OPEN POETRY CALL

New Voices of the Eclipse

Shining light on Underrepresented Voices & New Voices yet to be heard, The Jasper Project invites submissions of poetry from unpublished poets age 15 and up from the 8 counties of the SC Midlands.

Theme = the literal solar eclipse or the metaphor of transforming shadows.

A select number of poems will be chosen for presentation on Thursday, August 17th from 3 – 5 PM in Columbia, SC. One Poem will receive a cash prize and publication in the September issue of Jasper Magazine.

·         Poets may enter up to 3 submissions

·         NO multiple submissions or previously published poetry

·         Names should not appear on poems

·         Please send submissions along with a cover sheet stating  

•  title of poem
•  name
•  address
•  email

To:  SYZYGY@JasperProject.org              

Deadline: June 30th, 2017

 

Judge: Cassie Premo Steele

Cassie Premo Steele is the author of 14 books of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction published by small, independent presses. She was featured as a speaker for TEDxColumbiaSC and has been a columnist for Literary Mama and a blogger for the Huffington Post. She works as a writing coach with women from around the world and has a special affinity for creating connections between people and the natural environment. She lives in Columbia with her wife and daughter.
 

Cassie Premo Steele

What We Need Is Here - Brave Stories, Beautiful Songs

by Ed Madden

On Saturday, I will have the extraordinary privilege of reading aloud the brave and moving stories of local gay men as part of the Midlands Men’s Chorus spring concert, When I Knew: A Concert About Loving Who You Are.

The Midlands Men’s Chorus formed almost a year ago, in May 2016, and their first public performance was singing the national anthem at a Fireflies game last summer. There are about 20 men in the group, all from the Midlands.

For this concert, members of the chorus wrote their own stories about coming into awareness and coming out—stories that range from the heartbreaking to the hilarious. We hear about shirts-and-skins basketball, mothers who are horrified and wives who remain friends, and a boy who discovered his desire watching CHiPs (Ponch and Jon!) on television.

The theme of the evening echoes that inevitable question: “When did you know?” In those questionnaires you can find online designed to get straight people to think about sexuality, the inevitable question is, “When did you realize you were straight?” In part it’s because it’s the question gay and lesbian people get asked, and the question we sometimes ask ourselves. When did I know? How did I know? The stories and songs of the performance circle around that theme, when I knew.

In my first rehearsal with the chorus last week, many of the men were moved to tears, hearing each other’s stories for the first time. And their performance moved me as well, especially “What We Need Is Here,” a beautiful song based on a poem by Wendell Berry. For me, though other songs might be more stirring or more directly connected to the theme (or in one case, more entertaining #costumechange), this song is the emotional heart of the set. “What we need / is here,” they sang, “and we pray, not/ for a new earth or heaven, but to be / quiet in heart, and in eye / clear. What we need is here.” This song crushed me. To be quiet in heart, and in eye clear.

Another song sets to music Armistead Maupin’s “Letter to Mama,” an oft-anthologized chapter from the first novel in his Tales of the City series. “Dear Mama,” he writes, “I'm sorry it's taken me so long to write. Every time I try to write to you and Papa I realize I'm not saying the things that are in my heart. That would be O.K., if I loved you any less than I do, but you are still my parents and I am still your child. I have friends who think I'm foolish to write this letter. I hope they're wrong.” I remember writing a letter very much like that.

One of the stories that most moved me was by a man writing about his conversation with his wife when, after years of marriage, she confronted him about what she knew to be true.

Here’s an excerpt:

~

She confronted me about being gay.   The defenses came up, the familiar defenses, the practiced responses, the time–tested reliable denials. But she gave me her reasons and she told me how she knew.   She was right.   After some tense discussion, I remember lying on that bed and staring at the ceiling and saying for the first time in 45 years the words I had spent so much time suppressing;  “You’re right.  I am gay.”  

I couldn’t believe what I said. “I am gay.”

I am not exaggerating when I say that it felt like I could breathe for the first time in my entire life.  The first thing I can recall is the sense of pressure being released from my chest and my lungs expanding, as if I had just come up for air after being underwater from 1970 until 2010.   I had always known, but I had suppressed this part of myself so hard that I had convinced myself that the lie was true.   

