Dear Friends,
Five months ago, live theater returned to the Player Club of Swarthmore for the first time since March 2020. Since then, we have staged six productions and are currently mid-run on the excellent One Man, Two Guvnors, all while doing the hard work behind the scenes to make sure that the health of our volunteers, performers and patrons was a priority.
Over the past several weeks, the rise of the infectious Omicron variant has led to the seven-day average of new cases of COVID-19 more than quadrupling its highest point from last winter. It is now far more likely that someone you know has come down with at least a mild case of COVID, even if they were doing everything right.
With this in mind, the PCS Board of Governors convened a special meeting to discuss the remainder of the 2021-22 season. The following changes were agreed on:
• From January 7 through January 23, all PCS activity has been halted within the theater building except for performances and rehearsals of One Man, Two Guvnors. This eliminates concurrent activity and limits the number of people in the building intermingling. The sale of concessions has been paused during the run of this show.
• The productions of Godspell and The Rainbow Fish Musical, scheduled to audition this week, have been removed from this season’s schedule
• The Theory of Relativity, originally scheduled for Jan. 28 – Feb. 5 on the Raymond W/ Smith Second Stage, will now be performed Feb. 18 – 26 on the Main Stage.
• Urinetown, originally scheduled for Feb. 11 – 26, will be performed Apr. 22 – May 7.
If you are a subscriber who has already redeemed part of your subscription for one of the canceled or moved performances, your account will be re-credited with those tickets. We hope you’ll redeem them for one of the rescheduled performances. You will receive a separate e-mail confirming the credits.
These are difficult decisions to make, but it is our goal to protect the health and safety of everyone who comes into our building while giving our artists and volunteers space to create art and celebrate their love of theater.
We will continue to keep you informed of any updates to our policies or the schedule. We hope you will visit the Players Club one of the next two weekends to see One Man, Two Guvnors. And we thank you for your continued support of community theater.
--Jeff Martin
President, PCS Board of Governors
