Theatre and passion are always in fashion - the Refashionista reviews "Love, Loss, and What I Wore"

As a lover of fashion, my editor here at Jasper assumed I’d be a great fit to review Love, Loss, and What I Wore at Trustus Theatre.   I was a little worried that this show wouldn’t be for me.  I hate conventional shopping and consumerism (99% of my wardrobe comes from local thrift stores), and I was worried that this show was going to be some sort of Sex and the City knockoff - more style than substance.

Based on the book by Ilene Beckerman, the stage adaptation by Nora and Delia Ephron explores the adventures, loves, friendships, and tragedies of an array of women, and how the fibers of the clothes they’ve worn through the years are forever entwined with their memories and the women they’ve become.  This is something that just about any woman (life-long nudists excluded), can understand.  We all remember what we wore for our first dates and for our first dances.  We remember that really hideous orange leather jacket that seems tres chic in high school, but we wouldn’t be caught dead in now.  Objects have power when tied to memories, and what objects do we share a more personal relationship with than our clothes?  They are expressions of who we are and how we want the world to see us.

The five women of this ensemble cast are Amy Brower, Emily Deck Harrill, Tiffany James, Jodie Cain Smith, and Caroline Weidner.  They each play several different characters, each with their own unique stories.  Some are moving, while others are hysterically funny.  Each actress does a fine job, and with a show like this, where each of the women play off each other in such an intimate way, I would find it inappropriate to point out individuals.   Director Larry Hembree has done a superb job of getting a multitude of compelling characters from his cast.  The renderings of decades of fashions by USC Art student Miranda Fuller give us a visual landscape as we travel through each woman’s life.  That being said, I found a few of the vignettes to be trite and formulaically crafted to elicit an emotional response without any real character development, but overall this show is well-written.

Love, Loss, and What I Wore works well in the intimate Side Door Theatre at Trustus, due to its minimalist requirements.  A cast of five, a few chairs, a bar, and a slightly judgmental guy on guitar (who also happens to be the show’s musical director, Jeremy Polley) are all this production requires…oh yes…and a few drinks to loosen up the memories.

Are you excited about this production?  Do you want to gather your girlfriends and check it out?  Well…I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Love, Loss, and What I Wore is completely sold out (even after adding on an additional Sunday matinee.)  However, perhaps if you pester Larry Hembree (he’s not just the show’s director, he’s also the Managing Director of Trustus Theatre), they’ll bring it back.  This has happened before. (And there's always the option to call the box office to check on any last-minute cancellations, and/or to see if there is any sort of waiting list in case of no-shows.)

~ Jillian Owens

Love, Loss, and What I Wore runs through Saturday, January 18th, 2013.  Shows on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays start at 8pm. The Sunday matinee on January 12^th will be at 3pm. The doors and box office open thirty minutes prior to curtain, and all Trustus Side Door tickets are $20 for general admission and $15 for students. Reservations can be made by calling the Trustus Box Office at (803) 254-9732, and tickets may be purchased online at www.trustus.org .     Except that as of now, the rest of the run is SOLD OUT.

The Richard and Debbie Cohn Trustus Side Door Theatre is located at 520 Lady Street, behind the Gervais St. Publix. Parking is available on Lady Street and on Pulaski Street. The Trustus Side Door Theatre entrance is through the glass doors on the Huger St. side of the building.     For more information or reservations call the box office Tuesdays through Saturdays 1-6 pm at 803-254-9732. Visit www.trustus.org for all show information and season info.

"A Christmas Carol" for the post-modern, steampunk generation - August Krickel reviews the new show at Trustus

When the pretty young lady, clad in Victorian-era garb but sporting short, natural hair, leans into the microphone and begins beatboxing, you know this isn't your father's Christmas Carol. It's still Charles Dickens's timeless story, however, but with plenty of reinvention from playwright Patrick Barlow, director/scenic designer Chad Henderson, and costumer Amy Lown.   Purists may raise an eyebrow or two at this post-modern take on a holiday classic, while purists of a different sort may wonder why Trustus Theatre is producing a family-friendly, feel-good version of a century-and-a-half-old novella, but there's no question that talent both on stage and behind the scenes ensures enjoyable seasonal entertainment with some decidedly non-traditional story-telling twists.

We're all familiar with Scrooge, but let's focus on Barlow for a moment.  He's best known for a stage adaptation of The 39 Steps, in which three actors played dozens of characters from the Hitchcock film, interacting with a rugged hero whose tongue was firmly planted in cheek; their quick changes of costume, wig, accent and gender, miming or improvising most sets and props while navigating the melodramatic plot and dialogue made for broad slapstick comedy.  Here Barlow uses the same technique, but retains respect for the original flowery prose.

Stann Gwynn, almost unrecognizable under heavy character make-up, plays Scrooge throughout.  The bulbous nose, ravaged face and bushy eyebrows (designed by Robin Gottlieb) are reminiscent of some of the dwarves from the recent screen version of The Hobbit - exaggerated but still believable - but more importantly, they seem to free Gwynn as an actor. He's played older before, he's done accents before, and he's played grandiloquent characters before, but I've never seen those all at once, with such sustained intensity over more than two hours. Avery Bateman, Catherine Hunsinger, Wela Mbusi, and Scott Herr portray everyone else, although the quick changes and jumps from one persona to the next occur fairly naturally.  Actors playing multiple roles is commonplace now on stage, and Barlow only occasionally uses that convention for comedy. Even the use of marionettes to depict young Scrooge and Tiny Tim prompts an initial surge of laughter from the audience, but then plays out in a fairly straightforward manner.  Indeed, I found myself wishing that there were a lot more comedy, even if improvised by the capable cast, especially in the first act. When Hunsinger appears as a sort of sexy, steampunk Spice Girl-turned-nanny in the second act as the Ghost of Christmas Present, the pace picks up, and Barlow occasionally veers away from the original Dickens text to insert jokes here and there, including a hilarious conclusion to Scrooge's dream that breaks the fourth wall unexpectedly.

All four of the mini-ensemble also double (triple?) as singers and musicians, providing mood music in the background via various instruments, and sometimes breaking out into traditional Christmas songs.  Both Hunsinger and Bateman, last seen together in Henderson's production of Spring Awakening two years ago, get to show off their lovely voices, but they actually are even more impressive in their mastery of multiple characters and authentic accents.  Dialect coach Marybeth Gorman (surely helped by Mbusi, a native of the U.K. who has worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company) has ensured a lively mix of credible twangs and lilts that are mainly Cockney, "proper" British, and Irish, but I swear I heard hints of Manchester, rural Yorkshire, and Wales here and there, which was quite refreshing.

A little more on the music:  sometimes, Henderson incorporates modern songs, from artists like Justin Timberlake and Panic! At The Disco. At other moments, the actors perform moody instrumental tunes, developed by cast and director before rehearsals began. Particularly effective are Hunsinger on cello at moments of poignancy and sorrow, and Herr on keyboards, creating menacing chords sung to by Bateman, as Mbusi appears as the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come.  Henderson uses a Line 6 Delay Modulator to create a number of beatbox and hip hop effects, as well as a Vocalist Live harmony effects processor. The tech gadgetry is certainly interesting; I'm not sure how much it actually adds to the performance, but it certainly livens up the proceedings. What is especially memorable is the production design, which incorporates a painted facade of a London street scene, plus expertly detailed projected images (snow falling, the hustle and bustle of city streets, a clock's face moving forward in time, the logo of Scrooge's business, a time vortex a la Doctor Who) courtesy of Baxter Engle.  Those projections are seen on a large round screen of sorts over stage left, and enhance the setting so much that I'd be happy to see similar effects in future productions. Amy Lown's excellent costumes include elegant Victorian attire, saucy steampunk-chic couture, and an ominous, tattered Christmas Yet to Come that could have been designed by Terry Gilliam.

Not everything works. The audio technology sometimes gets very loud, which is intended as a sort of in-your-face wake-up call to an audience that might get bored by the familiar material, but might be a little intimidating to the youngest or oldest attendees. (The show is completely G-rated, but its intensity, from the apparitions for example, might make this best for, say, age 10 and older.)  Sometimes the music and sound effects clash with the dialogue, and/or make it sound distorted.  The first act drags at times, and could use a lot more of the comedy found the second. A re-imagined Marley, his chains now controlled by the other three actors as if to signify his torment in the afterlife, seems awkward and unwieldy rather than scary.  Christmas Yet to Come is scary, but a Darth Vader-like heavy breathing effect got laughs where there needed to be chills.

This production is a new one, however, simultaneously opening here, off-Broadway, and at other regional theatres around the country, and new works are often revised. What impressed me about Barlow's adaptation is his incorporation of huge amounts of the original language from Dickens, made easily relatable by proficient performers, and his tweaking of its theme to resonate even more with contemporary audiences. Scrooge is no longer simply a cranky old man who had a sad childhood and bad experiences at Christmas; Barlow's Scrooge is now much more of a predatory lender, who seems to take delight in seeing the poverty of his fellow citizens, and gloats over his riches like Alberich and the Rhine gold.  Several of the supporting characters emphasize with great eloquence the "It takes a village" mentality, making it clear that charity and compassion are necessary far beyond the Christmas season.  It's no secret to local theatre-goers that director Henderson likes to liven up material that needs it with inventive staging.  I'd love to see him take this overall production theme - music, costumes, set design - and apply it to some classic of the stage like Shakespeare or Aristophanes.

At this point, one is likely to do one of two things. Either you will say "Wow - a Dickens classic with a twist, actors playing live music, Avery Bateman beatboxing, Catherine Hunsinger playing the cello and dressed as a steampunk babe - I've got to make reservations now!!"  Or all of that that may sound utterly ridiculous.  I must say that I had no real interest in seeing the story of Scrooge yet again, but I enjoyed this production; however, I generally enjoy these performers, and the way Henderson often toys with narrative technique for maximum dramatic effect.  Box office for this show will likely determine whether Trustus experiments more in this direction, or less.  But as I often find myself saying with local productions, either way, the people involved do a great job.

A Christmas Carol runs through Saturday, December 21st; contact the Trustus box office at 803-2254-9732 for more information, or visit www.trustus.org.

~ August Krickel

"Yes Virginia - The Musical" at On Stage Productions - a review by Melissa Swick Ellington

The On Stage Productions performance of Yes, Virginia The Musical offers plenty of heartfelt holiday spirit.  Drawn from an animated television special, the stage musical (with music by Wesley Whatley, lyrics by William Schermerhorn, and book adapted by William Schermerhorn from the animated special and storybook by Chris Plehal) has been developed by Macy’s as a performance opportunity for young people.

Based on a true story, the action unfolds during the year 1897 in New York City. Eight-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon questions whether Santa Claus is real. The search for truth takes her to the library as well as through the holiday bustle in the city, where Virginia encounters a bell-ringing “scraggly Santa” who reveals gifts for friendship and wisdom. Since she has been told “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so,” Virginia writes a letter to The New York Sun, asking “Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?” While the answer to her query is well known, the journey to that answer provokes curiosity.

Highlights of the performance feature the lovely singing voice of Liberty Broussard as Virginia, the clever timing of Rachael Sprankle as the whimsical Librarian, and the dynamic exuberance of Olivia Lesniak as Virginia’s best friend. Zach Tenney as Scraggly Santa exudes strong stage presence and communicates believable character development. JoJo Wallace conveys the mean girl role of Charlotte with vigorous energy, supported by her snooty cat Mrs. Whiskers (Mia Coats). Sincerity and sweetness emanate from the entire cast, particularly in the closing reprise of the title song. Additional cast members include Ella Johnson, Grace Beasley, Emma Cathryn Eubanks, Pierce Mejias, Perry Raines, Zavery Johnson, Paul Woodard, Heyward Moak, Cameron Eubanks, Turner Carson, and Major McCarty. The capable and dedicated production team includes Robert Harrelson (Director), Ryan Rogers (Youth Director), Rebekah Cheatham (Youth Choreographer),

Michelle Cheatham (Choreographer Coordinator), Debi Young (Rehearsal Music Coach), Brandon Moore (Stage Manager), and Tony Vaccaro (Stage Design and Props). April Wallace and Gina Moak Cotton designed costumes, Harrelson and Rogers planned lighting and sound, and Jill Larkin and Niane Szalwinski shared producer responsibilities. Production design establishes numerous locations effectively, such as Virginia’s home, the Sun office, the library, and the streets of New York City. Projections of images featuring different Santas from around the world emerge in the library sequence. Younger viewers will benefit from front row seats, as the audience arrangement can obstruct the view of little ones. The intimate performance space creates a cozy and welcoming environment; carol-singing and piano-playing plus a hot chocolate “bar” (and the delectable dessert offerings for sale) make intermission feel like a friendly holiday party.

The focus on youth engagement at On Stage Productions is commendable, as evidenced by inclusion of the student directing intern in the opening remarks, and the production’s involvement of an eleven-year-old choreographer. The young actors appear comfortable and confident on stage. The audience’s enjoyment of the performance is buoyed by the children’s delight in performing. (My six-year-old daughter confided after the first act, “Mommy, this seems like a GREAT place to be in a play!”) The earnest ensemble entreats in song: “Believe in joy. Believe in love. Believe your whole life through. Keep bright the light of childhood.” The light of childhood shines brightly at On Stage Productions this holiday season.

Want to learn more about the script and score? The website yesvirginiathemusical.com provides production resources which will delight young theatre artists. Interested in attending the On Stage performance? Visit www.onstagesc.com for tickets and further information. Yes, Virginia The Musical will be presented at the On Stage Performance Center (680 Cherokee Lane in West Columbia) at 7:30 pm on December 7, 12, 13, and 14, and at 2:30 pm on December 7, 8, 14, and 15.

~ Melissa Swick Ellington

Brian Childers plays Danny Kaye this weekend at Workshop Theatre, and talks about his roots in local theatre

This weekend, award-wining professional stage performer Brian Childers brings his critically-acclaimed one-man performance as Danny Kaye to the stage of Workshop Theatre for two shows only.    An Evening with Danny Kaye is co-sponsored by The Katie and Irwin Kahn Jewish Community Center as a fund raiser for the theatre. Show dates and times are: Sat. December 7 at 8 pm, and Sun. December 8 at 3 pm.

Childers, a Columbia native and veteran performer on local stages, took time recently to talk with Jasper about his career and this special production.

Jasper:  Tell us a little about your background, and how you became involved in theatre locally.