. . . .When I came out to her, I really was coming out to me.  

And I breathed for the first time in my life.

~

That story, like so many others, will be vibrating in the air of the church this weekend.

I am delighted and honored to be part of this performance, and deeply grateful to Brian Smith, Gerald Gurss, and Lester Franzen for the invitation.

The concert is at 7pm Saturday at Reformation Lutheran Church (1118 Union Street), with guests invited to join the men for refreshments in the fellowship hall at 6. Tickets are $20 and available at http://www.midlandsmenschorus.com/.

This going to be a beautiful evening.

USC's Andy White Makes Art from Refuse

By Brad Dountz

On Thursday May 4th, University of South Carolina research assistant professor in anthropology, Dr. Andy White, will have his first art exhibit on display at Tapp’s Arts Center at 6 p.m. The exhibit is called Afterburner, and it will display both big and small art pieces that are made from metallic trash you might find on the side of the road. White took the time to sit down with Jasper and talk about what influenced him to make art, his thoughts on the exhibit, and his plans for the future.

Having grown up in the midwest, Dr. White got his bachelor’s degree from Indiana University, his master’s from Southern Illinois University, and his doctorate at the University of Michigan. White describes how his Midwest upbringing was the original spark that got him interested in art. “I think it’s a very natural, human thing to do, to just kind of take your environment and modify it or make something,” he says. “Members in my family, farmers, blue collar folks like people make stuff, that’s what you do, it’s like being human.”

Growing up, White was influenced by the mechanical aspects of movies like Star Wars and Mad Max. Now, he says he is influenced by the aggressiveness of grunge music like Foo Fighters and Against Me. “I like a combination of things looking kind of rough and then also having some finesse to them.” Even though he works with nonorganic materials, White still looks to nature to give him the push to mold his work. “Nature produces things that are incredibly complicated and I like to try to mimic that and get the shapes, the impressions from materials that are not designed to do that,” he says.

White started seriously working on his art pieces in 2011, but never got much time work on them since he moved around so much for his job. It wasn’t until he got his current position at USC that he has been able to work more extensively on his art over the past year.

White’s art products are sculptures that are made of pieces of scrap metal one can collect from any junkyard. “I enjoy the surprise when I walk the dog, I go around the corner and there’s somebody’s old foot stool,” he says. “Things kind of go through their own lives and accumulate scars. I kind of really like the idea of giving them another life, making something new.”

 White works in his own garage workshop, welding, hammering, and constructing someone’s old trash into art. “I never took shop class so I kinda learned all this by trial and error,” he says. “There’s light and there’s fumes and there’s noise and there’s danger and you burn yourself and like you feel it. I kinda actually like that part of it as a way of doing art because it’s kind of visceral.”

White’s official job title is an anthropological archaeologist and he says that side of his world blends into his work. “There’s overlap, but the art stuff is also different enough that it’s a break…As an archaeologist what I deal with mostly is material culture, things. Humans make things, we use things, we discard things, so I’ve always been fascinated by that and I’ve always liked the idea of being able to capture some kind of emotion.”

White compares what he adds to his artistic vision to the afterburner jet engines that also bare the name of his first exhibit. “I’m gonna add something to them, I’m gonna add my own energy and create something new and build off the past,” he says. Going into his first ever art exhibit, White gives off a blaring confidence of his work and his mindset. “It’s really low stakes for me because if I sell nothing like who cares, it all comes back and then I keep it and if I sell a few things great,” he says. “I’m not nervous or anxious, like, I don’t know what could go wrong. What’s the downside?”

White’s plans for the future include entering his work in more local competitions and shows. He is also in the process of coming up with a way of producing his art with other people’s material that they send him.

            The Afterburner exhibit will run until May 26th at Tapp’s Arts Center at 1644 Main Street in Columbia, SC.

___

Jasper Intern Brad Dountz is from Fort Mill and a senior in Print Journalism USC.

Chris Rosa - Former Jasper Intern Lands Dream Job in NYC

Chris Rosa is bundled up in a dark gray sweater as he leisurely stretches out on a plush couch in his shared New York City apartment. He is tired and a little under the weather, but with the exception of an occasional sniffle, it’s difficult to tell. Any evidence of fatigue is suppressed under a permanent grin.

