Opening Night is a special brand of chaos. It looks different for every arts organization, but for Nordo it’s an undeniable feeling in the air – we’re going to have an audience. An audience that will intimately know every movement of a performer in our uniquely long space. We have to serve them, feed them, keep them entertained, and (hopefully) sufficiently buzzed from our impeccably poured wine or cocktail selections. We have to keep track of them to be sure we don’t start a new act while they’re getting some air or visiting the loo. We maintain organized chaos from dining room to green room; a kitchen staff, servers, performers, band members, and bartenders running trays, staying hydrated, doing costume changes, clearing silverware. And above all, somehow, we have to keep the integrity of the theatrical experience: All those secrets that keep things running smoothly and maintain the mystery of a seamless transition with some amazing, pulse-racing moment of art that we will all remember time and time again. The magic of theater. The magic of Nordo.

It’s been 495 days since we experienced our last Opening Night, Sara Porkalob’s The Angel in the House. It’s been 237 days since we hosted our last dinner re-opening event in the space, Bloody Delicious.

It is a strange feeling for us to be Re-Opening without an Opening Night. We are most known, after all, for immersive dinner theater experiences that guide you through an evening of storytelling and culinary complexity. We even found a way to bring an evening out at Nordo to your living room with our Room Service Experiences during the darkness that was this past year. What we have discovered, however, is that when we are provided the opportunity (or faced with restrictive guidelines) to focus on the menu, the food itself simply shines.

So what is there to be celebrated about a Re-Opening rather than an Opening Night? Well, we are able to highlight our musicians as major players in the ambience we aim for. We’re able to really curate a unique and local menu that has fewer boundaries than is usually introduced when creating a multi-course meal themed around a show.

But regardless of circumstance, without fail every single time, the most thrilling and important part about opening Nordo’s doors is having you with us.

Our communities have gone through so many ups and downs in the past two years alone, and there is more change yet to come – but we believe in that special feeling when we are able to swing open our big bay windows, seat you at your table, and smile as our space springs to life in all its’ glory with your presence. What we’ve missed most of all in the midst of these uncertain times has been our ability to host you, to share our space and experiences with you. And now, in a season where change is undeniable and transformation awaits us around every corner, we’re here to host you once again. It may be under different circumstances, we may need to wait a little while for our next been Opening Night experience, but there is no denying that this Re-Opening brings an entirely fresh feeling of excitement. The menu calls for fresh, local, seasonal offerings that remind us that change is the most natural part of our existence; while our private party rooms and Chessboard dining room make spaces where our celebratory dinner of transformation is not to be shared alone.

We’ll see you at the theater!

The Nordo Team

by Terry Podgorski

I love picking a genre or a class or an aspect of culture and putting it through the ringer whether I like it or not. Nothing is above a good joke. And so, while I may - like a good Wiccan - prefer my dates written as if Halloween were the beginning of the year, or have crystals for protection beside my cat’s water bowl, I loved putting it all on its head for our 2018 show The Witching Hour. The entire point was to expose the humor behind a person who believes in runes (Viking runes, Norse runes, all the runes!) tarot card decks, and casting spells, throw in a little truth lurking behind the supernatural, and toss it in a salad. 

 Which is all to say when years later we were brainstorming what would

become our next Room Service Experience, there was no doubt in our minds:

The Witching Hour, baby! I immediately thought of Ronnie Hill’s performance as Head Adept and Magician of the Dark Arts, William Wescott, a character as learned and

scholarly as he is bad at magic. Of course we thought of our beautiful monsters based on the human fears. I particularly thought of the Fear of Loneliness, so hauntingly portrayed by one of my favorite actors in town, Tatiana Pavela, with a stunning costume design by Fantasia Rose and Indira Shlag. I couldn’t WAIT to pull that sucker out of the plastic bin that has been hanging out in our storage space and put Tatiana back in that perfect witchy makeup.

But most of all, I thought of crystals, and candles, and spells. I thought about delivering my ideal date night, where velvet bags are opened over craft cocktails, and spells cast one by one to reveal a story about the human condition. And savory pie. And monster comedies. (Mon-Coms for the Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans.)

Plus, it’s fun to watch actors play a human in one Act and the monster that represents their deepest Fear the next. So we’re bringing it back, and to get us all in the mood for the cursed and strange, we thought we’d share our Nordo’s Musings from the original show:

Watch:

Clue - First one guest, then another, and another until we have a colorful mob of personalities that don’t care one whit about one another as they chase the MacGuffin. What’s a better way to start a tale on a dark and stormy night.

