Lost and Found in the Mission Takes Best Ensemble Award in the SF Fringe Fest! Encore Performance September 26th

Here is the company outside the Exit on Taylor Theatre just moments after we learned Lost and Found in the Mission won the Best Ensemble Award! We are humbled and ecstatic. What a wonderful way to end our four-show run in this phenomenal, unpredictable festival. We really didn't expect it. Neither did we expect to sell out three out of four performances. Nor did we expect an audience member to tell us one of the post-its we refer to was his. Like Lost and Found itself, it was a festival full of surprises. (Photo by Borys Procak.)

A heartfelt thank you to our audience. We are lucky to have such great friends and family members who support us. But the Fringe also has a built-in audience. "Fringers," people who take in as many Fringe shows as they can, helped us sell out by spreading the word. Audience reviews played a part as well. One of our favorite reviews called our production ". . . A valentine to the Mission." Check out what our audience had to say: Audience Reviews.

As Best Ensemble we were invited to perform in the Best of Fringe benefit. We will give one more performance of Lost and Found in the Mission on Friday, September 26th at 8:30 at the Exit Theatre, 156 Eddy Street. Tickets are $20. Pay at the door or buy tickets online at brownpapertickets.com. All proceeds go towards funding next year's Fringe Festival.

Lost and Found in the Mission comes to the San Francisco Fringe Festival September 6-13, 2008

Lost and Found in the Mission opens on September 6, 2008, as part of the San Francisco Fringe Festival. Cast and crew (from left to right): Rowena Richie, Susie Hara, Carole Landes, Joan D. Saunders, Peter Griggs, and Jocelyn Truitt (not pictured here: Daniel K. Lai, Rozelle Polido, and Scott Stewart; scroll down to see their photos and profiles). Photos by Borys Procak.

Rowena Richie and Susie Hara, creator/directors of Lost and Found in the Mission, started finding and collecting handwritten notes from the streets of San Francisco's Mission District back in 2005. The found texts, including letters, grocery lists, bits of scripture, and post-its, eventually became the basis for Lost and Found in the Mission, a song-and-dance infused play. When it premiered in San Francisco in May 2007, with an intergenerational, multi-ethnic cast of seven, the San Francisco Bay Times called it "a treasure of a find!" Come see the revamped and reimagined version at the Exit on Taylor Theatre, 277 Taylor St. at Eddy:

September 6th at 7 pm
September 7th at 2:30 pm
September 9th at 7:00 pm
September 13th at 1:00 pm

Tickets are $9 at the door or online at: brownpapertickets.com/event/39295
No late seating. See you at the theatre!

Found: I Will Work Hard so I Will Change

One of our favorites: we found this near Precita and Shotwell and have had endless (but enjoyable) conversations about who wrote it and why. What do you think?

Spotlight On...Scott Stewart

Meet Scott Stewart (front), another one of our new recruits. Here Scott stands ready to deliver his list of Italian groceries in our grocery list scene. I love Scott's laugh, how well he takes direction, and his willingness to try new things: look out for Scott's cool "scratchin" in our Sasha scene and hot Spanish in our Vocabulary Lesson scene. Scott is an all around joy to work (hard!) with. Photo by Borys Procak.

Spotlight on Daniel K. Lai

We are happy to add Daniel K. Lai to our cast for this production of Lost and Found in the Mission at the Fringe (see panel on the right side of this page for performance details). In his own words: Daniel's last performance in S.F.'s One-Act Fringe was in Durable Theatre's Ritual Trio, a 6-7 minute one-act in the middle of Short & Sweet: 3 Plays. His last "real" thing was a docudrama called Aftermath of War: In Their Own Words, in which he played actual U.S. soldiers from Iraq using their real words. His last musical was at the end of May with fellow Lost & Founders Joan & Scott, Songs for a New World with Studio A.C.T. Yet a play with music (& music not in the background)? This is his first! Outside of theatre, Daniel shot a pilot with Danny Bonaduce for Spike TV this February. He is also a U.S. Citizenship tutor and teacher's aide at City College of San Francisco-Chinatown/North Beach Campus--kudos to Owen for the Mandarin lesson. Thanks to masterminds Susie & Row, Ben's flava, Joan's referral, cast's warmth & magic, Row's "blind" faith. Also, Mom, Dad, Patty, Ava, Nancy.