            The glow in his face is rare for someone reaching his mid-twenties. It’s unusual to find at any age. It’s the kind of beaming smile that makes a passerby on the street stop and wonder what they’re doing wrong in life.

             He speaks quickly and with enthusiasm about his new life in the city as Glamour magazine’s entertainment staff writer, and at times his mouth labors to keep pace with his brain. Like his smile, Rosa is an illumination. It’s hard to ignore a blinding light, and many people don’t.

            “It’s really funny. It’s such a roundabout way that I got involved in [journalism],” Rosa said. “In eighth-grade, I read a book about sharks, and I was very into it. I wrote this extra credit paper without the teacher even telling me to. I was just very inspired to do it.”

            After turning in the paper, Rosa’s teacher approached him about joining his middle school’s newspaper. He was uncertain at first but accepted after discovering he could drop physical education.

            Rosa’s first two pieces were movie reviews on “The Grudge 2” and “Employee of the Month.” The reviews allowed him to combine his love for writing with his other passion: entertainment.

            “I always knew I had a love for entertainment and Hollywood and the glitz and the glamour of it,” Rosa said. “But it wasn’t until I learned that I could write that I put two and two together. It wasn’t until around eighth-grade when I realized that I’m probably not talented enough or skinny enough to be an actor or singer, but maybe I could write about it and still be a part of that world in some way.”

            Once Rosa had a taste for journalism, he went into it with full force. He joined his high school newspaper as a sophomore and climbed the ranks. He was named editor in chief for his senior year and interned at Lexington Chronicle, a local publication.

            “And then in college, I knew I had to immediately get involved in student media. I knew that’s what I needed to do to get clips and the experience to put on my resume to get the internships that I wanted. I had an oddly clear trajectory of how it was going to work,” Rosa said.

            He entered the University of South Carolina and joined both The Daily Gamecock newspaper and Garnet & Black magazine. Early on, he split his time between writing entertainment reviews and scouring the Internet for journalists to email.

            “Early networking was just sending emails to people, and telling them how I was interested in getting to know them as a person and what they do,” Rosa said. “For me, the key to networking is to be authentic about it. Don’t be thirsty and feel like all these people need to see your business card. Take the time to build real meaningful connections.”

            Rosa’s determination was rewarded when he was offered internships at TheCelebrityCafe.com, a celebrity news website, and Jasper Magazine, a Columbia-based art publication. They were stepping-stones for larger things to come.

            “I learned everything I know about journalism, writing, and magazines through internships,” Rosa said. “They’re not only critical to making contacts that will land you a job, they’re the main way to learn how journalism actually works.”

            The summer before his junior year, Rosa was accepted as an editorial intern at MTV. He spent four months in New York City writing and editing entertainment stories, and he was the face of a viral video called “‘Mean Girls’ in 30 Minutes.”

            “I applied to hundreds of places, and that’s not an exaggeration,” Rosa said. “I had the philosophy that if you cast the net wide enough, if you apply high and low and take your ego out of it, you’ll get something. My advice in a nutshell about internships is: start from the bottom, don’t worry about getting paid, and apply everywhere within the realm of reason. I knew the key to journalism was experience, and internships were more important than anything else.”

            During the school year, Rosa worked as the online editor for Garnet & Black. He continued his fervent search for internships, and yet again, he found himself back in New York City the following summer. He was working for VH1 and still exercising his entertainment-writing muscle, but this time, Rosa returned to South Carolina with more than what he had left with.

            “They offered me a freelance position [writing] from college. I just wrote for them three to four times a week,” Rosa said.

            As Rosa entered his senior year, he had once again climbed the ranks of another publication. He was selected as editor in chief of Garnet & Black.

            “It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, like, still to this day. But it was the most rewarding,” Rosa said.

            As graduation neared, Rosa was contacted by VH1. A writer had left, a full-time position was now available, and they wanted him. He wanted them too.

            “I already knew everyone that I was working with, so there were no first job jitters,” Rosa said. “The biggest thing I learned from that job was how the Internet worked, on top of sharpening my writing skills.”

