The Jasmine Drama Group has been struggling to keep the Yonkers Theater open; due to the down turn in the economy many people are not going to off Broadway productions, produced by amateur theater groups such as the Jasmine Drama Group. The director of the group Jack Frost has been trying to keep the Yonkers Theater open. He has contacted many of his friends around the country, who have the same type theater groups to find out what they do to stay solvent during these trying times.
Jack has found the theater groups who are holding their own are the ones having mature themes for their plays. The plays featuring mature subject matter with nudity attract maximum capacity audiences, no matter how bad the economy becomes. The laws in many states have loosened, to allow advant-garde performances to audiences over twenty-one years of age.
The Jasmine Drama Group consists of; fourteen couples and twenty single members. The single members consist of thirteen women and seven men. The unattached men are divided between actors and stage hands or part of the lighting crew alongside many of the men who are married. The unattached women are seamstresses and actresses.
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The Director after compiling the information informed the members of a meeting date to decide how the theater group would like to proceed or if they want to disband. The bank is threatening to foreclose on the building. Their financial backers are threatening to withdraw their support for the group. The director has come up with a viable plan to bring the performing arts group into the black financially.
The night of the meeting the Director called the meeting to order explaining the financial crisis the organization is facing. Disseminating his findings to the group saying. "I have researched the profitable semi-professional acting groups and found the groups with mature subject matter and some nudity are the ones financial solvent. The others have gone by the wayside. Are there any questions?"
One woman stood and asked. "Will it be implied nudity or will the actors be required to be nude?"
"Most of the successful groups I contacted said the more explicit the show the more money will be made. To answer your question total nudity will bring in the most revenue, but it will be up to the group how far to take the experimental production." The Director explained.
After the Director found there were no more questions he asked. "Okay, Everyone in favor of disbanding the group and putting the building up for sale, raise their hands."
Very few people raised their hands.
"Everyone in favor of having mature plays performed with mature subjects and nudity raise your hands." The director asked.
Most of the group raised their hands in the affirmative.
"The majority here want to keep the theater open and go forward with mature subject matter, so how many actors are willing to do nude scenes in the context of the subject matter if asked?" The Director inquired.
Only four men and three women agreed to do nude scenes, all were in their early to late twenties.
"In order to become profitable there needs to be more actors and actresses willing come forward to do nude scenes in productions, in order to have more variety in our shows. We need at least five more men and six more women to make our group a successful organization again. Older women and men will be most in demand for the plays we envision producing." The Director stated.
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William Thomas and his wife Stacy have been members of the group for the last seven years. They joined the troop after their two Sons finished college and started a life of their own in other parts of the county. Stacy enjoys acting, but has only had bit parts in the productions to date. Bill is handy with props and electrical equipment being an electrical engineer.
Stacy was in college for elementary education with a minor in the performing arts and Bill in the electrical engineering course at the same college meeting thirty-eight years ago and marrying soon thereafter. The five foot six brunette with the hazel eyes gave up her acting career before it started, to take care of her young family, becoming an elementary school teacher when her children started school. The mature woman is all natural, has kept her thirty-four, twenty-three, thirty-six inch figure and the drapes match the carpet. She keeps in shape by eating right and exercising. Bill keeps in shape cutting firewood and working with friends on construction projects. The couple doesn't smoke and refrains from alcoholic beverages.
Like Bill and Stacy most of the group is in their early forties to early sixties, but don't take care of themselves as well as the Thomas's do. A few of the male and females are in their early twenties and thirties, the younger members of the group are the ones that volunteered for the nude scenes.
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Just after supper the day after the Director proposed having mature subjects and nude scenes as a way to keep their theater group going Stacy asked Bill. "What do you think of the idea of having nude scenes in our productions?"
"Why are you asking me that question?" Bill asked.
"Well, would you mind if I volunteer to do some of the more provocative scenes in the plays calling for a mature woman?" Stacy inquired hesitantly turning red with embarrassment.
Bill was surprised. He couldn't see his wife doing sexually stimulating scenes on stage, as she is so modest, when the kids were growing up she wouldn't let them see her in her underwear. "How is she going to do a mature scene on stage?" He thought as he said to her. "If you want to volunteer to do productions with mature content go ahead?" He never really believing she would have the intestinal fortitude to actually go through with it.
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Stacy and Bill never discussed this subject further and Bill thought that it was a mute subject. They went to a meeting on Thursday night to find out what show the troop will be producing.
The Director explained. "I have a script for a play about a mature woman who is not being attended to by her husband and helps a young man who is the same age as her son to overcome his shyness with women. She teaches him the joys of being with women, eventually ending up an affair with him. The problem is no woman who is old enough to be believable as the mature woman in this production has volunteered to do this type of play. This very play has gotten rave reviews in many of the theaters where it's been performed and to full houses."
There was a long moment of silence until Stacy the fifty-seven year old mother of two grown sons raised her hand. "I would like to read for the part." She informed the Director in a voice calmer than she was feeling at the moment.
Jack the director was surprised and very glad that she made this decision. He was concerned about whether she would be able to go through with the provocative scenes on stage being so shy. The Director gave Stacy a copy of the script that was emailed to him from one of his friends from another group on the west coast.
Stacy took the script home with her to study. The reading for the part will be the following week. The mature woman studied the script any time she was not working or doing house work. Her husband played the part of the husband and also the young boy, so she could go over the lines. Bill wasn't convinced she will be able to pull off the roll, but didn't say anything negative to his wife. The closer the time for reading, the more nervous she was getting, flubbing her lines when she practiced with her husband.
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