The Witches of Eastwick - Well, when a bunch of witches decided to summon the devil, and then they have to deal with the consequences. It’s classic. It’s the crux of so many dramas. And a few comedies.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer - The supernatural never landed so squarely in camp so well. Throw in the troubles of adolescence, the problems with public education, and a mandate the save the world from demons and vampires and you have a cultural hit.

Read:

Ray Bradbury short stories from “Quicker than the Eye” and “October Country”- These stories were not read for the comedy but for the unfettered strange worlds that he opened up in his writing. He touched ghosts and alternate worlds and twisted timelines and most notably brought Science Fiction into the mainstream.

“The Ocean at the End of the Lane” by Neil Gaiman- Monsters. Monsters. Monsters. And the most excellent telling of monsters just down the road that anyone has attempted to do. Clean fantasy.

  “Practical Demonkeeping” by Christopher Moore- I find comedy a hard thing to do in novels. The gimmick invariably gets old I think, and the same joke just goes on forever. Even the famed Hitchhiker’s Guide to Galaxy Trilogy got a bit old on books 4 & 5. (Don’t let Douglas Adams hear that I said that.) And well, Lamb by Christopher Moore may be just one of the best comedies in novel form there is. But that was about the life of Jesus or his best friend, and I needed a comedy about monsters so I hit up this one. It’s good. Not Lamb. But good.

“Gothic Grimoire” by Konstantinos- This started the whole thing really. Wandering around a New Age crystal shop, thumbing through the literature looking for themes and situations to use, I found this dark gem of spells from New York City. Self-help sublimely smashes into the dark arts.

Wander in New Age crystal shop and peruse books when you can wander a New Age crystal shop again.

Listen:

            “Black Hole Sun” by Soundgarden

            “Gold Dust Woman” by Fleetwood Mac

            “Life On Mars” by David Bowie. Always listen to David Bowie. Please.

Fact:   

According to books on the properties of stones, meteorite does help a person speak to aliens. Also, the “Gothic Grimoire” is a real book written by a real person named Konstantinos who lives in New York City and likes Gothic chanting. It says so on the back.

The 20/21 theater season, like almost everything in the past year, has been anything but typical. Across the world the marquees went dark as we were forced to close down live performances for the greater good. But we have seen such a font of creativity and innovation from our always scrappy theater world colleagues, which has been inspiring in a time when there was little to look forward to.

Almost a year later we’ve certainly thrown a lot of spaghetti at the wall. From the launch of our Retro-Dinners this summer, (followed almost immediately by a new spike in Covid cases that caused us to abort that project,) to a wine delivery program, to live, at-home cooking classes this has been a time of reinvention and even play. 

In the spring, after we closed The Angel in the House, in the midst of climbing infection rates in King County, the safety of Nordo’s staff and patrons became a serious concern and the question was raised: How do we bring Nordo into our audiences’ homes in a safe, contact free way?

And how do we stay true to our core values: creating exciting art that celebrates food, drink and storytelling?

Instead of pivoting outside the box, Nordo literally turned into it, and Nordo’s Room Service was born.  

We’ve always been multi-sensory. That’s what makes this theater company different. We could not imagine an exclusively digital offering. If Nordo is coming to your home, we are coming with the tactile, the aromatic, the delicious. That means physical ephemera and delicious treats to couple with our digital media.

Nordo paired with game designer and film maker Daryle Conners in the summer of 2020 to tease out our trademark immersive storytelling and expand upon a ghost story we created in the fall of 2016. It felt perfect for the upcoming “cancelled” Halloween party season.

And so a new story was born on the back of the old, a story told through typewritten letters and gilded invitations, through poems as riddles, radio interviews, and original music.

We invited our audience to check in to the luxurious Hotel Nordo, built in the year 1927, and explore its haunted history in a multi-media, multi-sensory manner. In their homes. With craft cocktails and delectable desserts as accompaniment.

Nordo is defined by original storytelling, original music, food, and drink. The creativity of our storytelling and music has created a string of audience hits over the years. And our menus won our co-artistic director, Erin Brindley, a Seattle Weekly’s Best Chef award. And through the new Room Service program those stories and full dinner menus are now available to be consumed in your home. 

With sell out orders for Do Not Disturb, and increasing media attention for the following Holiday story box “Christmas of the Corn”, it became clear to us that there was untapped potential to expand the accessibility on a national scale. Nordo’s brand of storytelling can grow beyond Seattle, and make the future live performances in the Culinarium destination events like Meow Wolf or Sleep No More.