Childers:    I was born in Columbia, SC, and graduated from Irmo High School.  My first "role" was in a production at our school assembly. I played the Narrator, and my mother says there was no stopping me. I was singing from the time I was able, and sang in church and school all the time. I did my first children's theatre rroduction with (Bette Herring's) Upstage Children's Theatre in Columbia many years ago, but I really cut my teeth on working with such theatres as Workshop Theatre, Town Theatre and the Lexington Arts Association.

Jasper: What were some especially memorable shows at Workshop, and some people you really enjoyed working with?

Childers:  Growing up in Columbia, I always wanted to be in a show at Workshop Theatre, and I got the privilege to be in several shows there.  I did And the World Goes Round, a play called Scotland Road, Scrooge, the Stingiest Man in Town, and one of my all time favorite theatrical experiences was playing John Adams in 1776 at Workshop. I worked with such directors as David Swicegood, Cindy Flack, and Clarence Felder. I loved every set I have ever seen built by Randy Strange. I really love the staff and crew at Workshop.

Jasper: At what point did you make the transition into acting professionally?

Childers:    I finished college, and came back home for a year and a half, not sure what was the next step to take. I actually did a full season and a half of back-to-back shows at Town Theatre and Workshop Theatre. Those were some of the best times that I can remember. After that season I decided it was time to head up north and try my wings in show business.  I decided not to move directly to New York. I had many friends who had up and gone to the Big Apple and had not worked since!  Instead, I decided to move to Washington D.C.    There was, and is, a thriving theatre scene there. I thought that if I couldn't get cast in Washington, I certainly was not going to get cast in New York. I was incredibly lucky in Washington:  I worked constantly for the next 5 years.  (After) my first audition, I landed the role of Emory in Boys in the Band at my first professional theatre company, The American Century Theatre. It was this theatre that brought about the life changing role of Danny Kaye.

Jasper:  You first played Kaye in Danny and Sylvia; how did you initially get cast?

Childers:  I was in a production of Hollywood Pinafore with The American Century Theater.  I was playing the role of Raif Rackstraw. When Jack Marshall (the show's director and the artistic director of the theatre) and I discussed what to do with this character, unbeknownst to us at the time, we really shaped him as a Danny Kaye-type without meaning to. There was one scene in particular that Jack saw me play and apparently the lightbulb went on.  Jack had had the script on his desk of Danny and Sylvia, but was convinced he needed someone who really could be Danny. So when Jack saw the scene in the show he ran back to me at intermission and said, “You are going to play Danny Kaye, and I have a script on my desk.”  I immediately said "Oh, I love Danny Kaye", but the truth was I knew very little if nothing about him. I went home that night and googled Danny Kaye... and then I thought "WHAT HAVE I GOT MYSELF INTO??"   Once we started rehearsals with Jack Marshall, I knew all was going to be fine. He directed me and taught me how to play Danny Kaye.  And that was the start of this incredibly long wonderful journey. I have been playing Danny Kaye on and off for over 13 years.

Jasper:  Kaye was a huge star at one point, but perhaps not as well known now to modern audiences, apart from his iconic role in White Christmas. What do you think about him as a performer, and then as a character to play?

Childers:  Danny was really a genius. He could sing, dance, act, clown, and hold an audience in the palm of his hand. He was a true entertainer. That word isn’t used much these days. You have a singer, or a dancer, or even a triple threat, but Danny was much more than all those things. At one point he was the highest paid actor in Hollywood.  Danny conducted symphony orchestras, was a professional Chinese chef, a pilot and was fascinated by surgery of any kind. Versatile was definitely a way to describe Danny.

Playing Danny as a character has been one of the greatest challenges and most fulfilling things I have ever done as an actor and performer. Danny was complicated offstage and yet was so wonderful with an audience onstage. It's a dream for any actor to dive into a role like that.

Jasper:    What are some particularly enjoyable roles and shows that you have done?

Childers:  Of course playing Danny Kaye Off-Broadway for three years was pretty spectacular. Danny still remains my favorite role. When I first arrived in DC, I landed the part of Emory in Boys in the Band. Perhaps because it was my first real professional experience,or just the great character that it is, I loved that role. I was fortunate to be cast in a brand new musical called 90 North at the Kennedy Center, which made me a member of Actor's Equity, the theatrical union. I played Tom Sawyer on the National Tour of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and loved the cast and the role.  And starring in a national tour was a very big learning experience.   I actually loved playing John Adams at Workshop Theatre in 1776. When I got the call that I was cast, I was floored.  I told the director I was entirely too young, and I was performing with some terrific actors in the theatre scene there at the time. He told me trust him, and it would be fine. I did, and I loved the role and the cast of that show.

Jasper:  What can audiences expect from this performance in Columbia?

Childers:  An Evening with Danny Kaye is just as it sounds. I have been in several different book musicals of his life, (including) Danny and Sylvia and another very successful show I did called The Kid from Brooklyn. Both covered his life story. This show is not that.  Danny used to perform one-man concerts all over the world. Many people over the years came up to me and said "Why don't you do a show that was like the concerts he used to do?" So I put together this show. The idea is that the audience is coming to see Danny in his one-man concert.  There is nothing but music and stories. I perform some of his greatest material, from  "Tchaikovsky", "Minnie the Moocher" to  "Hans Christian Andersen" and of course "White Christmas". The show is filled with great music and laughter - a fun and exciting evening at the theatre. My hope is that it will bring nostalgia to some and for others (introduce) this great performer to a new generation.

Jasper:  Finally, why do you feel organizations like Workshop Theatre are important to a city like Columbia?

Childers:  I believe that theatres such as Workshop play a vital role in both the community and in the cultivation of young talent. Community theatre enriches the lives of those who take an active part in it, as well as those in the community who benefit from live theatre productions. On either side of the footlights, those involved represent a diversity of age, culture, life experience, and a strong appreciation of the importance of the arts. Places like Workshop Theatre are essential and must be preserved and nurtured. I know that I would not be where I am without actively taking a part in Workshop Theatre. It is a privilege to be able to return and perform at Workshop Theatre.

...................

Brian Childers won the Helen Hayes Award for Best Actor in a Musical for  Danny and Sylvia: A Musical Love Story, as well as the Mary Goldwater Award for his portrayal. The  New York Times wrote that this was "an outstanding performance by Brian Childers as Kaye," while Talkin’ Broadway said: "Childers makes you feel as if you are watching the real Danny Kaye. Every gesture is perfect and he has mastered the mimicry and dialects that were such a great part of Kaye's performances."  In 2014, Childers will play the title role in The Jazz Singer Off-Broadway.  You can also learn more about his career at http://www.brianchilders.net.

Details on this special performance can be found at the Facebook event page  and at the Workshop Theatre site.  Tickets are available online,  or call the Workshop box office at 803-799-6551.

~ August Krickel

"Ho Ho Ho" at Columbia Children's Theatre - a review by Melissa Swick Ellington

Ho Ho Ho offers bright and energetic holiday entertainment at Columbia Children’s Theatre.  Designed to engage even the youngest audience members, this production features wacky humor in the custom of British pantomime.   As “panto” embraces audience participation and madcap folly, Ho Ho Ho keeps viewers shouting with gleeful laughter at the silly antics of familiar festive characters.  Father and Mother Christmas (i.e. Santa and Mrs. Claus) face rollicking chaos as they strive to reclaim elusive holiday spirit amid comical mishaps.  Tradition blends with pop culture references as elves cavort to contemporary hit songs. Audience members will enjoy participating in this rowdy ride through pursuit of Christmas magic.  The boisterous comic style of the show embraces broad physical jokes as in vaudeville, including slapstick sequences that may startle some of the youngest viewers, as well as a bit of potty humor that will appeal to a wide cross-section of audience members. (Truth be told, my husband and I laughed even harder than our children did during one particularly memorable sound cue sequence…I bet you’ll know which one if you see the show.)

As directed by Frank Thompson, the production maintains a brisk pace and admirable clarity. Cast members work together in a vibrant, captivating ensemble. In the central role of Father Christmas, Lee O. Smith brings empathy and warmth to his character in the midst of the wild hijinks. Will Moreau as the Musical Elf shares a special talent for mesmerizing the young audience, often without speaking a word. Mother Christmas (Christy Shealy Mills) drives the play’s narrative with vivacity, while the effervescent elves are portrayed with enthusiastic commitment by Elizabeth Stepp and Bill DeWitt. (Andy Nyland serves as understudy for the role of Elf Boy Len).

As ever with a CCT play, commendable production values are maintained, with sound design by Frank Thompson and costume design by Donna Harvey and Jerry Stevenson. Costumes combine recognizable holiday attire (that iconic red suit) with surprising delights (an ever-changing parade of zany hats). Complex action onstage relies on offstage support; clearly, this production has a superb team in place. Stage manager extraordinaire Jami Steele-Sprankle keeps the mayhem under control and provides effective backstage organization. Sound technician Anthony Harvey delivers praiseworthy precision in the execution of numerous sound cues which are essential to the show’s comedy, while David Quay supplies dependable light board operation.

As a parent, I was particularly gratified by the actors’ knack for nurturing my preschool son’s focus throughout the performance. He was able to engage in the audience-actor transaction of live theatre at a level of understanding that I hadn’t seen from this little boy before. The youngsters in attendance at this matinee performance were charmed by the actors, and became visibly invested in the play’s events.

Before the performance, cast and crew members involve children in coloring stocking ornaments and helping to decorate the onstage tree. A gentle approach to audience participation invites eager kids to take part in various opportunities, but does not overwhelm more reserved children. Stick around after the show to meet the cast, get autographs, and take photos. (My daughter observed, “I love when the actors autograph my program at Columbia Children’s Theatre!”)

Early in the performance, my youngest child chortled with laughter after a funny physical sequence and declared, “Ohhhh that is SO silly.” Yes, Ho Ho Ho, scripted by award-winning British children's playwright Mike Kenny, is indeed “so silly,” in the most affirming and affectionate sense of the term. Columbia Children’s Theatre offers our community a comedic gift this holiday season in a fast-paced and cheery romp. Head on over to Ho Ho Ho, jumpstart your holiday spirit, and laugh your cares away with Father Christmas and friends at Columbia Children’s Theatre.

~ Melissa Swick Ellington

"Planet Hopping" at the Harbison Theatre - a review by Melissa Swick Ellington

 

Planet Hopping Is Out of This World

The actor questions, “Is everybody ready to go back to earth?”

“No!” declares a young boy in the audience.

He was certainly not the only one who wanted to prolong tonight’s premiere performance of Planet Hopping: An Intergalactic Puppet Musical. This luminous collaboration between the puppet artists of Belle et Bête and popular “kindie” rock band Lunch Money reveals the theatrical magic possible when innovators imagine together. The performance quality easily rivals family-oriented productions I have attended at national theatre education conferences as well as various venues in New York City. Planet Hopping is a marvel that has been created right here in Columbia, and you don’t want to miss it.

Developed as part of the Harbison Theatre @ MTC Performance Incubator, Planet Hopping shares a voyage from earth to outer space with an emphasis on the power of friendship. Kimi Maeda brings engaging charisma to the play’s puppet hero (Stella Spark, “an astrophysicist when she was just a lass”), while Lyon Hill skillfully characterizes Stella’s sidekick marionette, the lovable and quirky robotic assistant Jack. Through Stella’s Planet Hopping technology, the audience accompanies the characters on a dramatic journey through the solar system, led by the appealing tour guide Mollinda (Molly Ledford). The incorporation of fantasy with scientific facts will delight both children and their adults.

The Lunch Money band members (Ledford, J.P. Stephens, and Jay Barry) are as captivating as ever, sharing clever lyrics and rocking tunes that resonate with music lovers of all ages. One of the production’s greatest strengths is the seamless inclusion of the multi-talented band members as purposeful characters in the story. The “Amazing on the Moon” musical number melds band, projection screen, puppeteer, and marionette in a charming sequence made extra special by a puppet moonwalking…on the moon. The crowd-pleasing “Big Ball of Gas” Jupiter rap performed by P.J. the “new guy” (Stephens) with beatboxing by Jack the robot (Hill) becomes a highlight of the show.

Planet Hopping benefits from an admirable unity of production design, with creative use of lighting effects, video projections, and shadow puppetry. Want to learn about zoetropes, moveable cutouts, marionettes, transparencies, scrims, and more? Check out a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at the production here: http://www.harbisontheatre.org/behind-the-scenes-with-planet-hopping/. You can also read composer/lyricist Molly Ledford’s insights into the development of the show’s music, which includes “a bubblegum pop song about orbiting” and “a rockin’ number about enjoying 1/6 of our normal gravity on the moon.”

What a gift this collaboration is to our community. My six-year-old daughter spotted a promotional poster weeks ago and has been pleading to “go see the show Planet Hopping” ever since; I am grateful for her awareness and persistence, because this production is a one-of-a-kind experience. Upon receiving a sticker badge when exiting the theatre, my kid sighed happily, “It is amazing to be an official Planet Hopper.”

You can go hop planets with Captain Stella Spark and crew on Saturday, November 16 at 2 pm at the Harbison Theatre at Midlands Technical College (803-407-5011 or www.harbisontheatre.org).

"Sleuth" at Workshop Theatre - a review by Jillian Owens

Would you like to play a game?

No no no! This isn’t the latest installment of a poorly-written body horror series. This is Sleuth, a mystery/thriller by Anthony Shaffer. The title made me think this play was  probably a just silly British farce of some sort. I hadn’t seen it, or either of its film versions (both starring Michael Caine.) Upon entering the theatre, I was warned that  “There will be at least one, and possibly more gunshots in this show.” by at least three  ushers.

"Spoilers,” I thought.

The show opens in the lavish country home of Andrew Wyke (played by Hunter Boyle), a successful writer of many mystery novels and a man obsessed with games.  He’s clever, and he knows it.  Games of strategy and wit are what he lives for.  Shaffer once said he based parts of this character on his friend, Stephen Sondheim, who also  shared a love of games.

Unfortunately, his wealth and intelligence aren’t enough to captivate his much younger  wife. She has left him for the handsome young Milo Tindle (played by the also  handsome Jason Stokes). Wyke invites Tindle to his home to presumably discuss the  details of his pending divorce from his wife.

Sleuth surprised me in many ways. As I said, I didn’t expect this play to be much more than a witty farce. But it is much smarter than that. What begins as a situation comedy, with plenty of funny wit-matching and clever dialogue, becomes something far darker  and complex as the action unfolds. Wyke and Tindle aren’t the only ones playing  games here. This script was written to toy with the audience and their expectations as  well. Just when we’re comfortable and think we understand what this show is about,  Sleuth takes another turn - carefully placing its next piece.

