Eclectic Mix of Short Plays Featured in USC’s 10 Minute Play Festival Oct. 24 – Nov. 3

The USC Dept. of Theatre and Dance will present the 10 Minute Play Festival, a fun and eclectic evening of short plays, October 24 – November 3 at the Lab Theatre.

Show times are at 7:30pm, October 24-26 and November 1-2, and 3pm on Sunday, Nov. 3.   Tickets are $10 and are available online at sc.universitytickets.com or at the door.  The Lab Theatre is located at 1400 Wheat St. on the first floor of the Booker T. Washington building.  

Enjoy a fast-paced evening of laughter, heartbreak and everything in between as we present a collection of (very) short plays, each directed by a different member of our theatre performance faculty. “A ten-minute play is a streak of theatrical lightning. It doesn’t last long, but its power can stand your hair on end.” (Take Ten, Vintage Books).

Featured plays include:

The Lobster Quadrille (Directed by David Britt)
Playwright Don Nigro’s quirky story depicts a casual encounter that quickly becomes a chaotic dance, as two lovers navigate the neurotic pitfalls of a one-night stand. 

So I Was Visiting Dad on His Birthday... (Directed by Lyle Browne)
In this sensitive and witty script by DC Cathro, a chance meeting between two women in a cemetery – one visiting her deceased father and the other hoping to join him in the afterlife – sparks an unlikely bond. 

Dead Giveaway (Directed by Mario Haynes)
Daniel Guyton’s unorthodox exploration of romance is set on Valentine’s Day, as Robert gifts his wife arrangements of the "final" variety, leading both to question the meaning of “’til death do us part.”

Tea Time (Directed by Patrick Michael Kelly)
Stabbings. Missing tea. A dropped goose. Something is afoot in Lady Gertrude's manor, and it is certainly not a game. Class and reality are dissected in Will Dunne's absurd comedy of manners and murder.

Cast in the plays are undergraduate students Isnerys Carrasquillo, Josh Cooke, Calvin DeLude, Donovan Dempsey, Destiny McCorvey, Reagan Michael, Aza Nyberg, and Morgan Passley.

While the wide variety of situations presented in these compact stories makes for a uniquely entertaining experience for the audience, the faculty directors say that the actors’ work is just as challenging and fulfilling as doing a full-length play.

“While the audience only sees these characters for 10 minutes, the actors have to develop characters that have lived full lives up to [the performance of] the play,” says instructor Lyle Browne. “Just as with a full-length play, that time has to be spent to engage the audience and bring them in.

Senior instructor David Britt concurs. “It really gives the actors a chance to study a character and flesh them out in one scene. It’s all or nothing, and that is exciting to an actor.” 

For more information on the 10 Minute Play Festival or the theatre program at the University of South Carolina, contact Kevin Bush by phone at 803-777-9353 or via email at bushk@mailbox.sc.edu.  

REVIEW: The Visit at USC Theatre and Dance

THE VISIT

USC Department of Theatre and Dance

April 5 - 12

This writing is woefully late for a number of reasons; none of them particularly good, and for that we do apologize. However, the excellent work by everyone involved deserves an acknowledgement.

USC Theatre and Dance closed out the season with Friedrich Dürrenmatt’s The Visit, and what a production it was. The piece was first produced in 1956 in Zürich, Switzerland, and was adapted for British audiences in a production directed by Peter Brook and starring Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontaine. After touring Britain in 1957 – 58, the play was taken to Broadway. Ingrid Bergman and Anthony Quinn starred in a film adaption in 1964, and Kander and Ebb (along with a book by Terrance McNally) flipped it into a musical starring Chita Rivera in 2001. In 2020, Tony Kushner’s  new English language adaptation was produced in London.

The story takes place in the “somewhere in Europe” village of Güllen, a village which has not fallen on hard times, but under them. A miserable, poverty-stricken, dingy little hamlet. The one bright spot is the impending visit of Claire Sachanassian, the wealthiest woman in the world. Claire grew up in Güllen, and the townspeople are hopeful and desperate that she will provide them with much needed financial assistance. The scene opens with villagers, desperate to make a good impression, frantically preparing for Ms. Zachanassian’s arrival. And arrive, she does.

As a young girl, Claire fell in love with Anton Schill, who has grown up to be a model Güllenite – a successful shop keeper with a devoted wife and children, and on his way to becoming the next Bürgermeister. Alas, young Claire finds herself  with a brӧtchen in the oven. Her beloved Anton abandons her, denies his paternity, and turns the townspeople against her. She is run out of town in shame. Claire will gift the town and each of its citizens a grand fortune, in exchange for the life of the man who abandoned her. Anton’s life is about to go to hell in a ham biscuit.

Revenge is a dish best served cold…

Rachel Vanek, a Sophomore (repeat – A SOPHMORE) nailed the role of Claire. She moves like a glacier across the stage – all icy, brittle perfection. I have no doubt that if you touched her, you’d get frostbite. Cruella Deville notwithstanding, there is a shimmer of that very young woman who was shamed by the people of Güllen so very long ago, and Claire begins to win us over. Vanek’s Claire is the Ice Princess personified. (She does not “Let it Go”). I look forward to seeing this young performer in other productions.

Olan Domer plays Anton Schill to smarmy excellence. If you met him in a bar, you’d keep your cocktail covered. His expression when he realizes that he is the fee for Güllens future  prosperity is priceless. Domer played the equally smarmy Karl Lindner in USC’s production of A Raisin in the Sun earlier this year.