            Rosa remained with VH1 for a little over a year until he decided that he needed an adjustment. He had been “on autopilot” for quite some time, and at the age of 23, he sought instruction and growth in his writing. He decided to limit himself with job applications, only choosing positions that were the best fit. He applied to Glamour magazine, and after a lengthy hiring process, Rosa was their new entertainment staff writer.

            “At Glamour, I’m learning to write for the Internet more, as well as my writing growing exponentially because the editor process is a little more intense. My writing is improving by leaps and bounds now. Everything I write gets edited and gets feedback without being detrimental. So I’m learning to write sharply, more concisely and with a better voice,” Rosa said.

            Rosa’s typical day at Glamour starts early. He is always the first person in the office, and he immediately sets to work on finding the latest entertainment news. He compiles a list of the most newsworthy stories, decides on angles for each, and then pitches his ideas to his editor. Once she picks a few, Rosa has 30 to 40 minutes to write them, each with a minimum 300-word count.

            “The goal is to be funny, personable, passionate—get in, tell the story and get out. On a busy day, I do about six of those. [On a] slow day, I do about two. I’m on that grind until about 1:30 or 2 p.m. After that, I transition to my features, my bigger stories,” Rosa said.

            After Rosa leaves the office, depending on the weeknight, he’ll settle in at home to do more work. As an entertainment writer, he is responsible for covering television and award shows, and it’s essential for his commentary to be online 30 minutes after the show has ended.

            “The hours aren’t the best. I have to watch a lot of TV, which involves working at night and bringing the work home with me. A lot of what you loved as a kid becomes your job. But if you really love it, it’s worth it. It’s not your typical nine to five job,” Rosa said.

            Rosa occasionally interviews celebrities, and recently met with Drew Barrymore to discuss her new Netflix show, “The Santa Clarita Diet.”

            “I always thought that I would get star-struck, but my professional mask came on and I was able to get through without fangirling. It’s like [I] go out of [my] body for a second, and

then I leave with the biggest high I’ve ever had,” Rosa said. “Talking to someone about the work they’re doing in movies is the coolest feeling ever. It’s not that I get to talk to celebrities. It’s that I get to talk to people about the way entertainment is made. I get just as excited talking to a screenwriter as I do talking to a famous actor.”

            Rosa says that he is rarely without fault, and takes guidance from his greatest influence, Madonna. Without her advocacy for self-love, freedom of expression and self-empowerment, he says it would have been difficult to take risks and show his vulnerability in his writing. But unlike his role model, Rosa has no time to be a diva.

            “Have no ego whatsoever. Be enthusiastic, be easygoing, be eager, be friendly to everyone, be a sponge, have a personality and have passion,” Rosa said. “You don’t have to be Ernest Hemingway to get a job in journalism. You have to be an eager beaver. No one wants to work for the best writer who’s a diva. Everyone wants to work with a good writer with a great attitude.”

New Jasper Intern Bria Barton is a student at USC majoring in Journalism with a minor in Hotel, Restaurant, and Tourism management. Passionate about travel, she is also a movie buff and her favorite genre is horror.

Lexington Artist Wins Artfields 2D People's Choice Award - Micheal Geddings

Jasper congratulates Lexington portrait artist Michael Geddings on winning the Artfields 2017 2D People's Choice Award. A commission artist who works from his home studio, we wanted to get to know a bit more about Geddings and the story behind his winning portrait. Here's what we learned:

Jasper:  First, tell us about your background and training.

Geddings:  I’m basically self-taught. I’ve been drawing from the moment I could hold a pencil. I was in advanced art classes throughout high school with a wonderful teacher. The summer before my senior year I spent at the SC Governor’s School for the Arts. That experience really helped me and exposed me to new ideas and mediums. I studied at USC for 2 years, but left to go out on my own. That was in 1992 and I’ve been doing it ever since.

Jasper:  You are working artist who does commission work -- Can you tell us about that? How much of your work is spent on commission work and how much on creations of your own design? How will the Artfields award effect your commission work?

Geddings:  Yes, I am a commission artist and I work out of my home studio. In an average year I will produce 200 to 225 portraits in various mediums. Most of my work is in charcoal, but pencil, oil and acrylics are very popular as well. I also do 5 to 10 murals a year also. With the steady demand of work that comes in, it does leave very little time to explore and create original ideas and concepts. The piece, “Hopeful Soul”, that was at Artfields was done between commissions I was doing at the time. I hope that the Artfields experience will help me to connect to the larger art world and to forge new friendships while I get new commissions.