Boyle and Stokes are well-cast in their roles as the jilted-but-proud novelist and the  young-but-not-so-dumb lover. It’s a tricky thing to go from quick banter to far scarier  places at the drop of a hat, but they do this fairly well. Their British accents aren’t bad, although a bit of Southern crept in every now and again. There were opportunities  where they could really brought out the more sinister moments of this play with even  more intensity, but I only saw this show on its opening night. With seasoned actors  such as these, I expect even more commanding performances as the show  progresses.

Randy Strange’s country manor set is impressive, with all the trappings of wealth  presented in a style you’d expect of Wyke. Alexis Doktor’s costumes are nicely done as well, although they seemed to lean towards the 1970 publication date of this play, rather  than the contemporary setting that is indicated by the use of a few modern bits of  technology throughout the show. There were a couple of technical glitches in the  performance I caught, but seeing Hunter Boyle play them off made me forgive thesesmall flukes.

I hope others aren’t put off like I almost was by what kind of play they assume Sleuth may be, because you really don’t know. Trust me. I would love to share more...but I’m afraid  that would just ruin the game.  The play runs through Sat. 11/23; call the box office for ticket information at 803-799-6551, or visit http://www.workshoptheatre.com.

~ Jillian Owens

"Venus in Fur" - a review of the new show at Trustus Theatre by August Krickel

Thomas is a serious author, determined to bring an influential work of Victorian eroticism to life on stage. Vanda is a brassy, uncultured actress. who assumes she's auditioning for glorified "S&M porn." Which she's totally down for.  His pencil-thin mustache, chiseled jawline, and rich baritone delivery channel his 19th-century protagonist, as he reads lines from classical poetry and his own play with passion and conviction. She shows up wearing lingerie and heels under a raincoat, although she assures him that "usually I'm really demure and sh!t."  He's Errol Flynn by way of Don Draper, dismissing her with a suave "if you will;" she’s Miley Cyrus, rendering his expression into the more modern "Whatever."

In Hollywood, this mismatched couple, played by Bobby Bloom and Jennifer Moody Sanchez, would be destined to fall in love. Off-Broadway, where David Ives's Venus in Fur premiered before a seven-month, critically-acclaimed run on Broadway, she's destined to tie him up and make him beg for more.  The new production at Trustus Theatre (which only runs through this weekend) is many things simultaneously:

- a seemingly straightforward, 2-person character study of actress and first-time director who begin  to take on the personas of their fictive counterparts as they run lines from his play.

- a recreation of the infamous 1870 novella, by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, whose surname gave us the term "masochism," and who attempted to explain dominance and submission (from a man's perspective, anyway) in terms of reverence for an all-powerful, goddess-like image of female perfection.

- a contemporary examination of gender roles, and how women are portrayed and perceived in art, and in life.

- a murky journey through primal, mythological themes of mother goddesses and retribution.

- a covertly wicked satire of the audition/rehearsal process, where a director's routine instructions to a performer (e.g. "Stand there. No, more to your left. Now do the scene again. Again.  Stronger this time!") become a metaphor for S&M, and vice-versa.

- a fast-paced comedy, at times, with plenty of laughter and wit.

- a thriller in which both leads may have hidden agendas: how does Vanda know so much about Thomas's new play, and about his life? How is she able to give such a sophisticated reading, when Thomas feels she fails to understand even the basics of the character?  And is Thomas simply an up-and-coming playwright with vision, or does he have way too much attachment and connection to the themes explored in his work?  There's thunder, and lightning, and the way she loves him is frightening.

Bloom and Sanchez are alone on stage for nearly two hours, with no intermission (so be sure to visit the bar, and/or the facilities, just before curtain.) The play is a showcase for two talented performers, and they never disappoint. Both excel not only in embodying their primary characters but also in switching to their roles in the play-within-the play, whose own natures evolve as the show progresses.  As Vanda, Sanchez is all awkward arms and legs; as Wanda, the role she reads for, those limbs become elegant, willowy, and graceful.  She gets the majority of the laugh lines, while Blooms gets most of the play's eloquent ones, as when he describes how "two people meet, and ignite each other." Both are to be commended for bravery on stage, with Sanchez spending half the show in lingerie (although no more revealing than a typical swimsuit at the beach) and Bloom forced into moments of extreme emotional vulnerability.

The show is quite talky, esoteric, and abstract, with references to Tristan and Isolde, Paris and Anchises, Dionysus and the Bacchae.  Clues and red herrings, are dropped throughout as to what really may be going on, but when Thomas and Vanda reach an impasse, where he decides she is wrong for the role, and she implies that she never wanted it, something compels both to finish the scene, as if their fictive counterparts' lives are more important than their own.

A surprise ending may leave some feeling empowered from an uplifting and important, if shocking, message; others may feel cheated or short-changed. Scholars of theatre, history, and literature will appreciate a return to the form's most archetypal roots,  while a few  may simply echo the sorority girl from the viral video, saying "Wait.... what?"  I wonder if Ives began with a stage version of the original novella, then realized that it needed post-modern commentary and analysis via the framing device of the audition, and finally realized that he had painted himself into a narrative corner, with no way for a believable denouement. Or perhaps the final five minutes are the only logical way for this piece to play out, exactly as Ives intended.  However, as I expressed to the cast - this isn't hard when there are only two - screw the ending if you don't like it, because for me the play was all about the journey, not the destination.  It's a great chance to see two gifted young performers, capably directed by Jim O'Connor,  in the roles of a lifetime, and you will definitely be talking about the issues and themes addressed on your way home.

Because of the production’s limited run, there will be two performances on the evening of Friday, Nov. 15, at 7:30 and 10 PM. For more information or reservations, call the box office at 803-254-9732, or visit www.trustus.org.

~  August Krickel

Grant Show, in town to play Dracula for the Columbia City Ballet, talks with Jasper (pt. 2)

 

In Part 1 of our interview with Grant Show, he discussed the challenges of taking on a dance role as the titular Count in Dracula: Ballet With a Bite, presented by the Columbia City Ballet this Thursday, Friday and Saturday, October 24-26 at the Koger Center.  Discussion now turns to his career, and how a role in community theatre long ago led to a career as an actor.

Jasper:  I take it you're on a break now, since you have a new series (Devious Maids, on Lifetime.)  Congratulations - how's that going?

Grant Show:  Thank you.  It's going great.  We finished our season real strong.  We started out OK, and had this really nice build, as far as the audience, which I think is a really good sign.  I think the show is really great - I never really had any doubts about it.

Jasper:  So it's officially coming back for another season?

Show:  Oh yeah, definitely.  We go back to work in January.  It'll be back on the air I think the beginning of April.  We're starting earlier this year than last year. Last year was a summer show, and this year it's going to be more of a spring show, in 2014. The cast has been pared down quite a bit, but it was massive, that cast. It had like 18 members, and I think we’re down to 12, which is a big cast anyway.  They've told us a little about what's going to happen next year. I'm excited about it.    My character Spence, and Rosie, who are sort of star-crossed lovers throughout, are broken up in the end, and it takes Spence down a really bad path. He ends up becoming a hot mess. (laughs) I'm looking forward to it.  That was the way it was described to me: he's a hot mess. (laughs more)

Jasper:  You're often described as "television star Grant Show," or "Grant Show from Melrose Place," or from your new series...but you actually began as a stage actor.

Show: Well yeah, I had done a lot of stage.

Jasper: You studied theatre in college, at UCLA.

Show:  Well yeah. My first real job (as Rick Hyde, on Ryan's Hope) was a television job, and then I did a lot of back and forth, gosh, for ten years maybe.  And then once I got Melrose Place, once you're on a show, it's really hard to do theatre.  After I left Melrose Place, for the next three or four years I did a bunch more theatre (including Wit on Broadway, and The Glass Menagerie, as the Gentleman Caller, with Elizabeth Ashley at The Alley Theatre in Houston)  and then I moved out to California, and it's very difficult to do both. Your agents don't want you to do theatre.  There’s no money in it. They don't believe the long term, about how it develops you as an actor, as an artist.  They just don't get it.  They don't see any advantage in doing theatre.  They're not doing it, but for us, it's fun.

Jasper: You actually took a break from television after your first series, and went off to London to study at LAMDA (the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts) - what was going through your mind at that point?

Show:  I knew that what I was doing, on a daytime soap, wasn't what I wanted to do.  And I also knew that I wasn’t really that good of an actor yet. There was something they were doing over there, and I wanted to go see what they were doing.  I don't even know how much I learned, but it was fun.  I had a good time.  It was like a year of summer camp for actors.

Jasper: Similar to your undergrad experience?

Show:  No, more intense.  A lot more intense. We worked every day, seven or eight hours a day, for nine months.  I couldn't have not learned something - I had to learn something.  What, I couldn’t tell you.  But it was great.  If you have the opportunity...I knew I wanted to do it for at least a year before my contract was up. So I saved up my money, I was young, I was 27, so let's go have fun.  And I did.

Jasper:  Did you always plan on being an actor?

Show:  No.  I was going to be a pilot.  I had planned on flying for the Air Force. But we were poor, and I was in a public school, and you're not going to get into the Air Force Academy out of a public school, so the only real private education I could get was at a parochial, or religious, school.  Very early into being there, I realized I didn't like people telling me what to do. So I left there, and quit that whole plan.  I was well on the way - Eagle Scout, Senator's letter of recommendation... there's a whole bunch of steps you have to have.  I had gotten it all stacked up already, but I just needed to get the right education.  I realized "Yeah, not for me - the military's not gonna do it for me."  So I kind of goofed off for a long time.  I did some plays in high school, just as something to do.  I was a couple of years out of high school, not knowing what I wanted to do, and I did a community theatre play, and I was like "You know?  If they'll pay me to do this, I like this."

Jasper:  What was the show?

Show: Oh, it was some musical revue.  And I don't sing. It was just something that somebody put together, it wasn't a big thing.

Jasper: But you enjoyed it enough, to pursue that as a career?

Show:  Oh yeah. And I've been very, very, very, very blessed.

Jasper:  Do you know what ran on cable not too long ago?  Ice (a made-for-tv natural disaster movie that ran on ABC in the summer of 2000, about Californians struggling to escape and survive a sudden Ice Age.)

Show:  Oh my godddddd.

Jasper:  You know, one of your co-stars in that movie was also a famous screen Dracula -  Udo Keir, who was Andy Warhol's Dracula.

Show:   Yes, yeah I know that. God, they missed the boat on that (Ice.)  That could have been a good, good, fun movie. I just think that....it was okay....

Jasper:  It was actually pretty good.

Show:  It was okay.

Jasper:  The story was actually...

Show:  It was okaaaaay.

Jasper:    Just done on a miniscule budget, but a pretty cool idea.

Show:    It just missed. You never get any time on those things. You get it, and you've got a couple of weeks, maybe, at most,  and they fly you up, and then you start working on it, and it's just work work work work.  And after we're all done, I'm like "Aaaah, god, we could have done this, we could have done that..." I  had all these thoughts in my head about what we could have done.   It's nature of the beast.

Jasper:  We're also fans of Burn Notice, and big Bruce Campbell fans. Any stories about working on that series?

Show: Aw, he's great. (thinks) Nothing all that crazy happened. I loved it.  You know, Jeffrey (Donovan, the star) and I tested opposite each other for that role that Jeffrey ended up doing, so it was probably going to be between me and him. And when they asked me to come in and do a few episodes, I was like "No, I'm not going to come in and play a co-star to someone I read opposite!  I'm not going to be his supporting actor.  They were like "Why don't you read the script, and see?"  And it wasn't just a supporting actor to him, it was a pretty big character, and I had a lot of fun doing it.  I just love those guys. Matt Nix, the creator - he's great. He's terrific.  I talked to him about his whole writing process, and he was really super-supportive, and ready to talk - he's just a good dude.

Jasper:  Apart from your new series, which isn't even new any more, do you have anything else in the works?

Show:  No, that's it.  Katherine and I bought a house on the Marina peninsula that is 90-some years old, that hasn't been touched in 40 years. We're remodeling that, so that's kind of nice.  But I go back to work in two months. So there's not really enough time for anything.

Jasper:  So nothing on the side?

Show:  This.  This is it right now.

Jasper:  Have you visited Columbia before?

Show:  No.  I've played golf in Greenville.  Columbia is great though. I haven't really seen much of it. I've seen from the hotel to the studio, and from the studio...to the hotel.  That's all I've seen.  I keep waiting for someone to give me some barbecue. I love me some pork.  But I'm just so busy - this is really kind of a lot, this is (laughing) kind of ridiculous trying to get me ready to do this in four days. So that's all I'm doing. So then I get home, and I'm in my room, doing the steps, and it's not the newest building in the world.  So the floors are all wood, and all creaking around, and I'm sure the person below is like "Yaaaaaa - damn you!  Stop it!  What are you doing up there?"

Jasper:  Thinking about arts now in the broadest sense - what do you see as the role of the arts, and acting, and drama, from a societal viewpoint?

Show:  In the biggest, broadest sense, it's just a sort of visceral understanding that no man is an island, that we're all in this together.  In a real broad sense, that's it - we're all here together.

Jasper:  What do you see happening in the future with the performing arts, especially at the local level, with local playhouses, local ballets, local opera companies that are struggling in the current economy?

Show:  It feels like you can see the light at the end of the tunnel.  I'm not in it that much, though, I'm not in the trenches. I mean I know you guys just lost a ballet company (in Charleston.) But maybe that's an opportunity.  I believe it's an opportunity for William. He's definitely going to pick up the slack there.  I think it's unfortunate that it's the first place (arts) that money is taken away from, but it's a fact of life. Live theatre, or ballet, if they can't survive because no one's going to see them, then maybe they're not relevant anymore.  I believe they are. And I believe they will.

Jasper:  Finally, what are some favorite roles you have played?

Show:  Both of them are in television shows.  I did a series, gosh, almost ten years ago now, called Point Pleasant.   Marti Noxon (an executive producer on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice, and consulting producer on Glee and Mad Men) was the producer.   I played this guy who had sold his soul to the Devil.  He was basically the Devil's Pope. It was all supernatural crap, and he was just really fun.  The guy could do anything. He didn't give a crap about anybody.  He was a true villain, and that was really fun to play. And then the opposite side of the spectrum, the character I played in Swingtown, Tom Decker - he just wanted to make sure that everybody knew they were invited to the party.  He was the guy that says "you're good enough, you're pretty enough, and damn it, people like you.  Come on in - let's have sex!"  He was really fun, to just be free to just be welcoming to everyone, and your  whole goal is to try to make everybody else feel good about themselves. That was really fun.

