing still, white table wines normally endeavor to bring out and enhance unique varietal flavors. Many smaller vineyards are even beginning to pick various lots of grapes from within one vineyard and label them as such. To contrast, the blending required for sparkling wines renders the above process useless, and when the second fermentation takes place, a totally different taste appears. Champagne is fermented twice, the first time in large vats where the alcohol remains and the carbon dioxide escapes. Once the fermented wine has been strained, it is blended with the cuvee and bottled. Exploiting the high sugar content, additional addi-tional fermentation takes place in the bottle trapping the carbon dioxide in the wine. Chateau St. Jean has made a commitment to quality and time, deciding to use the classic Champagne grapes. Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. Bottles will be aged in the yeast for a minimum of three years, with some blends going to five years. "On the yeast" implies that active fermentation may take place during this period allowing for all the sugar to disappear. The less sugar, the drier the wine. A very dry, sparkling wine frequently bears the title "brut" or "extra brut," an indicator of delicate flavor with the familiar crisp Chardonnay taste. Chateau St. Jean, like many newer wineries, was forced to buy their sparkling wine grapes on contract from other growers. Having worked with many excellent vineyards in the past, they knew of several worthwhile suppliers. Yet a wide variety of grapes were required as 13 experimental cuvees eventually were made from the grapes of a dozen vineyards in 1979. The experiments conducted that year allowed for accurate choices to be made for the premier pressing in 1980. Eventually, the Pinot Noir and Chardonnay varieties were selected solely from Sonoma County vineyards and the distillation process has been considerable. The premier cuvees were created from pickings that yielded only 90 gallons of juice from each ton of grapes. Allowing for flexibility in blending, enough fruit was purchased and crushed to produce 45.000 cases of sparkling wine. Following blending, however, only 16,000 cases will be produced, of 192,000 bottles. What does all this mean to you as a champagne or sparkling wine drinker? Without doubt, when the Chateau St. Jean product is released in 1983, it will be a very special premium wine, comparable to many of the $20 to $30 French champagnes. The price, while not yet announced, may be half that of the imported product, and that alone makes them well worth looking at. If your palate now waters for sparkling wine, you certainly need not wait until 1983. Several notable vineyards re presently releasing their 1978 vintages. Mirassou has just marketed their 1978 Monterey County Au Natural Champagne and the Brut as well. While we question their assumption of the title champagne and the needless vintage dating, the end product promises to be excellent. I tasted this wine last February while in San Jose and enjoyed it immensely. Mirassou notes that the wine was produced in the traditional "methode champenoise" where the wine is innoculated with Epernay and Ay yeast strains. The product was then kept "en tirage" (the three components being the two yeasts and the wine), for two years prior to being disgorged in March. Disgorging, the hallmark of sparkling wine, seals the yeast, sugar and wine in the bottle together. Eventually all the remaining remain-ing yeast and impurities float to the neck of the bottle, a result of the racking angle. After several years, the bottle of wine is frozen at the neck and opened. The "cork" of ice then pops out of the bottle, taking all impurities with it and the bottle is quickly corked with real cork holding the Co2 in the wine. The result is an effervescent white wine to compliment the warmest summer day. - 1 PSUNNYSDE UP AT DEER VALLEY IN PARK CITY Exclusive SolarEnergy Condominiums Privacy 0 Quality 0 Security Listing Agent: Mike Martin v-' -l Gump & Ayers, Real Estate, Inc. Park Meadows PlazaPark City, Utah 84060 (801) 649-8550 |