STRAND spotlight

Strand welcomes new Membership Coordinator and Development Associate

The Strand Theatre announces that Anne Rogers-Popejoy has recently joined their team as Development Associate and Membership Coordinator.

Rogers-Popejoy has had extensive experience in non-profit organization administration in the realms of education, administration, and development. An ardent supporter of the arts and education, she worked with the Historic Homestake Opera House, Boys & Girls Clubs, and Northern Hills Alliance for Children in advocacy and fundraising. A native of Connecticut, she has returned with her family to New England after a 15-year sojourn to the Black Hills of South Dakota.

In addition to overseeing the Strand Membership Program, Rogers-Popejoy will support the organization’s growing development efforts to support future programming, Strand Educational Program and Family Series, theater maintenance and technological upgrades. “We are thrilled to welcome Anne to the Strand, and to midcoast Maine!” said Strand Executive Director Jessie Davis. “Her experience, skills, and enthusiasm make her an incredible addition to our ongoing efforts, and we can’t wait to see all we’ll achieve with her as part of our team and our community!”

“I am so happy to be a part of the Strand Theatre team,” said Rogers-Popejoy. “The Strand has a solid fundraising track record, an impressive and dedicated membership base, and great potential for growth on all fronts. I am excited to put my experience in non-profit fundraising to work and get to know Rockland’s vibrant arts community!”

The Strand seeks a Box Office Manager & Projectionist

Do you love movies, music, and the performing arts? The Strand Theatre, a small but mighty non-profit arts organization on the Maine coast, is looking for a full-time Box Office Manager and Projectionist to join our team. The Strand brings the world to downtown Rockland, and with your help we will continue to provide dynamic and vibrant programming to the Midcoast!

BOX OFFICE MANAGER & PROJECTIONIST

This position requires direct contact with the public; contact [email protected] for more information about the Strand’s COVID-19 Vaccination Policy.

Full-time, 40hrs/wk. Schedule includes night and weekend work.

$15-$20/hr depending on experience

Paid Time Off and Holidays, access to Health and Disability Insurance programs

Responsibilities Include:

Manage ticket sales, primarily for live events, through cloud-based ticketing software
Sell tickets at the Box Office for Strand films and events
Operate digital projector for films and broadcast events
Assist with theater tech as needed
Assist with additional theater-based duties as needed

Required Skills:

Great customer service and inter-personal skills
Computer and tech savvy
Prior projection experience preferred but will train the right candidate
Critical thinker and creative problem solver
A willingness to work collaboratively with a small and dedicated team
Team player, positive attitude, and sense of humor = BIG PLUS!!!

Please submit a cover letter and resume to: [email protected]

For More Information: [email protected]

Accepting applications until November 14, 2021

THE OLD NEW NORMAL, Chapter 11: Make With the Treats Already!

By Liz McLeod

Again Your House Manager

“No, I say!” gusted Miss Carol T. Cat. “Indubitably NO! Take it away AT ONCE!”

I sighed, which is pretty much the limit of my capacity to communicate these days, as I scraped up the moistened Felimazole tablet with the point of a kitchen knife.

“THE GALL!” snorted Miss Carol, her whiskers aquiver with the utter indignity of it all. “The UNMITIGATED gall! Despite my continued remonstrances you CONTINUE in your bumbling attempts to induce me to consume that repellent tablet by concealing it in a foul gelatinous mass! WHAT CRUST!”

“It’s a TREAT!” I wheedled, in a lame attempt to follow the good Dr. Einstein’s definition of insanity. “Look, it says right here on the bag – ‘IRRESTISTABLES!’”

“Whoever termed them thus was careless with his nomenclature,” sneered Miss Carol. “They are, in fact, highly resistable. Especially when tainted by your unspeakable potion. No, I say, your feeble attempts at ‘trick and treat’ shall go unrewarded.”

“It’s Trick OR Treat,” I mumbled. “At least get it right.”

“Bah,” Miss Carol interjected, and nobody can interject like Miss Carol. “Bah!” she repeated for emphasis.

“Look,” I complained, “if I keep handling this stuff I’m gonna get more of it into me than into you. Look at me. What’s happening to my thyroid? I’m gaining weight, I’m moving slow, my vision is blurred, I’m tired and sluggish, I can’t think straight, and I’m always cold!”

“And this differs from your usual state how so?

“Go ahead,” I grumbled, as I popped another iodine supplement in hopes of counteracting the Felimazole now soaking thru my fingertips. “Be funny. But you’re the one who needs to take the pill, and you’re gonna take the pill if I have to sit here all night!”