Jasper:  And is there any role that you've always wanted to play?

Show:  (without hesitation) Yeah - James Bond!  I think I was born in the wrong area (i.e. America), and I missed my boat on that one.  But what guy doesn't want to play James Bond?

~ August Krickel

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Columbia City Ballet presents Dracula: Ballet with A Bite at the Koger Center, running from Thursday, Oct. 24 - Saturday, Oct. 26, at 7:30 p.m. Tickets can be purchased at Capitol Tickets, online at www.capitoltickets.com, or by calling (803) 251-2222. University students are encouraged to take advantage of special discount student pricing on Thursday, Oct. 24: all tickets are $10 with a valid student ID.

"This creature, this man, this person, this thing" - Actor Grant Show talks about playing Dracula for the Columbia City Ballet (pt. 1)

I very nearly miss actor Grant Show as I arrive at Drip on Main to talk about his upcoming role in the Columbia City Ballet's Dracula:  Ballet With a Bite. Dressed casually in workout clothes, looking down at his smartphone, he could be any young urban Main Street or Vista professional, stopping off for coffee after a jog or a visit to the gym, and not a visiting star from Hollywood on a break from rehearsal.  His publicity photo as Dracula doesn't do him justice.  He's the leanest, wiriest, tannest, fittest guy you can imagine, looking not much older than his character Jake Hanson did from 1992-1997 in the popular Fox series Melrose Place.   Since then, he's starred in a number of series (Point Pleasant, Swingtown, Accidentally on Purpose) cable television movies (Sex and the Single Mom, Natalee Holloway) and feature films (last year's The Possession) and has had recurring roles in series like Big Love, Burn Notice, and Private Practice.  Currently one of the stars of Lifetime's hit Devious Maids, which will return for a second season next spring, Show will portray the the blood-sucking Transylvanian Count in three performances this coming Thursday October 24 through Saturday October 26, at 7:30 PM at the Koger Center.   He shared some thoughts about this production, and his career this past Friday afternoon, the day before the production opened out of town in Savannah.

Jasper:  How did you first become involved with Dracula?

Grant Show:   Because William Starrett is pretty persuasive, as I'm sure everyone in Columbia already knows.  My wife, Katherine LaNasa (currently seen as Lizzie Ambrose on A & E's Longmire)  was a dancer. She danced with William in Europe. She stopped dancing professionally when she was in her 20's - she danced from when she was about 16 to about 26.  So I've known William for a couple of years now; William came out for our wedding.

Jasper:  You're a newlywed, correct?  Congratulations!

Show:  A year.  We're just past newlyweds now.  Thanks!   Katherine and William are doing a reality show, not in the sense of a "Housewives" reality show - it's more of  docu-reality show, what a documentary used to really be, about the Company.  So we've been a lot more in touch with him in the last couple of months.  They shot it a long time ago, and they're in the middle of making a deal on that.  I'm not a dancer, I've never been.  In my movement class at LAMDA (the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts) they called me "the Lorry Driver."  This is a Herculean effort, to try to get me to a place where there is any grace - but that's kind of why I wanted to do it.  I think (William) likes bringing in actors too - he's really terrific.

Jasper:  He's played Dracula himself, he's had dancers in the lead, and he's had actors play the role, so he's done it both ways.

Show:  He's a really creative guy, and creativity is really spurred on by disparate input.  His creativity is sparked when something new comes along, and having to deal with my limitations makes him more creative. Myself as well, me coming in here and trying to figure out what I can do and can't do. And then pushing the limits of what I can do.

Jasper:  Have you surprised yourself?

Show:  I don't know if I'm doing it well yet, but I'm doing way more than I thought I would.   I'm doing lifts!  I didn't think I was going to be dancing at all.  I thought I was just going to come in, (shifting into a Bela Lugosi-style voice) "and be Dracula!" and then kind of sweep out.  But he's got me in full-on numbers, quite a bit - a lot more than I thought.  I'm doing a lot of lifts. When they suggested it to me, I was like "You guys are nuts!  I'm going to take this part and just...walk across the stage?   People study for years before they do that!"  But the girls are so good;  everyone there is so good, that they're making me look better than I am.  And I'm having a lot of fun.  I am, I'm having a great time, just a lot of fun.  The weirdest thing is: I've seen one ballet in my life.  It's not my thing, or it wasn't.  The emotion that comes over me  most often now during rehearsal - not when I'm working, but when I'm waiting to work - is (that) I'm jealous of these people.  I'm very jealous.   I will never have anywhere near the grace that these that guys have.  Even if I decided now that I wanted to, it's too late. I've missed that boat.  And I'm a little bit jealous of these guys, if not a lot jealous of these guys. They're incredibly athletic and graceful and artistic, all at the same time, something I will never have.

Jasper:  How challenging is it to do an acting role with lots of movement, but no dialogue?

Show:  It's different.  They're not putting any pressure on me, so there's no fear, I don't have any fear here.  Not yet.  Maybe I will before the curtain goes up tomorrow.  The first three days I was just learning where I was supposed to be standing on the stage.  I got here Monday night.  So Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday... maybe a little bit Thursday afternoon, I started to act, but  there's really been no acting, it's just been "What do I do next, what do I do next? "  and listening to the music.  The cues are very different. There are some visual, but mostly, it's auditory cues, so re-training myself for that, that's difficult, and today was really the first time that I was able to go "What kind of choices am I going to be making?"  And of the choices I've already made for this character, for this creature, this man, this person, this thing, can I incorporate them, will they work?  It is challenging. And I don't have a lot of time  to do it.

Jasper:  That's not bad for three days.

Show:  I feel OK , considering. Unfortunately people in the audience aren't going to know that there's a "considering"  They come to see a show.  They don't come to see a show with a caveat of "Oh, well he's only had this much time."  They just want to see a good show.  One thing that is very challenging is, that if you're in a scene in a play, or a tv show, or a movie, or whatever, you can do that scene, with whoever you're working with;  it generally doesn't have more than two or three people at the most. You can do it again, do it again, do it again.  You can try different things, and keep trying.  But (here) you've got the entire company. If I want to work on one little moment, you've got to get the entire company together, you've got to cue the music up, you've got to move into it, so you really only get two or three shots at it in a day, in a whole day.  So that's really difficult and challenging - it's new.

Jasper:  You said "this character, this creature, this man, this person, this thing." So which is it?  How are you approaching the role?

Show:  Well you have to play it as a person, as a man.  The closest thing that I'm kind of, playing with, is that he's really kind of a sexual predator.  But there's also some things that are child-like about him, that maybe a sexual predator has as well, so that's kind of what I'm playing with.  Are you (the audience) going to see any of this?  I have no idea.  These are just thoughts in my head.

In Part 2, Grant Show discusses his current series Devious Maids, how he broke into acting then took a break to develop his craft, as well as favorite roles, roles he was very nearly cast in, and roles he would love to play.   Columbia City Ballet presents Dracula: Ballet with A Bite at the Koger Center, running from Thursday, Oct. 24 - Saturday, Oct. 26, at 7:30 PM. Tickets can be purchased at Capitol Tickets, online at www.capitoltickets.com, or by calling (803) 251-2222. University students are encouraged to take advantage of special discount student pricing on Thursday, Oct. 24: all tickets are $10 with a valid student ID.

~ August Krickel

Math, science, history, unraveling the mysteries - a review of "Arcadia" at USC's Drayton Hall

Depth of talent both onstage and behind the scenes is showcased in Theatre South Carolina's production of Sir Tom Stoppard's Arcadia, running now through Saturday at USC's Drayton Hall Theatre. Often hailed as the most important work from one of the giants of contemporary theatre, Arcadia is both witty and cerebral, tackling esoteric issues through the seemingly frivolous interactions of some very eloquent, highly intellectual characters. It takes a lot of concentration to follow and fully appreciate every issue raised, and something will almost certainly go over the head of any given audience member, but the comedy and conflict of the ostensible plot, and more importantly how they're presented by some extremely capable MFA students, makes this a worthwhile endeavor for enthusiasts of drama, literature, and even physics and mathematics.

You'd be reading this a day or two sooner if I hadn't found myself attempting again and again to summarize what the play is about, and failing each time. Ultimately Arcadia is a play of abstract ideas, but I must stress that it's also rather enjoyable just as a surface comedy of manners. That surface plot alternates from 1809 to the present day in parallel scenes set at Sidely Park, the expansive estate of the Coverly family.  In 1809, aristocrats and poets (including an unseen Lord Byron) engage in flirtations and assignations; two centuries later, modern scholars attempt to unravel some of the secrets from that past via varying methodologies, and with varying success. Especially in the first act, Stoppard recreates the erudite, droll banter that we associate with 19th- century wits like Wilde and Shaw.

James Costello, as tutor Septimus Hodge, is perhaps best among the "historical" cast at capturing the affected manner and flowing speech of an earlier era, and his curly hair and rakish sideburns fit his character perfectly. He gets some of the play's biggest laughs, as when a jealous husband (an underused Josiah Laubenstein) demands satisfaction, and he notes that the wife in question required the same. Melissa Reed, as precocious Thomasina, is a bundle of academic genius, ladylike manners, scientific curiosity, and teenage hormones.  While a freshman actor could have been cast to signify Thomasina's youth, Reed is fairly petite, and has the mannerisms of a young teen down pat, so the audience benefits from the skills and insight of an adult convincingly playing a child.  Kate Dzvonik, as Thomasina's imperious mother, is a younger, sexier Lady Bracknell, as if played by a Dynasty-era Joan Collins. Dzvonik's bio indicates that she is a native of Kazakhstan, and you definitely realize that this isn't a British accent you hear, but the character is fairly blustery and histrionic, so Dzvonik wisely takes her time enunciating each word with precision. It's not a big issue, and who's to say that Lady Croom wasn't raised by some great-aunt in the court of Catherine the Great?  Make sure you follow everything she says, however, because hidden in her rants are some important plot details that re-surface later.

Among the modern day cast, Leeanna Goldstein Rubin commands the stage with a serene, nearly-unflappable stage presence as Hannah, a writer researching the estate's history as it pertains to literary figures.   Cory Lipman, as Thomasina's many-generations-removed relative Valentine, perfectly embodies a man of science whose passion for learning encompasses far more than sterile numbers. Laurie Roberts portrays Val's nubile sister Chloe, a young woman of great intellect and perception who makes valid points about the unpredictable nature of human sexuality and attraction as a variable in any attempt to quantify human behavior.  Chloe’s interest goes far beyond the academic or theoretical, however; her observations add an important dimension to an ongoing debate in both time periods about the nature of science and order, but the character is somewhat underwritten, and Roberts uses every trick in the actor's hat, from enticing poses to suggestive glances to a sensuous sashay, to enhance her every moment on stage.  Don't discount her dialogue, however, just because it's funny and provocative - as with Chloe's ancestor Lady Croom, much of Stoppard's themes are hidden somewhere in there.  I'll leave it to women in the audience, and especially feminists, to decide if her performance is a little too over the top. Speaking for myself only, I found her to be delightful, and would be quite happy to re-watch her performance on some continuous loop. Although this may not actually have anything to do with the play.

Trey Hobbs, as ambitious academic Bernard, has grown as a performer since doing a decent job in reasons to be pretty three years ago at Trustus. He is the antagonist for the nominal plot: he's attempting to "prove" that Lord Byron killed another poet in a duel at Sidely Hall, while the audience sees the actual events transpire in flashback scenes.  His role is the least sympathetic, but with the most lines, and Hobbs manages to impress as an actor while depicting a less than impressive character. He and the other principals are all second-year MFA students, and have played the leads in most of USC's mainstage productions over the last year. As a group, they're an impressive lot, with Rubin and Reed amazingly different from their roles as Lear's evil daughters last spring.  Scenic design is by Xuemei Cao, with costume design by Sean Smith, both also MFA candidates, and their work is as good as it gets in Columbia. While probably based on the original design from the UK and Broadway, the set is simultaneously elegant yet minimalist, while the costumes look as if they came from real people's closets, reflecting individual styles and fashion sense.  A straw hat worn by Rubin immediately reminds us that a vast (and unseen) country estate stretches outside, while narrow bootleg slacks worn by Lipman define him visually as a hip, contemporary post-grad.  Richly colorful  lighting effects, by faculty member Eric Morris, subtly shift from sky-blue to twilight-violet in the distance, indicating passage of time.

If you still aren't quite sure what the play concerns, you aren't alone.  Armed with a love of Stoppard (I chose his early hit Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead for term paper topics in both high school and college) and a thorough study of both the advance press material and the director's guest blog, I still struggled to follow particular references and plot points, or absence thereof, no matter how skillfully the actors prformed the work. Eventually I had to sit down and read the play itself, as well as a couple of essays on its meaning and significance. Guest director Louis Butelli surely realized the material's inherent challenges, and his cast emotes and declaims the wordy text as if they're doing Shakespeare in the Park. They really do knock themselves out, ensuring that the audience has a good time even if a few things are lost in the shuffle, but I'm not sure that it was necessary.  (At intermission, a friend and lifelong theatre enthusiast asked "Why are they all shouting?")

One critic wrote of this work that it is easy to admire, but hard to love, and I can understand that.  Stoppard wants to present a comprehensive world view that encompasses both the sciences and humanities. At one point Thomasina perhaps speaks for the author when she observes that mathematics can define a curve like a bell, so why not like a bluebell, and then why not a rose?  Septimus adds another important point, that knowledge can never be truly lost, since it will ultimately be rediscovered in some fashion, while both Hannah and Valentine suggest that the details are less important than the actual search for knowledge; with the present day characters' research into the lives of their predecessors forming the storyline, we see these theories play out before us as they are proven true.  Bernard's suppositions fall flat, while surprisingly, a tragic, doomed romance is revealed, although never seen.  While everything from chaos theory, fractals, and thermodynamics, to the transition from the Classical to the Romantic Periods (in everything from poetry to landscaping) is fodder for discussion and analysis, I found myself wishing that there had been some greater revelation or conclusion, or a more dramatic and engaging resolution for the main characters in each era.  Four of Stoppard's works have won Tony Awards for Best Play, and many have enjoyed long runs on Broadway; Arcadia only ran for a few months, and lost the Tony to Love! Valour! Compassion! (also an enjoyable work, but not necessarily the greatest drama ever.) However admired it may be, critical reception has always been mixed. And it runs close to three hours with intermission added in. But that's the material.  This production, and these supremely gifted MFA students, do a great job.