We know our audiences are longing to come home. We are all craving for the experiences we miss so much.  

However, our imaginations have not suffered the sting of Covid-19. We ae rising to the challenge, and believe that our new interactive and delivered storytelling can be just as inspiring and delicious as coming to table with strangers to live and breath the same story.

When we first ran this production in Fall of 2012 we named the show after one of the main songs written by our dear friend Drew Keriakedes (listen to Drew's tunes). It ran at Theatre Off Jackson in their relatively new upstairs venue after The Wing Luke moved out to their current location. It was one crazy show (cooking on griddles in a classroom!?). For some reason, no one, not even us, could remember the name. It just fell right out of the head. But in my journal this show was always called “Lost Falls”. So, when it came time to remount it the title changed.

 I was a junior in high school when Twin Peaks debuted. I thought it was talking to me. It had everything. Murder. Cheesy high school romance. One-eyed women staring out through the blinds. Red velvet curtains in a black and white checkered room. Illicit drugs in old train cars. And the supernatural lurking behind every corner. Quirky, friendly FBI agents? Who let this through the censors? In one fell swoop I feel it changed television writing.

 I retreated up to the town of Skykomish to write this one. I stayed in the inn there. It turns out that not three days before I arrived two men broke into the only bar in town, smashed and looted the ATM machine, and burned down the back half of the restaurant in their escape. One resident described seeing the getaway car speeding West on Hwy 2 as the flames leapt into the night sky. You see, with the bar gone, the tiny restaurant at the inn became the night time hanging place for all the town, and I got to belly up to the bar and listen to the entire saga. From multiple points of view. It turned out to be quite apt and quite inspiring though I’d rather not burn down or otherwise destroy a perfectly fine business every time I need to write a play.

 To live in this world and soak up all its strangeness was a dream come true. To this day it may be the most successful trippy, food dining experience ever. We’re in a diner. It’s morning. The body of the chef has been discovered in the kitchen. And all the courses look like breakfast, but they are dinner!

Watch: 

 Twin Peaks-  Well, you have to. Watch the whole thing. It gets a bit wonky in Season 2 when it was cancelled and then brought back to life by popular demand but deal with it. It brought surrealism into the living room. Would there be an X Files without Twin Peaks? Also, watch Fire Walk with Me, the movie prequel that came after the whole series ended. And then, fall down the rabbit hole of the newest 3rd season that came out three years ago on Showtime Twin Peaks: The Return.

Rashomon- A masterpiece by Akira Kurosawa, a genius of cinema. It won an Honorary Oscar in 1952. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg said it changed their ideas of movie making. And for me, it was the story told from 3 different points of view in which the truth lies, somewhere. “What is truth?” 

Scotland P.A.- Small town fast food restaurant tragedy. The Scottish play meets McDonalds. Murder in a fryer. If you haven’t seen this one yet, please, treat yourself. Never have the witches been done so well. And there’s a Christopher Walken in it. Done. 

Listen:

Don’t miss the Twin Peaks soundtrack. Littler, mid-sized, Terry used to fall asleep to this album in his dorm.

            “Twin Peaks Theme” by Angelo Badalamenti

            “Falling” by Julee Cruise

But also, Annastasia Workman murdered this score and the twin vocals of Evan Mosher and Devin Bannon were exquisite.

            “Nowhere Town” and “Spruce Tree” by Annastasia Workman

Read:

At the time, I can’t say that I read much fiction to prepare for writing this piece. It was a very cinematic driven script. But, there was a lot of non-fiction reading going on about fast food and the culture it sprouted in America.

Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser- Well, it’s all there. The gross, manufactured food and questionable business practices as people like William Rosenberg (Dunkin’ Donuts), Dave Thomas (Wendy’s), Glenn Bell (Taco Bell), and Harland Sanders (Kentucky Fried Chicken) spread across the highways of this country and almost snuffed out a local diner culture. Support your local diner! (When you can go back to restaurants.)

In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan- And if you want some real facts for the fight against processed foods this is the place to start. Any book by Michael Pollen is worth the read.

The Secret History of Twin Peaks by Mark Frost (co-writer of the series)- Well, if you want to be a proper nerd you should pick up a copy and dive into all the notes and alien landings and government conspiracies that could perhaps be swirling around the town of Twin Peaks. David Lynch was not a fan of the book, but so what.

Fact #1:

Nordo was murdered on Oct 12th, 1991.

Fact #2:

There was a giant beaver in this show. It appeared and tapped into the psyche of suspects. The beaver made someone kill Nordo. The beaver costume still hangs around the theater.