Now it was Miss Carol’s turn to “hah,” because she knows I can’t do that. Because the next couple of weeks at the Strand are bustling with activity as we wrap up October with a couple of first-class movies, an outstanding opera, and our latest “Strand on the Air” broadcast. On the screen we’ve got the delightful comedy-drama “Falling for Figaro,” the story of a young woman who cashes it all in in hopes of getting her big break as an opera singer, followed by benedict Cumberbatch – yes, HIMSELF! – in “The Electrical Life of Louis Wain,” the story of an eccentric British artist with a thing for painting psychedelic cats.

And on top of that, the Metropolitan Opera’s bringing us Terence Blanchard’s groundbreaking jazz-inflected opera “Fire Shut Up In My Bones!” And then, from the heights of high culture to the guilty pleasures of the proletarian, our latest Strand On The Air broadcast takes you down to Abysmal Point for a chilling adventure up the wooded side of Pogy Hill, as Mrs Grunden and company deal with the horrors of alien abduction! And if that’s not enough, we’ll also have as our musical guests family favorites Bee Parks and the Hornets – whom you can also enjoy thru November 1st in the Strand’s exclusive streaming concert “Spooky Bugs!” Is that a spectacular Halloween package or what?

“Psychedelic cats?” interrupted Miss Carol. “Elucidate!”

“It’s art with cats in it, only, I dunno, psychedelic,” I stammered back. “Whattaya want from me? I haven’t seen the movie yet.”

“Nonsense,” scoffed Miss Carol. “Felids, as you know, do not partake of psychoactive pharmaceutical products of any kind. I myself forswear even the dubious pleasures of catnip. I am, as you know, hard-core ‘straight edge.’”

“Sez you,” I laughed. “Because when you had your mouth open just then, I flipped the pill inside! Direct hit!”

Miss Carol’s bright green eyes tripled in size as she involuntarily swallowed. “Hmph!” she gruffed as she stalked away. “Ridiculous fat barrel hew-mon!”

THE OLD NEW NORMAL, Chapter 10: Action!

By Liz McLeod

Your House Manager

“Come back here, you brat!” I growled, as Miss Carol T. Cat stormed from the kitchen, displaying as she did so the highest of all possible dudgeons.

“You will cease tormenting me, hew-mon,” Miss Carol hissed back, “or I shall certainly rend your garment, and you with it.” As she issued this reply I heard the unmistakable sound of her claws snapping into position.

“You gotta take your medicine,” I pleaded.

“As do you,” came the response. “And you most certainly shall if you do not immediately dispose of that vile bolus. Your attempt to taint my food with it has failed. Your concealment of it in a gelatinous meat-flavored substance has come to naught. My position on the matter is final. TAKE IT AWAY.”

I groaned. I do a lot of groaning these days. Miss Carol’s thyroid checkup last month went surprisingly well, all things considered, with the vet advising me that her numbers had, with medication, dropped from extremely high to a bit low. “I do nothing in half measure,” she declared when I read her the results, but she balked at taking the reduced-dosage tablets now prescribed. Maybe they taste worse than the other ones, maybe the Pepto-Bismol pink color of the pill is offensive to her restrained sense of esthetics, but either way it’s been a battle over the past two weeks to get them into her. I fear, from my own sluggish and fog-brained state, that I may be absorbing more of the drug than she is. Either that or I still haven’t recovered from CIFF weekend. Whatever. Either way, it’s a challenge.

“Maybe,” I shouted into the living room, where I knew Miss Carol now to be sequestered in her lair beneath the record-player table, “I oughta have one of the kids come in with a camera. Maybe I oughta make a movie of this. A REAL TWO-REEL COMEDY! You know, where the unbearably clever cat repeatedly outwits her LOWLY HEW-MON and leaves her humiliated in every scene! Maybe we oughta DO that – and submit it to the Strand’s Youth Film Festival! Because,” I continued, “the deadline for getting in entries is coming up fast – we’re accepting submissions right up thru October 31^st! I BET A FILM CALLED ‘PILL THE CAT’ WOULD BE RIGHT UP THERE WHEN THE AWARDS ARE HANDED OUT! JUST THINK, A REAL TROPHY FOR YOU TO KNOCK ON THE FLOOR!”

“Preposterous!” growled back the reply. “You are INELIGIBLE for this competition, both as a Strand employee and as a hew-mon of ADVANCED AGE. The CREAKING OF YOUR KNEE JOINTS would no doubt DROWN OUT THE SOUNDTRACK of any motion picture!”