By the time you read this, there will be only four more performances: Thursday and Friday nights at 8 PM, and Saturday at both 7 and, believe it or not, 11 PM. (One wonders if the script's cosmic implications and shifts in time might be impaired or enhanced by an altered state of consciousness.)  Is it for the general public?  Well, probably not.  Arcadia is a thoughtful and thought-provoking play, for people who want to be challenged while they are entertained.  But you absolutely won't see anything like this anywhere else in town, and as above, performances and production values are excellent.  Call the box office at 777-2551 or visit http://artsandsciences.sc.edu/thea/2014/arcadia.html for ticket  information.

~ August Krickel

"The Musical Adventures of Flat Stanley" - Melissa Swick Ellington reviews the new show at Columbia Children's Theatre

With a charming production of The Musical Adventures of Flat Stanley, Columbia Children’s Theatre brings to life a beloved character and his exciting escapades. I first learned about Flat Stanley when my visiting aunt arrived in South Carolina with a cutout of the character, which she photographed in various places for a grandchild’s school project. Decades later, I enjoyed sharing the “original adventures” book by Jeff Brown with my young daughter, indulging in a sense of wonder at the wide world and its possibilities. The whimsical nature of the Flat Stanley book series inspires lasting affection in readers; Columbia Children’s Theatre crafts a surprising and delightful world that entices theatregoers. As realized in the musical (with book by Timothy Allen McDonald and music and lyrics by McDonald, David Weinstein, Jonathan K. Waller, and Stephen Gabriel), the Lambchop parents enjoy a cozy family life with Stanley and his younger brother Arthur. After bedtime, the two boys take the audience on an exuberant “I wish I were” romp through cherished adventures (think Harry Potter and Star Wars) complete with light sabers and air guitar.  Stanley’s “star wish” leads to his dimensional transformation after a fateful encounter with a mysterious bulletin board.  He learns that the life of a “flat kid” has drawbacks (getting stuck in a tree when flown as a kite) as well as perks (mailing himself to Paris.)  Clever wordplay transpires in the script, such as the “porkchop” versus “lambchop” confusion that delighted my daughter.   Characters advise young audiences to “find a little adventure,” “write a letter and drop it in the mail,” and “make a star wish.”

Anthony Harvey as Stanley achieves genuine commitment to a child role without condescension, a true gift of a performance. He shares talents in physical comedy (the hilarious doctor’s exam) as well as an appealing voice, with a particularly poignant song while stuck in a tree.  Harvey handles the flat costume with admirable confidence – who knew Flat Stanley could shake maracas and rock a time step, not to mention a kickline? As Arthur, Riley Smith dives into exuberant antics that delight the young audience; he avoids caricature by offering lovable honesty and real sweetness. Actors demonstrate versatility in diverse roles: Evelyn Clary plays a wacky postal worker and a serene Mona Lisa, while Julian DeLeon moves convincingly from sincere father to bumbling physician to flashy entertainer.  Diane Gilbert, Rachel Glowacki, David Quay, Imani Ross-Jackson, and Elizabeth Stepp give vibrant portrayals of various characters that develop depth through nuanced ensemble work. Two different casts share the roles; additional performers are sure to be equally strong in a production of this caliber.    (That second cast includes David Quay as Stanley, Ruth Glowacki as Mrs. Lambchop, Toni Moore as Mr. Lambchop, Elizabeth Stepp as Stanley’s brother Arthur, and Taylor- Noelle Hammond as Mrs. Cartero.)

“Why say it when I can show you in an extravagant musical number?” asks a Hollywood character; engaging songs and dances illuminate Stanley’s world with infectious vitality. Cindy Flach directs and choreographs her talented cast with creativity and ingenuity, and Paul Lindley II guides enjoyable singing voices with skillful music direction. The design team (Donna Harvey and Jim Litzinger) proves that Columbia Children’s Theatre really can take us anywhere: characters travel through the Lambchop home, a park, a doctor’s office, California, Paris, and Hawaii.  Lambchop family members’ costumes and even their tabletop décor reflect a patriotic red, white, and blue motif.   Forgotten lollipops stuck on top of the bulletin board illustrate the designers’ meticulous approach; details like these bring a child’s world alive onstage.  Go see the show to find out how acting, directing, and design can collaborate on laugh-out-loud visual comedy with particular effectiveness in Stanley’s museum experience.  CCT shows last season included marvelous puppetry (Knuffle Bunny, Goodnight Moon); Anthony Harvey’s puppet design maintains this high standard.  Stage managers Ruth Mock and Susan Hitt keep the backstage domain moving with fast-paced fluidity and seamless transitions. Visual effects are very well done, especially the picture frame imagery and the lasting impact of Stanley’s unique and astonishing flatness.

But what do the kids think? The children at the matinee I attended were rapt with attention throughout the show.  Light saber hijinks, surf music and “wipe-out” moves, sharp and sassy tap dancing, surprising mailbox revelations, and exciting pursuit of the “sneak thief” proved riveting for even the smallest viewer.  My own five-year-old daughter, while skeptical before the big transformation (“Is Stanley REALLY going to be flat onstage?”), became firmly convinced of the production’s integrity: “My favorite part was when Flat Stanley got flat. I really love and appreciate this show. I think kids will like the show because it is cheerful.”

The mind-opening power of travel, discovery of adventure through sending and receiving mail, and lasting love of family will resonate with audiences of all ages. Through the ongoing development of Columbia Children’s Theatre, Artistic Director Jerry Stevenson, Managing Director Jim Litzinger, and their collaborators make our city a better place – to learn as part of a welcoming community, to raise a family, to love the arts. Thriving theatre for young audiences produced with gratifying commitment to quality in all areas: who could ask for anything more?

The Musical Adventures of Flat Stanley runs through this Sunday, September 29. Call the box office at (803) 691-4548, or visit www.columbiachildrenstheatre.com for ticket information.

~ Melissa Swick Ellington

Directing Tom Stoppard's "Arcadia" at USC - a guest blog by Louis Butelli

So, here I am, about to eat dinner at Al-Amir restaurant in beautiful downtown Columbia, and prepare for one last, pre-tech run-through of Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia with the company of actors and artists at USC’s Theatre SC.  We’ve been on quite a journey to get to this point. Having spent weeks reading, studying, and blocking the play in a rehearsal hall, and then having spent this week on stage at Drayton Hall as the set grew up around us, we are now on the verge of sharing this play with the public. As the show’s director, I couldn’t be more excited.

A little bit of background. I’ve been working as an actor, director, educator, and writer for the past 17 years. Back in 1998, I booked a job as an actor for a touring Shakespeare company which, at the time, was in residence at USC. For a couple of years, we would come to Columbia to rehearse, and then open our shows at the Koger Center before taking them all over the country. Those early years were very happy times, and it was through working for this company that I met director Robert Richmond, with whom I have continued to collaborate ever since, frequently at the Folger Theatre in Washington DC, where we have broken attendance and box office records, and been nominated for (and won!) several Helen Hayes Awards.

Here in Columbia, Robert and I created a theater piece based on Shakespeare’s Macbeth, called A Tale Told By An Idiot. A comic book-inspired mash-up of the Scottish play with the story of original English terrorist Guy Fawkes, it played at USC’s Lab Theater on Wheat Street, and featured the talents of USC undergraduate theater students. People loved it. Some years later, I founded a theater company, Psittacus Productions, in Los Angeles and chose A Tale Told By An Idiot as our inaugural show. Robert came out to direct, we opened as part of the first annual Hollywood Fringe Festival, then transferred to the Son Of Semele Ensemble Theater, where we sold out and extended. The press was excellent, and we received an LA Weekly Theatre Award for our efforts.

My point in all of this is that, for the past fifteen years, I have felt a deep connection to USC, to Theatre SC, and to the great city of Columbia. When department Chair Jim Hunter invited me back down to direct Arcadia, I jumped at the opportunity.

For me, Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia is a very special play. To begin, it appeals to two very distinct parts of who I am, both as an artist and as a human being, about which more will follow.

In the play, we encounter two sets of characters inhabiting the same drawing room in anestate on the English countryside. The first set is living in the year 1809. We meet a brilliant 13-year old girl, her randy tutor, her elegant mother, and various hangers-on. The whole household is scandalized – one of the guests, a minor poet, has been cuckolded by the tutor. There are allegations, handwritten challenges to duels, love notes passed, all while the young girl makes an important mathematical discovery, many years before the rest of the world would catch up. Additionally, everyone is in a tizzy because of a visit from that most famous of Romantics, Lord Byron, who is lurking, offstage, throughout the show.

The second set of characters live in the year 2013 – or, at least, in “the present day.” Here on the estate, we meet the noble descendants of the family from 1809. There are three siblings – a twenty-something male who is an Oxfordian mathematician, a saucy teenaged girl, and a fifteen-year-old boy who hasn’t spoken since age 5. Visiting the family, to research her next book, is a thirty-something author. Into this idyll charges a hotheaded, fame-hungry professor in his late thirties. He believes he is on the verge of a new discovery that will shake the foundations of English literary studies, particularly on the subject of Lord Byron. Gradually, the artifacts left behind from 1809 start showing up in 2013, and we watch the present day characters getting quite a few of the details wrong…while inching ever closer to the truth.

Certainly, the play is populated by very intelligent, hyper-articulate people, who spend quite a lot of time talking – about theory, about math, about landscape gardening, about art, about poetry. More interestingly, though, they also discover that no matter how sure one may seem about their place in the world, it is love – and lust, and the terrifying un-knowability of other people – that throws a wrench in the works every time. As the mathematician Valentine says in the play, these things are “the attraction that Newton left out.” They are the flies in the ointment of a deterministic universe governed by “free will.”

As I said, this appeals to me personally in two ways. First of all, I am a pretty huge nerd. I love teasing apart big ideas. I love intellectual sparring and heated conversation. I love to read, and I love to research. That said, I am also an actor and a flesh and blood male. As follows, I also love the irrational. I know what it is to feel swept up with passion. I know what it is to run away with the circus. This play presses both of those buttons for me, and I hope that it will for you, too.

“Well, good for him,” you might think in reading along. “But so what?”

My point, I suppose, is to say that, in coming to direct this play – or, in fact, any play – one must find a point of entry. One must attempt to answer the question “why produce this play, and why now?” In the current climate of economic fragility, global unrest, mass shootings, a shrill and polarized news media, and a deadlocked government, why would one choose to put on a play that is simultaneously a “big idea” play, and a classic English farce?

There are two potential ways of answering that question, one of which is complex, and one of which is…less complex.

The complex, or at least the “literary” answer goes something like this: Stoppard, particularly in this play, reminds me of two literary titans from the history of drama, Shakespeare and Chekov. To be a bit reductive, both of those playwrights were conversant in creating drama during times of – and through the lens of – great social upheaval. Shakespeare wrote sprawling, imaginative plays against the backdrop of Elizabethan England, a place full of religious conflict, wars against the Spanish, bouts of plague, and a linguistic explosion. Chekov wrote stories about families languishing at a remove from society and, ultimately falling apart, in the years directly preceding the Russian Revolution. Both playwrights are concerned with people wrestling with lofty ideas while simultaneously unable to escape some of the baser parts of their own humanity.

At nine years old, Stoppard, a Jewish, Czech national, moved to England with his mother and English stepfather who, according to the stories once said to young Tom, “Don’t you realize I made you British?” Having been displaced by World War II, and having embraced England, and indeed Englishness, Stoppard has created a literary world that is characterized by rapid-fire wit, philosophizing, and issues of human rights, censorship, and political freedom. And sex.

As for his literary debt to Chekov, one might consider his play cycle, “The Coast of Utopia, which addresses social philosophy in pre-Revolutionary Russia and won the Tony Award for Best Play. As far as Shakespeare goes, I suggest that one re-watch the movie Shakespeare In Love, for which Stoppard won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay.

Intimidated yet? I certainly was!

Here’s the less complex answer. This play is really, really fun. Yes, it’s very talky. Yes, it’s very heavy on ideas. Yes, it isn’t packed with a huge amount of “event.” Sounds a bit like an episode of Seinfeld, no?

Seriously, though. When I think about the question of “why this play, and why now?” I keep returning to the Internet. One of the things that sets our little moment on earth apart from any other throughout all of history is the presence of the Internet – not just in our lives, but in our pockets, and on our nightstands, 24 hours a day, every single day.

When I think of my own propensity to click along, chasing a notion or idea from link to link, from graphic to video to article to image, ad nauseum – it reminds me of following Tom Stoppard’s characters as one idea leads to the next, and we bounce between 1809 and the present day, until those worlds collide and overlap in the last scene of the play.

And yet…this is a piece of theater. For me, what the theater does, that no other art form does, is bring a whole bunch of strangers together in real time, under one roof, to trade these ideas with artists themselves. We’re all breathing the same air. You can see and hear us, to be certain. But we can also see and hear you. You impact our performance. Moreover, without you, we simply couldn’t make this work of art come to life at all. In short, theater, by its very definition, needs you to be there with us.

I suppose that’s a really long-winded way of gently pleading with you to buy a ticket to see our show. We’ve all become sort of fascinated by the weird, time-traveling world of this play, and have started seeing little idea nuggets from this play everywhere we look – be it noticing the way the beautiful tendrils of milk stir into uniform color and heat in a coffee at Cool Beans, or the way the tree trunks extend to branches and into leaves and into veins-in-leaves ad infinitum while strolling along the Horseshoe.

You might like our show, or you might find it a spectacular bore. Regardless: if we can all share a few laughs, and you come away with some food for thought, and some things you might want to chat about with friends afterwards, or Google when you get home, then the experiment was worthwhile.

Won’t you come experiment with us?

To close, I’ll just say that working on this play has made me obsessed with fractals. I’m not a good enough writer to unpack fractal theory here, so I’ve included a link to a video animation (click HERE.)  In short, fractals are at the heart of the theory that our 13-year old girl discovers in 1809, and that our mathematician in 2013 extrapolates.

The video is another metaphor for Arcadia. Sometimes seeing a thing unfold makes more intuitive sense than hearing some nerdy director talk about it. So, click this link, and watch this video animation of fractals. If it exhilarates you, then you should definitely come and see our show.

Thanks for reading! See you at the theater!