Jasper:  Do you have another day job like many artists? If so, what is it?

Geddings:   I do have another job that I enjoy. I’ve been with a company called Mac Papers for many years. I work there as a branch manager with the responsibility to oversee the morning operations of getting the paper out on time to the customer. I have great flexibility with my hours which allows me to leave around 11:30am-12:00 pm every day. I could never do a 9-5 and work as an artist also. On the average afternoon I have about 5 hours to myself to create. I typically produce about 1 piece a day.

Jasper:  The piece that won the People's Choice award had religious undertones -- is that a common element to your work?

Geddings:  Again as a portrait artist, there are no opportunities to really express myself or to creatively think outside the box. I just simply produce what the client wants. In the case of this piece, I was able to say something from my heart and display God’s love for us and the hope that one can have by trusting him to guide us. The subject in the piece has that hope and clinches to it during his obvious day to day struggles. He has nothing but the shirt on his back and hope in his heart. Will I continue this theme in future works? Probably. I would like to have a series with that continuing theme

Jasper:  What are the typical inspirations for your work? 

Geddings:  My biggest inspiration I have is the joy I get in my heart when I see the look on people’s faces when they see their finished piece. I have heard every story you can imagine as my clients explain the reasons for why they want this person done. Many of the portrait subjects I do are of their loved ones who have passed. From life-long marriages to unspeakable tragedies. There are many pets that have passed on that come through my studio, children that were taken too soon, and some that were stillborn. Those are the hardest ones to do. I believe I have been given this ability to help others and minister to them in this way. Every person that comes through my door is an instant friend.

Jasper:  Had you entered Artfields before? When?

Geddings:  This was the first time I’ve entered Artfields. I had heard of it, but never really had anything to show. Most of what I do is already sold before I put the first mark on the paper. I will be back though. It was an amazing experience.

Jasper:  Can you take a moment to brag about any other accolades you've received?

Geddings:  I’ve won several best of shows through the years. The first one was in 1978, I was in the 1st grade. Believe it or not, I still have it. Within the last year, I have won 2 Best of Shows with 2 different pictures. A 24X36 Charcoal entitled “John Lee Hooker” won top honors at the Rosewood Art and Music. Back in October the “Hopeful Soul” piece won also Best in Show at the SC State Fair. The current project that I’m involved with now is a mural design that will be on the Pecknell Music building in the center of Five-Points in downtown Columbia.

Jaseper:  Where can we see your work now and in the near future? 

Geddings:  I have had work in a few galleries around town, but nothing at the moment. Usually those pieces are sample portraits to just show the buyer what I’m capable of producing. I am anxious about creating a series of originals for the purpose of showing. Like I said, everything I do is sold before I even begin.

Visit Geddings website at http://www.michaelgeddings.com/

John Lee Hooker by Michael Geddings

The Play Right Series, Community Producers, and Sharks and Other Lovers -- a message from cindi

When we started the Jasper Project last year as a non-profit entity dedicated to collaborative arts engineering, one of the first projects on our roster, after putting out the next issue of Jasper Magazine, was the formation of the Play Right Series.

The Play Right Series is an endeavor to enlighten and empower audiences with information about the process involved in creating theatrical arts, at the same time that we engineer and increase opportunities for SC theatre artists to create and perform new works for theatre. The word process is italicized because one of the four main missions* of the Jasper Project is to pull back the curtain on what, for most of us, is the magic and mystery of art. The Process.

How, for example, does a play get from a nugget in the playwright’s brain through her pen and all the way through re-writes, communication with directors, casting, table readings, stage readings, blocking, costuming, lighting, scoring, marketing, financing, rehearsal after rehearsal after rehearsal, and so much more, all the way to the stage on opening night?

We believe not only that the process of creating art deserves the same kind of accolades and wonder that the product does, but that knowledge of the process makes us both better audiences and patrons, as well as better artists ourselves. One of the ways we implement this belief is by involving Community Producers.

Community Producers are normal people, just like you and me, who invest a modest but meaningful amount of money in the production of one of the Play Right Series plays. In exchange for their investment, Community Producers are offered an insiders’ view of what goes on behind the scenes and are invited to follow the process of producing a new play from the first readings on.