Daniel also tells us: I'm passionate about some things in life, but very much so for acting and education, and it gets even better when acting becomes a forum for education, because it challenges you to think in different ways, or see a perspective of someone who'd you normally ignore, judge, ostracize, etc. I like to act because it's a healing art and a real key to self-discovery, it's never the same thing twice, it's educational to others as well as ourselves (like playing a doctor and having to study all that scientific lingo for instance), it's getting to do or say what you normally can't in the "real world," it gets you in the gut where you're living life to the fullest, and it's good storytelling.

Who's That Girl?

A year ago, Susie met Rozelle Polido, writer, dancer, actor, singer, when they were both slogging through stacks of paper at a publishing company. We were lucky enough to land Rozelle when our beloved Flo bowed out. Rozelle fit right in. She's sharp and funny and sassy and can sing. Come see what we mean. In her own words: Rozelle Polido began her performance training when her mother decided she was too shy and that it was unhealthy for little girls to enjoy lonelily pondering their toes in pre-school classroom corners. Rozelle blossomed studying dance at the Rosalie Woodson Academy in Honolulu, and loved the theatre thereafter. She earned a B.A. in Creative Writing from Pepperdine University, where she also studied theatre and music. Rozelle performed and choreographed with the company Dance in Flight, and apprenticed with Meh-tropolis Dance Theatre in Los Angeles. Past performances include: The Imaginary Invalid, Our Town, The Vagina Monologues, The Music Man, Nishikigi, et plus. In the spirit of Lost and Found... “Degas: We were created to look at one another—if the leaves of a tree didn't move, how sad would be the tree, and so should we be...”

Found: A Mother-Daughter Birthday Card

We found this on Duncan Street near Valencia. The words became lyrics for a song in our show, Lost and Found in the Mission, coming soon to the San Francisco Fringe Festival. See upper right corner of this page for performance details.

Found: A Vocabulary List

We found this list on 22nd Street between Valencia and Mission. It's the basis for a scene between two arguing merengue dancers, and is one of many vignettes in our play with music, Lost and Found in the Mission. The play runs September 6-13 in the San Francisco Fringe Festival at the Exit on Taylor Theater. For showtime details, see upper right corner of this page . . .

The latest "photograffities"

Here are some of the results of yesterday's publicity photo shoot. Thanks to our photographer Borys Procak and to the cast for making the most of the wind despite the alley stench. (But props to the graffiti artists for giving us such rich landscapes)! I've posted four of my favorites--of these four which is yours? In the end, I'm leaning towards the one at the bottom that replicates last year's. I really like the one where we're dancing in the sun, but we can't see Jocelyn's radiant face. I have a soft spot for the intimate close-up, but is it "dynamite" enough? Any votes for "Saskatchewan?" Peter, were you trying to imitate Sasquatch, or does it come sort of naturally? Teasing!

Lost and Found in the Fringe, September 2008

"Lost and Found in the Mission" got into the San Francisco Fringe Festival. The revival/remounted production comes to the Exit on Taylor theater this September, 2008. Exact details to come. The Fringe roster is decided by lottery with hundreds of entries vying for a few coveted slots. We were picked 14th out of 15. Going forward we face the loss of two of our performers, Robert Kellerman, pictured here down front, and Flo Nakamura, whose elbow can be seen growing out of the back of Carole Landes (far left). We are so grateful for their contributions to the original production and will miss their creative spirits dearly. But...the show goes on with (left to right) Carole, Joan D. Saunders, Peter Griggs, Jocelyn Truitt, Rowena Richie, and Susie Hara, co-artistic director of Boathouse & Co. Performance (not pictured). Besides being a great way to take in a lot of shows in two-weeks' time, the Fringe is a friendly competition. Audience members can vote for your show as "best of fringe," which makes your show really popular. So, we hope to see you there and to wow you. Stay tuned.
--Rowena