~ Louis Butelli

Born and raised on Long Island, New York, Louis has spent the past seventeen years working as an actor, teacher, director, and writer. From 1998-2008, he was Artist-In-Residence and Company Clown for the Aquila Theatre Company. During that time, he played in over 25 productions of the works of William Shakespeare and other classical playwrights, appearing Off-Broadway, at major regional houses, on tour in the US to 49 states and across Europe; taught over 300 masterclasses; wrote, adapted and appeared in a new production of Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Other credits include Folger Theatre; La Jolla Playhouse; LA Shakespeare Festival; Shakespeare Theatre Co, DC; Alabama Shakespeare Festival; Yale Rep; Long Wharf; Orlando Shakes; Pasadena Playhouse; Two River Theater, NJ; Alpine Theater Project, MT; Seaside Shakespeare of Nantucket; La Scala Opera’s West Side Story in Milan, Beirut, Nagoya, Fukuoka, Osaka, and Tokyo; many others. TV: The Unusuals, and All My Children (ABC), Law & Order, and L&O: Criminal Intent (NBC). He is co-founder and Executive Director of Psittacus Productions, for whom he has produced A Tale Told By An Idiot (LA Weekly Theater Award), and CYCLOPS: A Rock Opera (NYMF Award for Excellence, 3 LA Weekly Award Nominations, Pulitzer Prize Juror Nominee) which played a sold-out and extended run at the 2011 New York Musical Theatre Festival, and the World Premier of the company’s latest show, A True History, which had a workshop at the Obie Award-winning Vineyard Theatre in New York City. He is honored every day he is able to go to work in the service of a great story.

Arcadia opens Friday, September 27 at USC's Drayton Hall Theatre, and runs through Saturday, October 5.   Show times for Arcadia are 8 PM Wednesdays-Fridays, 7 PM Saturdays and 3 PM on the first Sunday. Tickets for the production are $12 for students, $16 for USC faculty/staff, military personnel and seniors 60+, and $18 for the general public. Tickets can be purchased in advance by calling 803-777-2551 or by visiting the Longstreet Theatre box office, which is open Monday-Friday, 12:30 -5:30 PM.  Drayton Hall Theatre is located at 1214 College St.  For more information, contact  Kevin Bush at 803-777-9353, or bushk@mailbox.sc.edu.

Cast in this production are graduate acting students James Costello, Kate Dzvonik, Trey Hobbs, Josiah Laubenstein, Cory Lipman, Melissa Reed, Laurie Roberts and Leeanna Rubin, as well as undergraduate students Jason Fernandes, Grayson Garrick and Liam MacDougall.  Acting instructor David Britt will also appear in the production.   Graduate students Xuemei Cao and Sean Smith will design the set and costumes, respectively.   Guest artist Baxter Engle will create the sound design.  Instructor Eric Morris will design lighting.  Guest artist Todd Stuart will craft the show's intricate props.

A New Era Exploding at Trustus - a review of Ragtime (the Musical) by Jillian Owens

It was the music of something beginning. An era exploding.

A century spinning.

In riches and rags,

And in rhythm and rhyme.

The people called it Ragtime.

Ragtime (the Musical) - based on the E.L. Doctorow novel of the same name - is a story of hope and disillusionment in the face of the American Dream.  This dream is interpreted in many different ways by the many characters in the show, which opened at Trustus Theatre this past weekend.  Ragtime opens during the “Progressive Era” in 1904.  Industry is booming, and excitement is in the air.  This air is filled with the strange, new, simple, and syncopated music of Ragtime.  The music (by Stephen Flaherty) is catchy and tender, simple yet deep, with lyrics by Lynn Ahrens, and book by Terrence McNally.

Mother and Father have a kind, though sterile marriage.  When Father, played by G. Scott Wild, heads off to explore the North Pole with Admiral Peary, Mother - played by Marybeth Gorman - is left to tend to their son, large house, and business affairs.  When she digs up something very unusual in her garden, a chain of events are pushed into movement that will change the lives of her small family, as well as the communities around her.

Ragtime shines thanks to one of the most talented casts it could have possibly pulled together, consisting of many Columbia theatre veterans, as well as a few talented new faces.  There are no weak links in this production.  Terrance Henderson pulls double duty as the charismatic ragtime musician Coalhouse Walker and the show’s choreographer.  Vicky Saye Henderson plays the radical anarchist, Emma Goldman, with gusto, Younger Brother - played by Kevin Bush - is passionate about finding something to be passionate about, and Scott Vaughan’s appearances as Houdini, though short, are very charming.  Chip Stubbs delivers a beautiful standout performance as Tateh, with a voice that conveys all the determination, elation, and heartache of a poor immigrant father struggling to reconcile his dream of America with the reality of his new world.  Stories are intertwined and alliances are made and broken.  With so many characters and stories, you’re bound to find at least a few you can identify with.

If you call the Trustus Box Office hotline, a friendly recording will inform you that this show has over thirty actors in the cast – the most they’ve had onstage at one time.  Upon hearing this, I must admit I was a little worried.  When Trustus tries to put on a large-scale show, it usually ends up being a mixed bag.  Their small stage can only hold so much spectacle, scenery, and cast members before things start to get cramped.

Fortunately, for director Chad Henderson, this particular big show doesn’t require a massive set or much spectacle beyond the talent of its actors.  That’s not to say the set is unimpressive.  Brandon McIver’s construction of his giant Statue of Liberty was well-documented on the Trustus Facebook page in the weeks before the opening.  This, along with fragments of early 1900’s Americana, are evocative of the period and theme.  The orchestra is small but skilled.  The costumes are period-accurate and lovely.

Between Henderson’s (Chad) stage direction and Henderson’s (Terrance) choreography, the actors don’t seem confined or cramped at all.  I would advise you to try to get a seat closer to the back as sight lines are a slight issue.  I can’t help but wonder…Is the success of Ragtime just the beginning of a new era of larger-scale productions for Trustus?  Are we ready for this “new music”?

~ Jillian Owens

Rockin' the Beehive - a review of "Beehive the 60's Musical" at Workshop Theatre by Melissa Swick Ellington

There are plenty of good reasons why Beehive - the 60's Musical has been brought back to the Workshop Theatre stage after a successful run fifteen years ago, and eight of them light up the performance with stunning vocals and infectious energy. Jocelyn Sanders and Daniel Gainey provide expert direction that shapes a fluid journey through 1960’s music, as the eight performers celebrate female singers and songwriters. While the first act presents a vivacious stroll through girl groups of the early sixties, the second half of the show really rocks the house with the rough, raw sounds of Tina Turner, Aretha Franklin, and Janis Joplin. Medleys combine excerpts of familiar favorites through fictional characters, as in the extended party sequence that features “It’s My Party,” “I’m Sorry,” “You Don’t Own Me,” and “Judy’s Turn to Cry,” among others.

The Beehive ladies excel at inviting the audience into their world, as the performers handle the audience participation segments with friendly enthusiasm. Valdina Hall, a consummate musical theatre performer and a cast member in the first Beehive production at Workshop, launches the show with confidence. Her warmth and magnetism permeate the occasions when she addresses the audience directly, one of the show’s many strengths. (I enjoyed the good fortune of attending Beehive as the middle member of three generations of girls who love to sing. My mother observed, “When Valdina is on stage, you just feel like everything is going to be all right.”) Jordan Harper’s exquisite yearning and soaring vocals illuminate “Where the Boys Are” and “To Sir With Love,” while Tameshia Magwood thrills with her stirring rendition of “Proud Mary.” Devin Anderson is a true powerhouse who fires up the stage in “One Fine Day,” “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow” and “Respect.” The rest of the cast (Rayana Briggs, Roxanne Livingston, Brandi Smith, and Safiya Whitehead) brings versatile talent to a slew of musical numbers; the directors deserve commendation for insightful pairings of singers with songs.

The design team makes cohesive choices that support the production with efficiency and purpose. Randy Strange’s scenic design features dynamic visuals and useful levels, while Barry Sparks provides masterful lighting design. The placement of the excellent band onstage proves valuable, as the music (directed by Roland Haynes, Jr.) is front and center throughout the performance. The band’s presence also enables energizing interaction with the performers. Singers and musicians benefit from Baxter Engle’s effective sound design. Choreography by Barbara Howse-Diemer evokes the girl groups of the sixties, evolving through different movement styles as the decade progresses. Costume designer Alexis Doktor provides visual evidence of the decade’s social changes as the performers replace pastel florals with psychedelic miniskirts.  Expectation of impressive wigs and hairstyles comes with the territory in a show called Beehive, and this production does not disappoint. Bobby Craft’s expertise as stage manager keeps the energetic show running smoothly. Design elements work very well together; the lighting and choreography establish a definite shift in tone with “The Beat Goes On.” A few issues with clarity of spoken dialogue over band accompaniment early in the show and a couple of awkward transitions are minor quibbles in light of Beehive’s audience-pleasing power. My young daughter proclaimed upon leaving the theatre, “That was a great show!”

Beehive at Workshop Theatre delivers an entertaining showcase of 1960’s music through the considerable talents of eight versatile and hard-working performers. Beehive earned great buzz from responsive audiences on opening weekend and deserves to pack the house with sixties music lovers through the remaining performances. Be assured that this production is not a series of imitations of the original singers. These Beehive performers make unique contributions to create something that is at once both nostalgic and new.

Beehive the 60's Musical  continues at Workshop Theatre through Saturday, September 28, with curtain at 8 PM, except for a 3:00 PM Sunday matinee on September 22. Contact the Workshop Theatre Box Office at 803-799-4876 for ticket information, or visit www.workshoptheatre.com.

~ Melissa Swick Ellington

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Jasper   welcomes a new critic to our theatre team.  Melissa Swick Ellington earned a Ph.D. in Educational Theatre from New York University. She has directed or performed in numerous productions in professional, community, and educational theatres in New York and South Carolina. She taught theatre in K-12 and university settings for over a dozen years.

Who is wrong and who is wronged? Ed Madden reviews "Collected Stories" at Trustus Theatre

There was a moment during a dress rehearsal of Collected Stories earlier this week that simply crushed me.  The stage was dark, and a stagehand went around the set in the darkness, slowly and methodically making a mess of the place.  A plant toppled, papers strewn across furniture and floor, prescription bottles scattered on desk and table, a curtain undone, a shawl tossed in the floor.

Collected Stories, a play by Donald Margulies, opens at Trustus Theatre this Thursday, August 15, and closes on Sunday August 18.  It’s a short run for a powerful little play, directed by Milena Herring.  In a sequence of short scenes over the course of six years, we see Ruth Steiner, an older writer and teacher, take on as her student and later assistant the seemingly innocent Lisa Morrison, a 26-year-old would-be writer.  I say seemingly innocent, as it’s never clear how manipulative and shrewd she really is.  As the balance of power between the two shifts, we wonder at the end who the real innocent might be.

Ruth is played by the indomitable Elena Martinez-Vidal, confident and pitch-perfect throughout the play.  A couple of moments feel performed for the audience as much as they are for Lisa—stagey, theatrical, but that feels right.  Ruth’s little Greenwich Village apartment is her stage, Lisa her pupil and audience, and she is acting out what a famous writer is and says. I’m reminded of that scene in Douglas Sirk’s 1959 Imitation of Life, when Susie (Sandra Dee) tells her mother Lara (Lana Turner), “Oh stop acting mother!”  But she can’t: she is always onstage.  Martinez-Vidal is fascinating in this part, especially near the end, when Ruth’s life and health are ruined, and still some dark vitality—and anger—drives her speech and action.  She bristles stiffly in what seems to be a conciliatory hug from Lisa.

Elisabeth Gray Engle as Lisa was a puzzle, a chameleon.  Ingénue or ingenious, devious or devoted, we’re never really sure, though Engle, like Lisa, slowly but surely finds her voice.  The moment she tells Ruth about a story her father hated, something shifts in the play, and we start to realize that Lisa, as Engle deftly portrays her, has more to her than we imagined.

Either character could have been a type character if not a caricature—the old Jewish writer and professor, the gushing would-be writer—but both actresses brought a real depth to their portrayals.  The room itself, the set, is almost a character as well. Early in the play, Lisa rhapsodizes on how wonderful it would be to live in a place like that, a place perfect for a writer.  She reads the space through Ruth’s fiction, noting a Matisse from this story, the view of a playground from that one.  So when the stagehand comes through knocking over a plant and strewing paper and pill bottles, we realize that something has gone deeply wrong.

Two primary issues drive the play.  One is power.  When Ruth and Lisa argue over the guilt of Woody Allen after his affair with his 19-year-old step-daughter, we can’t help but wonder about the balance of power in this relationship.  Ruth admits her own affair with an older man, the poet Delmore Schwartz, but she also says that she has never written about the affair, even though it was the bright moment of her life.  “Some things you don’t touch,” she says, a command this daughter-figure is, we know, bound to disobey.

The second issue is the ownership of stories—and in an indirect way, lives.  Ruth admits to exaggerating elements of her own biography for political effect, and the two women agree that writers “rummage” through other people’s lives for stories.  “We’re all rummagers.  That’s what writers are.”  When one accuses the other, “You’ve stolen my stories,” the glib reply—“They stopped being your stories when you told them to me”— amplifies rather than answers the ethical questions.

In 1993, American novelist David Leavitt was sued by English poet Stephen Spender, who accused him of using a section of his memoir World Within World as fodder for his novel, While England Sleeps, a fictional portrayal of someone very like Spender.  I can’t help but think this literary larceny inflects Collected Stories, which premiered three years later in 1996.  (Leavitt’s next published work was The Term Paper Artist, a wicked novella from the point of view of an author accused of plagiarism, who starts to write term papers for college students.)

Where does theft stop and imagination begin?

Even though Ruth may think she’s granting voice to the voiceless, or Lisa may claim she is paying homage, there’s still a real sense here of ethical risk, one that carries, for me, beyond the play.  This would be a fascinating play to discuss in a creative writing class, where questions of writing about real people, people we know, inevitably lead to complex conversations.  What happens when our families read themselves in our stories (no matter how fictionalized)?  Or what happens when we alter details in a presumably nonfiction piece for aesthetic effect.  Yeah, we all know art is the lie that tells the truth (pace Oscar Wilde and Julian Barnes), but playful paradoxes rub raw when real people feel wronged.

Collected Stories closes out Trustus Theatre’s 28th season, and runs Thursday thru Sunday, August 15-18 (with a matinee on Sunday).   It’s a rich play—and as a meditation on plagiarism, intellectual property, and dishonesty, a great way to start the school year.  See it while you can.  Contact the box office at (803) 254-9732 for more information, or visit http://www.trustus.org .