There truly isn’t a weak link in this cast. Maggie Davisson as Bobby, Claire’s assistant, Dominic DeLong-Rodgers as the Bürgermeister, Cameron Eubanks, the village doctor, Didem Ruhi, the priest, Elaine Werren as Fraü Schill, and Elizabeth Wheless as the teacher were all very well-cast. Along with the rest of the ensemble, many of whom were double and triple cast, the story builds in intensity and suspense. I must mention Koby Hall and Rafe Hardin, who play the two blind men. Not only are they hysterically funny (until we learn how they came to be blind), but they are also blind and on stilts.

Lindsay Wilkinson’s costume design is amazing. Working with Kristy Hall, she develops a costume plot which is a bit art-deco, a bit Weimar Republic, a bit Picasso, and a smattering of A Clockwork Orange…. It was fascinating to watch the costumes change  as the characters  wearing them changed. Her use of patterns and color brought another dimension to the production.

The stage at Drayton Hall is massive, and the set/lighting/sound designers (Ashley Jensen, Lorna, Young, Danielle Wilson) filled it completely. The use of beautifully painted scrims allowed the set to change completely with a light cue. The sound was very well done. The train station serves as a focal point, and the sounds and the smokestacks turned me into a gleeful five-year old kid again. (I must confess I so wanted Claire to burst into “Don’t Cry for Me, Argentina” when she stepped out onto the balcony.)

The Visit is not only a story of revenge, but also a warning tale about avarice, integrity, loyalty, and the effects of soul-searing capitalism. Director Craig Miller, a USC alum, brought all of this together in an entertaining, provocative production. The only negative to this show is the all too short length of its run.

USC’s Department of Theatre and Dance has long been a contributor to some of the very best of Columbia theatre. Its students and faculty share their talents with theatres throughout the city. Many of them have gone on to teach, perform, and share their gifts on stages and in schools across the country.

Tickets & Subscriptions for USC Theatre & Dance Now Available

With offerings that range from classics (Raisin in the Sun) to family fun (Sideways Stories from Wayside School) to the kind of play you have to see if it is ever offered in your area (The Visit), and more, USC Theatre and Dance continues to raise the bar in arts entertainment in the Midlands. Add to that Dance performances that offer innovative choreography and the chance to see legendary Complexions Dance Company, and you’ve got a winning ticket — or better yet season ticket subscription!

Individual tickets and ticket subscriptions are now on sale at the University of South Carolina Department of Theatre and Dance website.

Don’t wait to Lock in Your Seat!

Vote for the Arts at USC with your ticket purchase!

And don’t miss

10 Minute Play Festival
Directed by Theatre Performance Faculty

Lab Theatre

Enjoy a fast-paced evening of laughter, heartbreak and everything in between as we present a collection of 10-minute plays, each directed by a different member of our theatre performance faculty.

Lab Theatre

Friday, Nov 3, 2023 at 8:00 PM (ET)

Classic Greek “Call-To-Action” Play The Trojan Women Comes to Lab Theatre

The UofSC Department of Theatre and Dance will present The Trojan Women, translated from Euripides’ ancient text by acclaimed scholar Nicholas Rudall, Feb. 26- March 1 at the Lab Theatre.

Show times are 8pm nightly. Tickets are $5, and available only at the door.  The Lab Theatre is located at 1400 Wheat St. in the Booker T. Washington building.

Senior theatre major Kelsea Woods is directing the centuries-old Greek meditation on the brutality of battle, which continues to move and inspire audiences, even in the present day. Euripides’ classic tragedy tells of the fates of the women who remain in the city of Troy after its destruction during the Trojan War.  Woods’ production of the play intends to give audience members a firsthand look at the human cost of war, as told by the women left to survive in the aftermath of their fractured world.

The director plans to use the entire Lab Theatre space, as well as unconventional seating, to immerse the audience in the action of the play.

“I knew I wanted to use different staging elements to really enhance the experience of this play, instead of just watching it proscenium style,” says Woods. “I’m playing with the sensation of place and time, and using design elements as characters almost. The audience will be considered ‘Trojan Women’ and there will be a set of rules to let them know what they are getting into. The whole Lab space will be playing space, the characters have been living their daily lives here, and the audience is walking straight into that.”

Woods’ vision for the production injects a contemporary, urban aesthetic into the ancient, war-torn world of the main characters. She imagines the surviving women of Troy living in a derelict subway, abandoned during the years of violence.

“These women have watched their families be killed and their city be destroyed, and they are waiting to see what is next for them,” says Woods. “But, they aren’t just going to sit around and do nothing.  This play was originally a call-to-action for the Greek people… and I see echoes of that within the Trojan Women themselves.”

Woods says she was drawn to direct the play after spending last summer in London at the American Institute of Foreign Study.  As a scholar with USC Beyond Boundaries and USC Carolina Global Study, Woods conducted research on experimental and immersive theatre.  Additionally, she began a dialogue with Dr. Josephine Machon, author of the pioneering textbook, Immersive Theatres, to further delve into the concepts.

“In my mind, immersive theatre is really an extra-sensory experience,” Woods says about the unorthodox production style.  “It’s really about imbuing all the senses and pulling you into the world of the story as if it’s happening around you.”

Appearing in the production are undergraduate students Jamie Boller, Rebecca Shrom, Cami Reid, John Floyd, Jon Whit McClinton, Jasmine James, Elizabeth Houck, Haley Sprankle, Brooke Smith and Ashley Graham.

“This production won’t be just ‘theatre,’ it will be an actual life experience,” says Woods. “That’s what immersive theatre does — it enhances your ability to intellectualize and interpret the text because you have now lived it, felt it and experienced it first hand. You will come out of this play a different person in some way, shape, or form.”

For more information on The Trojan Women or the theatre program at the University of South Carolina, contact Kevin Bush by phone at 803-777-9353 or via email at bushk@mailbox.sc.edu.