“Oh yeah?” I retorted. You can tell how fogged my brain is today from the lacerating, Wildean quality of my ripostes. “Well, YOU’RE twelve years old! Ya gotta be 18 or under to enter, an’ it don’t say nothin’ about SPECIES! I could enter it under YOUR NAME, and you’d be a CELEBRITY.”

“A celebrity?” Her voice here took on a surprisingly mild tone, with just a hint of intrigue. “Indeed? I have, as you know, considered pursuing a career as an entertainer, as the Judi Dench of felinity. Perhaps I have been hasty in dismissing this opportunity.”

“Yeah,” I bounced back, sensing my chance. “But you know, you can’t be a star unless you rehearse. Lotta rehearsal in show business. You gotta do your scene over an’ over to get everything just right. Like, take this pill for instance – you might have to do the scene, oh, I don’t know, twice a day…”

“Indeed? Then we must begin at once.” She dashed back into the kitchen, her dudgeon slightly lower now, and made a straight line for her bowl, where the soggy, gravy-moistened Pill Pocket containing her medication awaited. With a lick and a gulp and a chew, it disappeared.

“Did you get that?” Miss Carol queried. “I considered my performance exceptional.”

“Sorry,” I said, holding out my empty hands. “No film in the camera, and no camera. Whattayasay we try it again? In, oh, twelve hours maybe?”

“Very well,” she agreed. “I shall, as we say in the profession, be ‘on my mark.’ See that you are on yours.”

“Absolutely,” I agreed.

“In the meantime,” said Miss Carol grandly, “I shall wait in my trailer. See that craft services delivers a proper meal.”

THE OLD NEW NORMAL, Chapter 9: Largo al Cattotum

By Liz McLeod

Your House Manager

“What do you mean,” demanded Miss Carol T. Cat, “that my routine is to change YET AGAIN?”

I mumbled incoherently. I do a lot of that these days. Miss Carol fixed me in an unrelenting icy state and repeated her challenge. “Are you not AWARE,” she thundered, “that my routines have been repeatedly thrown into utter disarray by the events of the past nineteen months, and that you have done little, if anything to mollify the disruptions. Your lack of decisive action in bringing an immediate end to the present unfortunate circumstances do not reflect well on your managerial skills.”

“What?” I erupted back. “Look, I don’t have any say over the world at large, OK? I can barely even control my own shaky little corner of it, so don’t blame me for any of this. I’m just a poor soul trying to get along same as anybody else. All I’m saying is my schedule is gonna change a bit – now that OPERA SEASON is about to begin! I’d think you’d be EXCITED about that, you being an apostle of high culture and all.”

“And here again,” Miss Carol snorted, “you inevitably disappoint me. Recall my request at the height of the pandemic when we spent much time in lonely sequestrance that we together learn to perform Rossini’s “Duetto Buffo di Du Gatti,” with my clarion-like soprano set in joyous counterpoint to your honking, nasal alto. And yet you declined my repeated requests to rehearse this selection.”

“You know I only sing show tunes,” I snapped back. “And even then just for comedy. I’m not gonna embarrass myself…”

Miss Carol’s bright green eyes opened wide as she emitted a hilarious snuffle. “Your wallowing in low culture demands elevation. It is my responsibility to educate you. Repeat after me: ‘MI-A-U – MI-A-U – MI-A-U….MI-AU A-U A-U AU MI…”

“OH ME is right,” I retorted. “I ain’t gonna do it. I’m gonna leave opera to the professionals.”

And that’s exactly what we WILL do when the Metropolitan Opera in HD returns to the Strand on October 9^th. The Met’s been a regular fall and winter feature at the Strand since 2007, except for the unfortunate unpleasantness that terminated our 2019-20 season early and prevented the season from taking place at all in 2020-21. But all the drama, excitement and color of grand opera at its best returns to our Big Screen this fall, and we’re really excited to welcome all our friends back for the new season. There will, however, just as Miss Carol notes, be some changes in the routine this year. As most of our opera enthusiasts have no doubt noted our usual reserved-seat program had to be suspended for this season due to pandemic seating restrictions, and we’re forced to limit attendance for each screening to 100 persons, with an empty buffer section required around each reserved seat or group of seats sold. There have also been adjustments in our usual Encore screening policies, and in addition, scheduling conflicts we can’t avoid will force us to present two of this season’s operas on a delayed basis only. We want to stress that all these changes are temporary, and we hope we can return to our usual policies in subsequent seasons. But for now, we’re just happy to be able to present the Met at all – and we know you’ll be understanding of any difficulties that may come up along the way. As ever, our Box Office Manager Norrie Thompson is ready and available to help you at 594-0070 extension 3 – if you don’t catch her in the office, be sure to leave a clear and detailed message and she’ll get back to you as soon as possible.