~ Ed Madden

Be the first to see "The Velvet Weapon" (winner of the 2013 Trustus Playwrights' Festival) on Sat. Aug.10 at 2 PM!

Love live theatre, but stymied by steep ticket prices?  Trustus has got you covered.

Love live theatre, but have commitments like jobs and children that keep you from going out at night?  Trustus has got you covered.

Love live theatre, but wish there were some way to see new shows other than traveling to New York?  Ever wish there were some way for new works of theatre to get a shot at an audience without having to worry about either being a Broadway blockbuster?  Trustus has got you covered.

Ever wish you could give feedback directly to a playwright, before the play ever even opens?  Trustus has got you covered.

Are you so tired of the famously hot August heat - punctuated by the monsoon-like August thunderstorms - that you wish you could just sit down in the dark somewhere with a cold beer or refreshing glass of wine, and watch some live theatre you've never seen before? Trustus has got you covered.

Tomorrow afternoon at 2:00 PM - that's Saturday, August 10th - The Velvet Weapon, winner of the 2013 Trustus Playwrights' Festival, will have a one-time-only staged reading at Trustus Theatre, open and free to the public.  The Trustus bar will also be open (although not free.)  There are only some 135 seats, however, so make sure one of them is yours.

The playwright, Deborah Brevoort, was kind enough to talk with Jasper about her new work, and you can read that exclusive interview here.  The cast for this reading includes:  Paul Kaufmann (last fall's Next to Normal and  I Am My Own Wife, both at Trustus), Trey Hobbs (Albany in USC's recent King Lear, Greg in reasons to be pretty at Trustus in 2010), Mandy Applegate (The Last Five Years and Plan 9 from Outer Space, both at  Trustus, and The Producers at Workshop) Hunter Boyle (Peron in Evita at Trustus, Big Daddy in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at Workshop) Chelsea Nicole Crook, Eric Bultman, Cindy Durrett (numerous incarnations of Nunsense at Act One Theatre), Josiah Laubenstein (Edgar in King Lear, and Mike in Pine, the previous year's Festival winner  currently running at Trustus), Raia Jane Hirsch (The Motherf*@%er With the Hat at Trustus, Pride and Prejudice with SC Shakespeare Co.), and Kayla Cahill (The Shape of Things at  Workshop.)

Press material describes The Velvet Weapon as "a hilariously smart backstage farce that will leave you laughing while also engaging you long after you've left the theatre.  At the National Theatre of an unnamed country, in an unnamed city, a matinee audience rises up in protest over what is being performed on stage, and demands something new. They begin a performance of their own of The Velvet Weapon, a play by an unproduced playwright of questionable talent. Inspired by the Velvet Revolution in the former Czechoslovakia, The Velvet Weapon is a humorous exploration of populist democracy told through a battle between high-brow and low-brow art."

Director Chad Henderson shared a few thoughts with Jasper:

Jasper:   What has your involvement been in previous years with the Playwrights' Festival?

Henderson:  I directed Swing ’39 in 2011. I also acted in Copy Man under the direction of Jim Thigpen years ago.

Jasper:  Why is it important for an author to get feedback via a reading?

Henderson:  Probably the same reason I invite colleagues to come watch rehearsals of a show I’m directing before we open – its good to know what’s working and what’s not. In this particular case, Brevoort has written a farce – so pace and delivery is the name of the game it seems. The language on the page is the direct key to engaging an audience, so

Jasper:  How did you go about casting Velvet Weapon?

Henderson:  I was looking for people who are quick, humorous, and who have good timing.

Jasper:  For audience members who have never attended a reading before, what can they expect?

Henderson:  The actors (and it’s a great cast) will be reading without staging. Therefore, they will be acting while reading – but not walking around the stage. We would have loved to have staged this reading, however with farces there’s so much action that simplistic blocking would get in the way of the words being said. And since this is a celebration of a new work – we’re keeping it simple. But the script is certainly funny enough and endearing enough to entertain on a Saturday afternoon.

Jasper:  What sort of themes are addressed in this play?

Henderson:  “What is art?” is a question that strings through the narrative. Should art entertain? Should art explore the human condition? If it doesn’t explore the human condition – is it still art?

Be the first to see The Velvet Weapon, which will get a full production in the summer of 2014.  Curtain is at 2 PM tomorrow (Sat. Aug. 10) at Trustus Theatre, at 520 Lady Street in the heart of the Congaree Vista.  The Facebook "event" page for the reading is here.

~ August Krickel

"Pine" at Trustus Explores Emotions, Loss, and Family Dynamics

Pine, the winner of the Trustus Playwrights' Festival which runs through this coming Saturday, August 10th, has a double meaning in its title:  the aroma of the trees that dominate stage right, and the prevailing cloud of mourning that has surrounded an upstate New York family since the death of middle son Colin five years previously.  Never entirely a comedy nor a sentimental drama, this new play from Eugenie Carabatsos successfully explores the complex nuances of how ordinary people interact in situations we all face: loss of a loved one, inclusion of newcomers to the family, and changing dynamics when children become adults. The twist: Colin is still around.  His spirit lingers in his family's home, and comments on all the action as it unfolds on stage.

That twist is certainly nothing new, from literature (The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, Topper, Wilde's Canterville Ghost) to stage (I Hate Hamlet, Coward's Blithe Spirit) to film (the Patrick Swayze-Demi Moore movie Ghost, and big-screen versions of most of the preceding.)  Following the conventions of the genre, it's therefore no plot spoiler to assume that one or more characters have unfinished business, but as in life, nothing is clearly spelled out. Are some characters still grieving, or did they never have a chance to?   Is Colin trapped in limbo as a result, or is the unfinished business his?

Advance publicity and opening scenes where Colin speaks to the audience make it clear that Colin really is a ghost, i.e. this isn't Next to Normal, and he's not the product of anyone's delusion.  As Colin, Hunter Bolton is up to the challenge of reacting to everyone's dialogue and movement without ever being acknowledged by the other characters.  He's terribly under-used in the first act, simply because there's no one with whom to interact. Still, a number of audience members commented on how skillfully his body language and facial expressions convey his presence and feelings, even when he's a passive observer.  The pace picks up significantly in the second act, when plot twists allow Colin to participate more, and the opening night audience gave the first scene of Act 2 a round of applause as a result.  Bolton takes his time with every line, and is both sympathetic and believable as a decent, ordinary guy who has found no answer to his question:  "If I'm gone, why am I still here?"

Indeed, all the characters are quite ordinary; one might almost say under-developed,except part of the point of the script is that this is a regular family, with no dysfunction beyond what would be expected.  Becky Hunter as sharp-tongued mother Rita, Rachel Kuhnle as independent sister Julie, and Cory Alpert as troubled younger brother Teddy all look like they and Bolton could be related.   Jennifer Moody Sanchez plays Rachel, Colin's fiancée (not his ex- fiancée, Colin is quick to assert, since they never broke up) who is still considered part of the family, but also is finally ready to move on with her life.  Josiah Laubenstein as in-law Mike has some nice moments of comedy with Kuhnle; I enjoyed his portrayal of Edgar in USC's King Lear a few months back, but the manic tone that worked for Edgar's feigned madness is a little distracting here, and there's no line that couldn't benefit from being delivered an octave lower.  He gets some of the show's biggest laughs, however, rejoicing when Rachel's new boyfriend supplants him as the barely-accepted outsider.  In one of the show's many relatable and accessible themes, boyfriend Miles (Harrison Saunders) has to compete with the persisting presence of Colin, and how many of us have had to compete with the metaphoric ghost of a significant other's ex?  Which is especially ironic, given that Bolton and Saunders fought for the hand of Juliet as Romeo and Paris in a memorable production in Finlay Park a few years ago.

I was prepared to say that Alpert's maturity makes him a little old for his role, but program notes reveal he is exactly the same age as his character, the teen who survived the car crash that killed Colin, and who states what I'm told is sadly all too common in such scenarios: "it should have been me."  His scenes with Bolton are genuinely moving, as each wrestles their circumstances, the former pleading "I'd rather have this than nothing," while the latter despairs "I'd rather have nothing than this."   Alpert and Bolton do nice work together as they reveal how family conflict can persist long after one of them is gone.  Carabatsos excels in natural dialogue that captures the quirks of everyday life, as when wine is spilled on Rita's best pair of slacks, and she gripes that even a new pair won't be that same "best" pair.  A culminating and cathartic scene allows each character to grieve in a different way, and to explain differing but understandable rationales.

Guest designer Chet Longley's set is more detailed than we have seen recently at Trustus, and includes a very believable patch of forest, and a simple recreation of the wooden-siding-covered exterior and interior of a home in the Catskills. I might have enjoyed a little more set decoration - mirrors or pictures on the wall, the occasional lamp or dresser - but as much space for movement needs to be opened up, in order for the cast to be able to move about freely with ever bumping into the invisible Colin. A nice touch is the way an upstairs bedroom is located directly above the kitchen, allowing Bolton to move easily from one to the other, perching on top of a refrigerator as a ghost might.

Director Dewey Scott-Wiley handles the challenges of blocking around an unseen and non-corporeal main character well, and takes full advantage of her cast's ability to wring emotion and meaning from pauses and silences as well as from lines.  Her sound design might need a little tweaking, however, as audibility and clarity decreases the farther a character goes toward stage right.  There is also a whooshing sound effect hat signifies Colin's presence that I never entirely "bought," although at the same time I can't think what, if anything, might work better.

Playwright Carabatsos graduated from college only three years ago, and is to be commended for her mastery of realistic dialogue and the ability to focus on and portray idiosyncratic character traits that we all possess.  Her skill not only derives from what must surely have been an excellent education at Wesleyan University, but also, I suspect, from good genes:  I discovered at opening night that her father, James Carabatsos, is the screenwriter of such films as Hamburger Hill, Sally Field's Heroes, and Clint Eastwood's Heartbreak Ridge. While completely unrelated to Pine, I must note that as recently as three weeks ago a group of baby boomers in a 5 Points bar paused while channel-surfing to chant "Swede, Swede, Swede!" along with Clint's platoon, that at least once a month for the last couple of decades I have quoted the "permission to speak freely?" line, and that also within this past month I quoted the immigrant soldier from Lost Battalion who proudly asserted that he was indeed an American: "I took the test!"

Pine is not the greatest play ever written, but it's certainly a good one.  It could probably stand another re-write or two, to tighten up the story and perhaps drop about 30 minutes of chit-chat.   The characters too could be more fully developed - we could see Teddy as more fragile, more lost, and more at risk, and Rita could be meaner and feistier, a la Shirley MacLaine in Terms of Endearment (and everything she's done since.) Pine's tone is very much like that film, or the play and film Steel Magnolias, both full of memorable laugh lines but ultimately dealing with death.  It would be very easy to say the ending is all too predictable, but in the last half hour, I found myself desperately wanting just that ending and no other.  Which makes me think that the characters became people that I cared about. A friend and colleague noted that he felt his emotions were a little manipulated, and I can certainly see that.  My reaction, however, is excitement and joy that such a young writer has mastered the skill of manipulating emotions!   Either way, I don't think there was a dry eye in the sold-out opening night house by the show's end, and I rarely cry at live theatre.

Pine may not go on to win any Tony Awards - although it would be extremely cool if it did - but could certainly make for a decent Hallmark Hall of Fame movie.  What's much more important is this chance to nurture and encourage the growth of a new, talented author, and I wouldn't be surprised at all if one day Pine is seen as a promising early work from an acclaimed playwright.  But make those reservations now - there are only three more chances to be part of theatre history, with shows this coming Thursday, Friday, and Saturday nights at 8 PM.  Contact the Trustus box office at (803) 254-9732 or visit www.trustus.org for more information.

~ August Krickel

Deborah Brevoort's "The Velvet Weapon" Wins 2013 Trustus Playwrights' Festival - Chad Henderson Directs Staged Reading Saturday, August 10th

The Velvet Weapon, by Deborah Brevoort, is the winner of the 2013 Trustus Playwrights' Festival, and will receive a full production in the summer of 2014, preceded by a staged reading  this coming Saturday, August 10th, at 2 PM on the Thigpen Main Stage at 520 Lady Street in the Vista.  As sponsor of one of the nation's longest-running play festivals, Trustus has nurtured and fostered the growth of new playwrights such as David Lindsay-Abaire, who later went on to win the Pulitzer Prize.

Over the following year, each winning playwright has the chance to develop the script for production, with the opportunity for input from and consultation with members of the Trustus staff and company, based on feedback at the initial staged reading.  This year's reading will be directed by Chad Henderson, chosen by Jasper readers as the 2012 Theatre Artist of the Year.  Included in the cast are Paul Kaufmann (Next to Normal and I Am My Own Wife at Trustus) Raia Jane Hirsch (The Motherf*@%er With the Hat at Trustus, Pride and Prejudice with SC Shakespeare Co.) Kayla Cayhill (The Shape of Things at Workshop) Trustus Managing Director Larry Hembree, Eric Bultman, and Chelsea Crook.

The reading is free and open to the public, but seating is limited; the bar will be open, with liquid refreshments for sale.

Deborah Brevoort holds an MFA in Playwriting from Brown University and an MFA in Musical Theatre writing from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, where she currently teaches. She also teaches in the MFA playwriting programs at Columbia University and Goddard College. Her web site is www.DeborahBrevoort.com.  She is perhaps best known for her work The Women of Lockerbie, which won the Kennedy Center’s Fund for New American Plays Award, and the silver medal in the Onassis International Playwriting Competition. It has been produced across the U.S., as well as in Scotland, Japan, Greece, Spain, Belarus, Poland, Australia and England, and has been translated into seven languages.

The Velvet Weapon was inspired by the Velvet Revolution in the former Czechoslovakia, and is described as "a hilariously smart backstage farce that will leave you laughing while also engaging you long after you've left the theatre," and "a humorous exploration of populist democracy told through a battle between high-brow and low-brow art.  At the National Theatre of an unnamed country, a matinee audience rises up in protest over what is being performed on stage, and demands something new. They begin a performance of their own of The Velvet Weapon, a play by an unproduced playwright of questionable talent."

 The author kindly agreed to share some thoughts with Jasper via e-mail in this exclusive interview!

Jasper:  You have written drama, comedy, and the books for musicals.  Is The Velvet Weapon your first venture into farce?

