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PNS - Thursday, October 12, 2023 - House Republicans nominate Rep. Steve Scalise as next House Speaker if he can get the votes, a number of Americans missing in Israel may be hostages, and North Carolina Democrats sue over restrictive new voting laws.
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PNS - Thursday, October 12, 2023 - "Activate Mississippi" aims to boost voter engagement and education; Scalise is the front runner for Speaker, but many details remain; and adult learners to fill workforce gaps.
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According to the “Psychology After Dark” podcast, in 1972 Dr. George Owen, a university lecturer, geneticist, mathematician, and member of the Toronto Society for Psychical Research (TSPR), recruited eight other members of the TSPR for an experiment designed to determine if ghosts were real or mental projections of the living. The group was tasked with creating a made-up character with a vaguely historical persona.
Fictional Philip Aylesford was the result. He was the subject of séance techniques used by the eight in the experiment. What followed was a series of unexplained and disturbing events, with the participants witnessing the unexplained phenomenon known as “The Philip Experiment.
This experiment is the subject of a new production of the play “The Margins,” to be put on by the Anaconda Ensemble Theatre (AET) with Jackie Vetter producing, The production is a horror play written by David Skeele, and it comes just in time for the season. The play is directed by guest director Blane Pressler of New York.
The idea for the Anaconda Ensemble Theatre (AET) began back in 2019, when “people were asking me to do more theater in Anaconda,” said Jackie Vetter of AET. At that time, she was already working full time in Butte with the Orphan Girl Orphan Theatre (OGCT). Even though Jackie had a full-time job she still wondered about and pursued the idea of doing theatre projects in Anaconda.
In 2022 she resigned from OGCT and began the road to creating AET. They became an official nonprofit in August of 2022 and opened their first show in September of that same year. “I call it community-based professional theater, so engaging community members, but also with the goal of paying artists for their work,” explained Jackie.
In their first year and a half they’ve done several plays and they also done some Community Reading Series throughout the town at different venues. Both the play and readings have accomplished not only bringing more of the arts to the community, but it also brings people to Anaconda that have never been. It also creates a home for those with a dream or desire to be in theatre.
“The Margins” comes to Anaconda in October.
“The story “keeps you on your feet but it’s also like an hour and 15 minutes long with no intermission,” said Jackie. It is a roller coaster of a story that once it begins it takes you along for the ride.
Blane’s directing credits include productions of “The Great Gatsby,” “It’s a Wonderful Life”: A live radio play, and “Little Shop of Horrors,” to name a few.
Blane and Jackie met while they were working on a Broadway show and became friends; even though their respective theater careers went in different directions, they kept in contact.
Currently Blane is the Artistic Director of Ozark Actors Theatre (OAT) in Rolla, MO. He is in his 10th season with OAT. This project really appealed to Blane, “I do love the spooky, I love the spooky horror fall time vibes. And when she (Jackie) reached out and asked if I’d be interested, YEAH!”
Blane has a degree from Purdue University in Fort Wayne. After he graduated in 2009, he went on tour as an actor and did “classical Shakespeare for a year with a company that bounced around Illinois, Missouri, Ohio, New Hampshire just taking regional gigs as an actor,” said Blane. After doing this for a short time he began taking some smaller directing gigs. “It just seemed appealing to me. I had taken directing courses when I was in college, but was always something I wanted to do,” Blane said. He went on to say that “It is almost as hard to break into directing without credits than it is to be an actor.”
This project is the first time Blane has traveled to Montana and when asked what he thought he said, “the air is lovely, The water’s lovely. Everything’s different over here, and I like it a lot.”
“The Margins” can be seen at The Tammany Ballroom in the Old Montana Hotel at 200 Main Street, Anaconda, MT. Each performance will be at 7:00 pm on October 13, 14, 15, 20, 21, and 22. Tickets are $20.
To learn more about AET and tickets for “The Margins” to go anadondaensembletheatre.wordpress.com
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By Mark Moran - Producer-Editor, Contact - News
Big Sky Connection - A $50 million investment from the U.S. Department of the Treasury will create community health services, schools, child-care options, and jobs in Montana's indigenous communities. Comments from Joel Smith, chief credit officer, Native American Bank.
Mark Moran
October 11, 2023 - Native American Bank has been chosen to administer $50 million in grants from the U.S. Treasury Department to bolster low-income Native American community projects and businesses in Plains states, including Montana.
The Treasury Department has given Native American Bank the authority to invest in disadvantaged Indigenous communities often lacking access to the capital they need to start and maintain viable, sustainable businesses on tribal reservations or other American Indian-owned land.
Joel Smith, chief credit officer for the Denver-based Native American Bank, said in northern Montana, the investments will show up in the construction of community service facilities on and around the Blackfeet Indian reservation in Browning.
"We're looking at a lot of health care clinics, wellness centers, behavioral health or opioid recovery centers," Smith outlined. "In addition to child care and schools."
The $50 million program part of a larger, $5 billion federal investment designed to spur economic growth in low-income urban and rural communities nationwide.
Smith emphasized the federal investment will fill the gaps remaining on Indian land not currently covered despite bank and grant funding.
"When you layer this on top of it, gets the project across the finish line," Smith stressed. "In that regard, it's one of the most impactful things because it's making projects happen that really would not otherwise."
Along with new and much-needed community services, Smith added the investment will also create jobs in the communities where the facilities are built.
