For more information or to book a performance, call us at 773.743.9625 or e-mail at acrewofpatches@aol.com.

Audience Size and Pricing

• If the school has less than 200 students attending, a base fee of $2,000 is the cost for the performance. A Crew of Patches is a full-sized professional company and cannot do a performance for less than the base fee. We have many schools on our usual schedule who only have 150 or 175 students, but they still find it cost effective to bring us to them rather than coming to us because they do not therefore have to pay any bus fees.
• If the school has more than 200 students attending, the cost of the performance is $10 per student. Performances for more students are more difficult and the company is paid accordingly.
• If your school has more than 600 wishing to attend, we ask your school to book two performances—they can be the same day—simply because we have learned that the experience is better for everyone if we keep the house size down.
• Performances of more than one show are available in a day: for instance, we can do a Romeo & Juliet in the morning (starting between 8:30-9:30am) and then do a Macbeth in the afternoon (starting at 11am or 12pm).
• All teachers and chaperones are free.
• CPS and small-school discounts are available.
• A 10 % deposit is due within three weeks of agreeing upon a date and sending a contract in order for A Crew of Patches Theatre Company to hold the date.
• The balance of payment is due two weeks prior to the performance. However, we do know how hard it often is to collect from students or to get payment centers to cut checks. What we often do is accept partial payment two weeks prior to the performance and final payment the day of the performance.

Facility Requirements

• The School must have a theatre space for the performance: A Crew of Patches does not perform in gymnasiums or cafetoriums (the sound quality in such spaces is usually awful and makes the entire experience less than optimal for both the company and the audience). We have performed in studio-sized spaces before, this is not a problem — we just need to make sure there is a) enough room for the audience, and b) enough room for a good sword fight onstage.
• The performance space must be cleared of all sets and have basic masking accessible. Many schools have very large theatres, and, if this is the case, usually sets for plays (or risers for concerts) can be moved upstage and covered by a curtain and we can perform downstage. A Crew of Patches asks that the school take care of this before our arrival.
• A Crew of Patches must have access to lighting equipment (we bring our own technical director to handle lighting)—whatever is in the air is usually fine—and access to sound equipment which must have basic CD capability. If both sound and lights cannot be run by one person, we ask the school to supply a tech student or other reasonable help.
• A Crew of Patches must have access to a room adjacent to the theatre space for dressing and for our belongings—dressing rooms are fine.

The Productions

• Macbeth is performed almost entirely uncut and runs approx. 1 hour 50 minutes. It is performed in period dress (Scotland, 1140 AD) with period combat and imagery.
• Romeo & Juliet is performed almost entirely uncut and runs 2 hours. Our script has one major change: the combining of two scenes. It is performed in period costuming: 14th century Italy—and uses period weapons and fighting techniques.
• Julius Caesar is performed almost entirely uncut—though some characters are combined for clarity of theme—and runs approximately 2 hours 5 minutes. It is performed in modern dress with 21st century combat and imagery.
• A Crew of Patches Theatre Company uses Shakespeare’s First Folio for all of its productions, therefore, there may be slight alterations in texts read by schools due to later adaptations and editorial choices. Minor changes may be made to aid in a modern audience’s understanding of the show and are at the discretion of the director.
• A Crew of Patches Theatre Company uses minimal stage effects and scenery, but blood effects, scenes of violence, and what might be deemed “adult content” (ie. ribaldry and innuendo) are common in Shakespeare and part of the productions.
• There will be no intermission.

The Day of the Performance

• A Crew of Patches asks to be allowed into the school’s theatre space 90 minutes prior to the performance time. This allows for fight calls and getting comfortable with your technical capabilities prior to the seating and settling of students and the show to begin on time.
• The show can begin at any time between 8:30 and 10 am—we work around your bell schedule. It is not unusual for a show to start at 8:56 or 9:17 because that is what works for that school.
• Teachers and chaperones are asked to aid with the seating of students.

The Talk-Back

• Following the performance there will be a 15-20 minute (dependent upon the needs of the school) Question/Answer session with the company.
• Questions will be chosen at random from students unless your school asks ahead of time for a different arrangement. If you have a specific point you’d like us to make, or an area of theme or content you know you’d like us to comment on, just let us know.

These are the nuts and bolts. We’re really pretty self-sufficient: just let us in the space and we’ll do the rest.