Fact #3:

The two mystical bikers, Ralph and Rocky, that became the one mystical biker in the second production may be my favorite character to write for.

“Alcohol is good for preserving anything but secrets”

—  Sauced, by Terry Podgorski.

 There is much to be said about wine, but this post is going to focus on the Nordo history of two special cocktails. You might say these beverages are the spirit of our brand –innovative cuisine that tells a story.

 Coincidentally? These cocktails are available for your home bar through our Cocktail Kit Delivery Service. We’ll deliver them to your home, including recipe cards, with the option of adding on a cheese plate and charcuterie.

 THE CRUMB BUM- from “Sauced” 2010

 Step out of the Seattle rain, just off Main Street and the doors of the Culinarium will open. As your eyes adjust to the light, you make out your destination, the bar. Bathed in light, bottles shining. A man in a tailored vest polishes glasses, his eyes on his work. 

The place is packed, but no one approaches the bar, it’s raised and separated, above the tables. It’s theatre. The other members of the audience nibble and sip.

Welcome to Nordo. 

Once you tuck into your seat, the cocktail list of beverages mixed to match the world of the play is pointed out to you by your cleverly costumed server. “I’ll try the Crumb Bum and add the cocktail flight.” Your beverage is the password, providing entry into the story, the characters, and the concept.

It wasn’t always this way. Nordo’s first two shows and menus “The Modern American Chicken” and “Bounty: An Epic Adventure in Seafood” focused on your plate, with gorgeous wines to pair. No cocktails.

The Barrel’s Best Cocktail Kit.

The set of “Sauced”, 2015, by Terry Podgorski, photo by Bruce Clayton Tom

One dark and stormy night, creators Erin and Terry shared a drink post-show of Bounty. She had cooked for the audience, and he had ran the lightboard and bar backed, running wine to tables. They were exhausted, and exhilarated. 

The actors changed out of costume, and joined them. A bottle of bourbon was revealed and passed, the cast and crew mingling and going over the highs and lows of the performance.

Someone jumped behind the translucent screens that enclosed the dining room. The theatre lights were dimmed and a charade of silhouettes was improvised with the bourbon bottle.

There were new faces laughing, audience members who stayed after the last plate had been cleared, thrilled by the concept and community of coming to table with strangers.

Erin and Terry cheered and led the fun, but spent most of the evening in a volley of conversation about the next big thing. That night in 2010, the idea to do a show about the history of the cocktail was born.

It was aptly titled “Sauced”.

Writer and set designer Terry Podgorski put those late night conversations into the pressure cooker of his writing room (The Waterstreet Hotel in Port Townsend), and added influence from his adoration for film noir and the writings of Dashiell Hammett.

He remembers how the idea of serving cocktails to pair with the dinner menu was formed, and the bartender who made it all happen.

“Sauced was set in a bar with the film noir as its model. And so we began to ask around for who could teach us the secrets behind great cocktails and over and over and over the answer was Murray Stenson. “ 

Terry and Erin found their answer at the place where most go for such things.

Murray Stenson

“Neither of us had been to the Zig Zag at the time. Murray had not yet won the Best Bartender in America award. That would come in a few months. Descending those stairs to the front door of the Zig Zag, bellying up to the bar, and asking Murray if he would take a moment to make us a cocktail and tell us all about mixology is one of the best Nordo memories I have.” 

With a third production scheduled to take place at the warehouse behind the Theo Chocolate factory in Fremont, director and chef Erin Brindley dug in to the idea of a show focused on spirits. There would be four mini-cocktails included in the ticket price, with morsels to match, that told the story of the cocktail. She explained the concept for the show, and the script ideas Terry was working with, and the time period, pre-war 1930’s Seattle.

Terry recalls,

“If you know Murray you know how his eyes can light up and how fast he can talk while he moves about the bar, grasping at bottles, asking questions, his mind whirring. By the end of the night we asked if he would create the menu, and he said yes.

He was humble and never asked for anything. A few days later, we met for brunch and he handed us the menu. Simple and elegant. He said the best cocktails has no more than 3 ingredients, perfectly balanced. And each one was either a slight variant on a classic or an obscure and forgotten recipe he kept filed away in his head. If I remember correctly, the Crumb Bum was one of those obscure ones that he learned from a fellow bartender in New York City that he felt was under appreciated. We've enjoyed plenty since then. Thank you Murray.”

For more information about the show Sauced in its 2010 and 2015 versions, visit the archive.

“What happens when you push a man until the wall is at his back, and there’s nowhere to run?”