Brevoort:   Velvet Weapon is my first farce, although one of my previous plays, The Poetry of Pizza, an Arab/American comedy about love, used elements of farce here and there. Albert Bermel, who wrote the definitive critical study on farce, said that it was “an older dramatist’s medium, because the techniques involved are so formidable.”   That surprised me; farces tend to feel so slight. They are like meringues that melt the minute they hit your mouth.   So, I wanted to try my hand at the form to see what was so difficult.  I was greatly humbled by it, I have to say.   These “slight” little plays are built like Swiss watches!

Jasper:  Do you find it challenging or difficult to move from one form to another, or does that give you a sort of freedom, to work in whatever form suits the material?

Brevoort:  I love writing in multiple forms.  I always find it difficult to move back and forth between them, but that is also the pleasure of it. As a writer, I have a couple of rules for myself. One is that I don’t ever repeat myself.  Another is that in every project I do, there must be something that I don’t know how to do. These rules help to ensure that I am always stretching myself as an artist, and that I don’t stagnate, or get too comfy.

Jasper:   Your theatrical career began at Alaska's Perseverance Theatre, and from there you moved into writing - how did that transition take place?

Brevoort:  I was the Producing Director of Perseverance Theatre, which means I was the person who raised all the money, and was the public administrative face of the theatre.  But Perseverance was an unusual company, because we were basically a group of artists who administered ourselves and the company. I started out as an actor, and worked in the acting company for the better part of 13 years.  I had always wanted to be a writer, so when we started offering playwriting classes at the theatre, led by Paula Vogel and Darrah Cloud, I took them. Paula snatched me out of the class, told me I was writer, and gave me a fellowship to come to Brown University to make the switch from theatre producing and acting to writing. I accepted the fellowship, and moved to NYC, where I’ve been ever since, working as a playwright, lyricist and librettist.

Jasper: I gather that contemporary themes, especially relating to political and social topics, recur in your work, although perhaps sometimes not overtly. Do you have a particular goal in your work?

Brevoort:  I am not aware that I have a political agenda or even that I have political themes - I just write what interests me.  And I am committed to writing each project truthfully, whatever that may entail.

Jasper:  How easy or difficult is it to make the audience think while still entertaining them?

Brevoort:  There are plenty of techniques you can use as a playwright to make an audience think or feel.  To me it’s simply a matter of craft.  It’s no harder to make an audience think than feel—it just requires different tools.  I do have to say, however, that the hardest thing to do is to make an audience laugh. That is 100 times harder than to make them cry.

Jasper:  Why did the "velvet revolution" in Czechoslovakia appeal to you as source material?

Brevoort:  I was very good friends with Pavel Dobrusky, a Czech scenographer who defected from the former Czechoslovakia and came to work with us at Perseverance Theatre in the mid-1980’s.  When the Velvet Revolution happened in 1989, Pavel worked with us on production called Wonderland, a sort of Alice-in-Wonderland take on the events taking place in Eastern Europe.  It was one of my favorite productions at Perseverance Theatre.

Fast forward 15 years:  Pavel and I both now live in NYC and got to talking one night about The Velvet Revolution and how we’d love to make a theatre piece about it.  Pavel knew all the theatre artists who had been involved—they were his old friends.  We put together a grant request to CEC Arts Link, which gave money to theatre artists to do projects in Eastern Europe.  We got the grant, which enabled the two of us to go to both the Czech and Slovak Republics and to interview all the artists who collaborated with Vaclav Havel to bring down the Soviet regime.  We spent about a month conducting intense, in-depth interviews with 43 of the ringleaders.

After the interviews, I remarked to Pavel that the Velvet Revolution was like one, great big back stage farce. Literally.   So, I wrote the play as a farce.

The goal was for Pavel to eventually direct the play.  But unfortunately, Pavel passed away.

Jasper:   Once you finished the play, you had readings at La Mama and the NJ Playwright’s Theatre?  How did that process work?   

Brevoort:  In addition to getting a CEC Arts Link grant to do the interviews, I got a playwriting fellowship from the NJ Council on the Arts, to write the play. The reading at the NJ Playwright’s Theatre was part of that fellowship.  Pavel directed the reading, which was done for about 30 NJ senior citizens, all of whom thought I was writing a satire about Obama.

The La Mama reading was part of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts “Performing Revolution in Central and Eastern Europe” festival, a citywide, 5-month event to commemorate the 20^th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution.  Pavel was no longer in NYC at that point, so he didn’t direct the reading. Many audience members at the reading were from Eastern Europe, so they got all the references in the play and recognized it as the story about Vaclav Havel.  The other half knew nothing about the Velvet Revolution and thought I was parodying populist democratic movements taking place around the world.

In February of this year I had a reading of the play at William Patterson University in NJ, and this time the audience thought I was writing about Occupy Wall Street.

This of course tickles me to no end; it was my goal that this play be about populist democracy not about the Velvet Revolution—and it appears to be working on that level because people are seeing references to American politics or world politics in it.  But I have also loaded the play with lots of inside jokes and references that only Eastern Europeans would “get”—and they seem to be “getting” them.

Each reading helped me to CUT the script. Speed of delivery is necessary for farce. If you have one syllable too many in a line, you won’t get a laugh.  So these readings have helped me to pare each line down so they work like darts.

Jasper:  How did you discover Trustus and the Playwrights' Festival?

Brevoort: I have heard about Trustus for many years,  most recently when I was the playwright-in-residence at Center Stage in Greenville, SC.  I’m delighted to get a chance to work with them!  I’ve never been to Columbia, so I don’t know anything about the community, and am looking forward to coming down and being there next year for rehearsals.

~ August Krickel

Eugenie Carabatsos discusses her play "Pine," premiering at Trustus Friday August 2nd

Pine, the new play by Eugenie Carabatsos and winner of the  Trustus Playwrights’ Festival will open on the Thigpen Main Stage at Trustus Theatre this Friday, August 2, at 8 PM, and will run through the following Saturday, August 10.  The author graciously agreed to share a few thoughts with Jasper, prior to her first visit to Columbia this weekend to see the world professional premiere of her new play.

Jasper:   What inspired you to become involved in theatre?  Is that your main focus as a writer?

Carabatsos:   My primary interest and passion is drama, though I would love to also be a novelist and perhaps create my own television show someday. As far back as I can remember, I have loved theater. My parents are theater-lovers, so they would take me to see plays and musicals frequently as a child. I remember I made my parents take me to see a community theater production of Annie Get Your Gun three times in one weekend. I always loved going to plays and telling stories, but it wasn't until my senior year of high school when I combined my love of storytelling and my love of plays and wrote my first play for my senior project. After seeing my play read aloud by actors, I was hooked.  I have not done any acting, but I have self-produced a few of my plays in festivals, which is a fun, challenging experience that I like very much.

Jasper:  Where did you grow up? 

Carabatsos:   I am from Bridgehampton, NY, which is a small town on the eastern end of Long Island. The area I live in is not unlike New England, so it was a very nice, easy transition to living in Middletown, CT for college.

Jasper:   Your alma mater, Wesleyan, is a very distinguished liberal arts college.  Did you study theatre or writing there?     

Carabatsos:  Wesleyan does have a wonderful theater and film program, but I actually was an English major, so I didn't get involved in the theater scene at all in college. For me, the best way to learn how to write well is to read well-written books, plays, and essays, so I definitely feel as though I gleaned a lot from my education creatively, even though I wasn't involved in the theater program there.

Jasper:  You wrote the first draft of Pine while attending an artist-in-residence program in the Catskills.   Was there anything in particular that inspired this story?

Carabatsos:   The play isn't based on personal experience. I was thinking about what it would be like for a young widow, and what her relationship would be with her "ex's" family.   I thought that relationship might be an interesting idea for a play. Then I thought, well what if the dead spouse was still around, but no one knew it? And that was the jumping off point. Then when I was in the Catskills, I thought that would be a perfect setting for the play.

Jasper:  Is there a significance to the title?

Carabatsos:   The title refers both to the idea of longing, and also to the smell that connects the family to each other and especially to the father.

Jasper: Is comedy a new medium for you?  And do you like to work with any recurring themes in your work?

Carabatsos:   Yes - when I wrote Pine, I hadn't dabbled in comedy at all.   I think the most recurring themes in my work are death, memory, and love. In terms of writing style, I am very interested in trying out different structures. Pine has a pretty straightforward structure, but most of my other work plays a lot with structure.

Jasper: Are you a full-time author? 

Carabatsos:  Making a living off of writing has been a goal since I decided I wanted to be a writer. I hope to one day reach it!  I work both as a private tutor and academic tutor for a tutoring company that specializes in clinically informed tutoring. I have also previously worked for an online university as an adjunct teacher. I actually really enjoy my tutoring work, and I am passionate about education, but being a writer full-time is definitely the end goal.

Jasper:   Part of the Trustus Playwrights' Festival includes a staged reading the year before the actual premiere, allowing for feedback.  What was that process like?

Carabatsos:  I did not attend the reading, but I had a wonderful conversation with the director afterwards, and we discussed the feedback the play received. It was a really helpful conversation. The play has been revised since that first reading. The core of the play is the same, but there are some things that I expanded upon or made stronger connections to. For example, I gave a lot more information about the father, so that the ending had more weight. I also included a scene with Rita in the trees and allowed her to have a moment with her daughter, Julie.

Jasper: How did you discover Trustus, and are you familiar with the Midlands area?

Carabatsos:   I learned about Trustus through a posting on pwcenter.org, which is the website I use to find all of my play submission opportunities. I have driven through South Carolina on a roadtrip, but haven't spent any significant time there (or in the South in general). I am really looking forward to it!

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From press material:

Eugenie Carabatsos has written eight plays, all of which have been produced in professional or festival settings.  After Eternity (Winner of the Venus Theatre Festival), The Brink, and Stalled have been produced in festivals including the Alumnae Theatre New Ideas Festival (Toronto, ON), the Midwinter Madness Festival (New York, NY), the Venus Theatre Festival (New York, NY), and Manhattan Repertory Theatre Festival (New York, NY). Her ten-minute plays have been produced by the Playwrights' Round Table (Orlando, FL), the Short + Sweet Festival (Sydney, Australia), the Edward Hopper House (Nyack, NY), Manhattan Repertory Theatre, The Secret Theatre (Queens, NY), Silver Spring Stage (Silver Spring, MD), the Pan Theater (Oakland, CA), the Complete Theatre (New York, NY), and Love Creek Productions (New York, NY). In Their Glory has received staged readings as part of Alumnae Theatre’s New Ideas Festival in Toronto, and, by the Truffle Theatre Company in Brooklyn. A one-act version of the play won the Scholastic Arts and Writing Award for Best Play in 2006. She graduated from Wesleyan University in 2010 with a BA in English.

The Trustus Playwrights’ Festival is considered by various publications to be one of the best in the nation. Not only do winning scripts garner a professional reading, but they also receive a full production on the Trustus Thigpen Main Stage. Past winners of this festival including  Jon Tuttle, Stephen Belber, and Andrea Lepico have gone on to have their scripts published and performed all over the nation. Past winner David Lindsay-Abaire was even awarded the coveted Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the Tony Award later in his career. Now NYC playwright Eugenie Carabatsos joins the fine company of Playwrights’ Festival winners as her play Pine makes its professional debut right here in the Capital City.

Pine, under the direction of Trustus Artistic Director Dewey Scott-Wiley, is a ghost story – with humor and a tremendous amount of heart. As the lights come up, audiences are introduced to the White family. Gathering for the Christmas holidays, we realize that older son Colin White seems to go throughout the house unnoticed. Further exposition reveals that Colin is actually a ghost following a fatal car accident years earlier. Colin constantly tries to avoid his overbearing mother and to communicate with his younger brother Teddy, but Teddy can’t see him…or can he? The plot thickens as Colin’s ex-girlfriend shows up to the White home for a holiday visit with her new boyfriend. The Whites' Christmas takes many turns as Colin’s memory and spectral presence make us wonder if Colin’s family is beyond his reach.

Sarah Hammond, a Columbia native who is now a successful playwright in NYC, is the Trustus Literary Manager and oversees the festival submissions. “We went electronic with our competition last year,” said Hammond. “This year, for the first time ever, we also eliminated the submission fee for playwrights, which increased the number of submissions substantially. We got 400 submissions this year from all over the country.” Submissions consist of playwright bios, a play synopsis, and a 10-page script sample  which Hammond has to peruse thoroughly. She then asks for full plays from 25-40 of the playwrights submitting. “When asking for those full scripts, we look first for voices that leap off the page,” says Hammond “Is it theater? Does it feel live? Some dialogue just sings, and that's apparent in a ten-page sample. There's a rhythm - an energy - that comes from a playwright's gut. While we don't have one aesthetic for the new work at Trustus, we do tend to favor scripts with a very strong current of personal truth.” After the full scripts have been read, the top five make their way to Columbia, SC where the Trustus Artistic Director chooses the winner. Obviously, Ms. Carabatsos’ Pine found itself in the winner’s circle in 2012.

Director Dewey Scott-Wiley has assembled a talented cast to bring Carabatsos’ characters to life for the first time. Long-time Trustus Company member Becky Hunter (Palace of the Moorish Kings) takes the stage as Rita, the matriarch of the White family. Hunter Bolton (Love! Valour! Compassion!) makes his Trustus debut as Colin, the ghost. Playing Teddy and Julie, Colin’s siblings, are Cory Alpert and Rachel Kuhnle respectively. Playing Julie’s husband is USC MFA in Acting candidate Josiah Lauberstein (Boeing Boeing). Portraying Colin’s ex-girlfriend Rachel is Jennifer Moody Sanchez (My First Time), and with her is Harrison Saunders (Red) as Rachel’s new boyfriend and soon-to-be fiancé.

Pine makes its premiere on the Trustus Thigpen Main Stage on Friday, August 2nd at 8:00pm and runs through August 10th, 2013. Main Stage shows start at 8:00 pm Thursdays through Saturdays, and Sunday matinees are at 3:00pm. Tickets are $22.00 for adults, $20.00 for military and seniors, and $15.00 for students. Half-price Student Rush-Tickets are available 15 minutes prior to curtain.

Trustus Theatre is located at 520 Lady Street, behind the Gervais St. Publix. Parking isavailable on Lady St. and on Pulaski St. The Main Stage entrance is located on the Publix side of the building.   For more information or reservations call the box office Tuesdays through Saturdays 1-6 PM at 803-254-9732, visit www.trustus.org .

~ August Krickel