“Are you finished?” interrupted Miss Carol. “We must resume our rehearsal. Please be seated at the piano.”

“We don’t have a piano,” I growled. “All we have is this wheezy pump organ, and it leaks air.”

“We shall perform acapella,” insisted Miss Carol. “You will find the challenge stimulating. Repeat after me… MI-A-U – MI-A-U – MI-A-U….MI-AU A-U A-U AU MI…”

THE OLD NEW NORMAL, Chapter 8: The Old New Schedule

By Liz McLeod

“Another schedule change!” roared Miss Carol T. Cat.

Actually, it wasn’t so much a roar as a loud yowl. Miss Carol finds roaring declasse, but she is capable, when roused, of generating a piercing mezzo-soprano. Suffice it to say that her statement was delivered with force and emphasis. Especially as she was perched on my desk staring straight into my baggy old eyes as she delivered it.

“Yeah,” I replied, with decided enthusiasm. “But you’ll LIKE it!”

“Your judgement concerning that which I might, in fact, ‘like’ has proven to be sadly deficient over these recent weeks,” she snapped back. “The matter of a certain brutal abduction comes to mind.”

“I took you to the vet,” I retorted, “and that trip likely saved your life. So stop beefin’.”

“I cannot tolerate beef,” she declared. “You should be aware, after a decade, of my meal preferences. Which do not, incidentally, include vile orange-colored tablets.”

“Yeah,” I eyerolled, “I’m sure glad we’re done with that.” She may or may not realize I’m still spiking her food with her prescribed medication, but she’s been, with the aid of dollops of rich poultry-based gravy, cooperating. So that’s something, anyway. “But this new schedule at the Strand is gonna be somethin’ you’re gonna like, honest. I’ll actually have a bit of time in the afternoon to spend with you, and you can sit in my lap and be all sweet and stuff. If you want, of course.”

Miss Carol scowled. She can, indeed, be all sweet and stuff when she chooses to do so, but she is self-conscious about admitting it. So I know better than to press the point. But nevertheless, the new Strand schedule will offer benefits both to her – and to you, our many friends and patrons. As of this Thursday, September 2^nd, we’re returning to a full seven-day-a-week schedule at the theatre. There’ll be something doing every night of the week as we head into the fall, with a selection of fine motion pictures to entertain you as the autumnal shadows draw nigh.

It was Miss Carol’s turn to roll her eyes at that bit of cliché, but hey, clichés are the spice of life, or something. Whattaya want from me, I’m on a deadline.

In any event, this new seven-day-a-week schedule will also see the Strand returning to its traditional showtimes for both weekday and weekend screenings. Starting this week, our Friday and Saturday shows return to their former 5:30pm and 8pm time slots, the better to accommodate our patrons who like to grab a meal at one of our many fine local restaurants before their movie experience, and Sunday will feature our popular 3pm matinee and an early-evening show at 5:30 pm for those for whom Monday’s a workday. Monday thru Thursday evenings will feature 7pm screenings, with Monday remaining our bargain-night special, with all non-member tickets priced at $8. And our Tuesday matinee will return to its traditional 1 PM start time, which will be a big boost for our friends out on the islands who need to catch the afternoon boat home. As always you’ll want to keep an eye on the Strand website and social media for all the latest information on upcoming films and events, especially in these days where circumstances may require adjustments as we move ahead into the fall and winter.

“The crucial question however,” interrupted Miss Carol, “remains unaddressed. As you know, a felid with my diagnosis should be permitted all the sustenance she wishes to eat. Of course you know I shan’t permit this new schedule to disrupt my necessary feeding routine. My health, after all, is at stake.”

“Nothing,” I insisted, “could possibly disrupt my performance of my duty to you. I will at all times remain aware of my obligations.”

“See that you do,” Miss Carol commanded. “Indeed, the hour has arrived for my noon meal. And do not conclude that I am unaware that you have for nearly two weeks been lacing that meal with a foul-tasting antibiotic. I require that you increase the quantity of gravy provided in each serving.”

“I will,” I sighed. Schedules may change, but my role in the universe does not.