— Smoked, by Terry Podgorski.

 THE PINE BOX – Smoked, 2012. (Available in our “Going Clear” Cocktail Kit)

This is a very different sort of bar. The Sauget Ballet is full to the gills with expectant witnesses. There’s a hanging planned, and the small town is thirsty.

The set of “Smoked”, 2018, by Terry Podgorski, photo by Bruce Clayton Tom

You’ve got to elbow in and push past the swinging doors to claim your seat. You may marvel at how the Culinarium has changed since the last show you saw, Sauced. But likely as not, your eyes are feverishly reading the menu, to see what drinks are on tap.

After the collaboration with Murray Stenson on Sauced, Terry spent the next few shows making relationships with other Seattle bartenders, and as Nordo grew, hiring a few of our own. Always, the goal was to tell local stories with our suppliers and ingredients.

Your eyes rest on “The Pine Box”, a stiff gin, served up, with pine liquor. This place has a sense of humor.

Terry remembers how The Pine Box was born.

“Smoked was our third cocktail show when it opened in 2013. And I was on the hunt for interesting and new products for the menu when I heard about Brovo, an all women owned and run distillery that at the time was based in Seattle. They had five liqueurs. A ginger, a lemon balm, rose geranium, lavender, and pine. And all were made without additives. Real plants were used. It fit so perfectly in the Nordo ethos that we hunted them down for a tasting. And from there it was a no-brainer. An old west cocktail show and an all pine liqueur? They were made for one another.”

by Terry Podgorski

Hotel Nordo was one of the best to write. I felt in my own element allowed to revel in all the things I love in entertainment. Ghosts sliding around corners. The epic tale of the otherworld glimpsed through only a few, small lives revolving around one ghastly truth. The macabre merry-go-round of souls trapped by their sins. And artistically, since it was an episodic piece, it was fun to establish a world within a few minutes then tip it on its side immediately and watch the truth of the scene trickle out. I visited serval hotel lobbies for inspiration and observed how people moved about one another in a place made for strangers, filled with strangers. 95% of the time it was boring. People listlessly sip a beer and stare at innocuous sport news or flip through their phone connecting with a home or a job in another place. And most hotel bars look like dressed up airport bars. But then, every once in a while, a person with a bright smile or a sharp wit or a catchy sing-songy voice would surprise you with a glimpse into someone else’s life story.

Watch:

The Others- A favorite ghost story as we see the real world through the eyes of the ghosts, and a ghost would really never know they’re the one doing the haunting. It’s just in their nature to haunt. Ghosts do look to be ghosts.

Twilight Zone (early episodes like 1-6)- The motherlode for this Hotel Nordo because it was both episodic and eerie, and nowhere has it been done better, consistently, than in The Twilight Zone.  Learn to write 46 and 23min whole stories! Learn the recipe for tilting the normal into the unnatural.

The Shining- Number #1 Haunting in a Hotel. It’s a building that breathes and breeds evil, and the humans are only there for it to feed. I read it too for the writing of Hotel Nordo, and while I liked some things about the book better I’m going out on a limb here; I prefer the movie. Sorry Stephen King.

2046 by Wong Kar-Wai- The sequel to perhaps the best love story ever, In the Mood for Love, 2046 is a melancholy dream world out of time and place in which a man waits for love while living in a hotel. It’s all ambiance. And so cool. 

Lost in Translation by Sophia Coppola- Lonely souls passing one another in a hotel lobby and looking for something more between strangers. This is what attracts me to hotels: all the strangers in one place anticipating something from another that will likely never happen.

Listen:

Songs from the show itself. Check out Music for Dining Volume II by Annastasia Workman on Spotify or order a CD from our website.

Tear for Fears - “Shout”

Beyoncé - “Haunted”

David Bowie- “Changes”

“Big Break” and “Ghost” by our Annastasia Workman

Read:

“Stories from The Twilight Zone” by Rod Serling- The source of modern American weird fiction. The recipe for the surreal- 3 parts normal day life and 1 part WTF.

“The Bone Clocks” by David Mitchell- It’s the episodic telling of a larger tale from different characters that drew me to this one. Plus, the luscious language. Plus, the story of the otherworld in our most modern world. 

Short Story “Playmates” by A.M. Burrage- I don’t know. Just really creepy. Friends playing forever in the walls of an abandoned school. Who doesn’t love that?

Fact:

Did you know there is a word for the criminal act of poisoning the water of others? It’s Lurgulary. Think Oregon cult. And it proves, there’s a word for everything. Except maybe, poisoning your own wedding cake.