The first in our line-up of new, audience-friendly plays is Sharks and Other Lovers, written by Columbia native Randall David Cook, and our first class of Community Producers is made up of Bonnie Goldberg, Roe Young, Bill Schmidt, Marcia Stine, Charles and Jean Cook, and Jack Oliver.

Larry Hembree is the director of the play and he believes strongly that this program is important for the Greater Columbia Arts Community at this point in time. “In a city that prides its arts and culture scene, the Play Right Series validates the performing arts’ work here and is a testament to artists and audiences that new work can be created and supported,” he says. “The long term goals [of the Play Right Series] are to continue to keep our city and state at the forefront of theatre by continuing to produce as much new work as possible.  Trustus has done a stellar job at this for over 30 years. So has the Columbia Children’s Theatre with its Commedia productions for young audiences.   Now the Jasper Project can continue to grow that. It’s exciting. Because this process is a true collaboration between playwright, director, actors and designers. It can only work if there is true collaboration among all the artists involved which certainly improves theatre skills for all of them.”

Sharks and Other Lovers stars Libby Campbell, Jennifer Moody Sanchez, Josh Kern, Glenn Rawls, and Perry Simpson. David Swicegood does costume and hair, Barry Wheeler is the sound designer, and Emily Harrill is the stage designer.

Because of the support of Bonnie, Roe, Bill, Marcia, Charles, Jean, and Jack, the Jasper Project is delighted to present a staged reading of Sharks and Other Lovers on Friday, April 28th and Saturday, May 6th. Both readings will take place at Tapp’s Arts Center and the cost is only $10. There will be a cash bar and an exciting discussion of the journey the play has taken thus far, and where it will go from here.

I hope you’ll join us for the first in an on-going series of experiments in theatre arts. It’ll be fun, and we’ll all be better theatre audiences (and hopefully artists) for having been there.

Take care,

Cindi

*The Jasper Project is committed to four integrated criteria:

• Process – illuminating the unique processes endemic to all art forms in order to provide a greater level of understanding and respect for that discipline.

• Community/Collaboration – nurturing community both within and between arts disciplines.

• Narrative – creating a more positive and progressive understanding of SC culture.

• Economy – being efficient stewards of arts funding committed to creating more with less. 

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Review: Trustus Theatre Presents Hand to God

If the image of a Trustus company member with a puppet on his hand in the promotional materials for Hand to God conjures up some déjà vu , that would make sense—the theatre produced the irreverent Sesame Street send-up Avenue Q back in 2012, showcasing the power and possibility of adult-oriented theatre that incorporates puppetry.

Given that, it’s hard not to make some surface-level comparisons to the two shows, particularly since they lean into the dependable gag of having puppets say naughty things. But while Avenue Q was toying directly with the staging and conventions of the traditional children’s programming around puppets, Hand to God uses another, lesser known convention of puppetry—sock puppet performances that fundamentalist churches often use to teach about the Bible to young ones—and spins off boldly from there. The expected biting satire lampooning conservative evangelicals is there, of course, but playwright Robert Askins actually peers deeper into the very nature of storytelling, and of mythmaking itself. He tellingly bookends the play with soliloquies (fittingly from a puppet) that wax poetic and half-crazed on the subject matter to prime the audience for such connection. And it works. To paraphrase Joan Didion, Hand to God is fundamentally about the stories—the fictional stories—we tell ourselves in order to live.

The building blocks of the plot are relatively simple—a grieving widow, Margery (Jennifer Hill), and her teenage son, Jason (Jonathan Monk), find solace in their church’s puppetry club. Pastor Greg (Paul Kaufman) is into Margery, Jason is into girl-next-door fellow club member Jessica (Martha Hearn Kelly), and troubled teen Timmy (Patrick Dodds) is also into Margery. The devil gets involved. Shenanigans ensue.

Central to those shenanigans is Jason’s masterful sock puppet alter-ego, Tyrone, whose foul-mouthed antics and increasingly belligerent presence gradually subsumes Jason’s character. Tyrone voices the most extreme parts of Jason’s psyche--anger, fear, love, lust, all get ribald treatment from the puppet even as Jason himself remains shy and meek. The thematic layers that get worked through in this performance--the trials of puberty, the bewildering emotional highs and lows of religion, the grief over a lost parent--all get lifted up, swirled around and interrogated by the crazed humor rather than turned into punchlines. A great example of this (mild spoiler alert) occurs during an extended puppet sex scene, which is both as comical as you’d imagine it but also surprisingly rife with sweetness and emotional complexity as it managed to capture the screaming sex drive and shuffling awkwardness that is endemic to adolescent dating rituals.

On the whole, this is one of Trustus’s finer productions in recent years, with a would-be boring set that manages to get all of the nuances and details of a church rec room down tight, with the dated evangelical posters and chintzy decorations evoking that highly specific atmosphere. And when it rivetingly transforms into the devil’s happy place at one point, with demonic, upside down crosses and lewd messages scrawled on the walls, the place becomes positively electrifying.

Too, the casting and performances here are sharp and delightful. The show itself requires Monk to give a masterful performance as Jason to make the whole thing tick, and watching him make machine gun-fire shifts between Jason’s voice and mannerisms and Tyrone’s will remind you of the magic of theatre over and over again throughout the show. The supporting cast around him is equally superb though— Paul Kaufman nails the ingratiating, slightly delusional self-confidence of a do-good-but-not-that-good pastor. Jenny Mae Hill deftly pulls the young Southern widow caricature in just enough to bring genuine pathos to the character while also gracefully hitting all the comic notes as well. Martha Hearn Kelly and Patrick Dodds both take on the kind of roles we’ve seen them in before, but there’s no denying that they both can convincingly bring to life the girl-next-door romantic interest and nascent bad boy, respectively. Kelly’s Jessica is particularly good as she seemingly calibrates a relatively straightforward character to match Jason’s eccentricities in a way that could have been forced but instead manages to feel tender and organic.

In addition to the set, director Patrick Michael Kelly’s careful blocking is also a technical showcase, particularly when allowing Monk and the rest of the puppeteers (primarily Hearn’s Jessica) to move around the stage quite naturally alongside puppets that feel every bit like separate characters from the actors bringing them to life. There’s a sense of well-rounded excellence that pervades this production, and it’s a pleasure to see such execution on a local stage.

What most surprises though, is how well the play itself deserves such thoughtful production. For all of its acerbic one-liners and comedic foibles, it’s making some astute connections that will leave you buzzing as you leave the theater. The web of connections Askins draws between sexual desire, religion, mental health, and storytelling are sharper and more thought-provoking than dramas with a tenth of this play’s charm and wit.

And one thing’s for sure—you’ll never underestimate the power—or really trust, even—a sock puppet ever again. –Kyle Petersen

Hand to God runs through May 6 on the Thigpen Main Stage at Trustus Theatre. Tickets are available at trustus.org.

This is not a poem. This is an incident report.

At the South Carolina March for Science, held at the Statehouse on April 2, Earth Day, Tara Powell read a powerful new poem, "Incident Report." Written specifically for the march, the poem addresses environmental concerns through conversations with her four-year-old son.

The state march was held in conjunction with a national March for Science and many other marches around the nation and the world, all calling attention to the importance of science, the value of clear air and water, the reality of climate change, and the policies of the Trump administration that betray all of these things. South Carolina organizers included speakers from the arts and religion on the program--including Powell, an associate professor of English and Southern Studies at the University of South Carolina and a poet. 

Powell's poem calls attention to the value of science through conversations with her four-year-old son, who shows up in the poem with a paper model of the solar system on his head. "This is not a poem," Powell repeats, it is an incident report, it is a report card, it is a lesson plan.

We are honored and delighted to post "Incident Report" for the first time in print here on the Jasper blog. 

~~~

Incident Report

Columbia, SC, March for Science

April 22, 2017

Listen up, class.

This is not a poem, y’all.

This is an incident report.

My four-year-old came home wearing the solar system

on his head.  It’s all the colors,

scraps of paper orbiting his curls.

I imagine this boy commanding tides,

moving back the waters creeping up our steps.

I tell him about the cypress water;

he tells me about stars.

One thing reflected in the other.

The bream move beneath, whatever

we believe.  The stars shoot across,

whatever we know.

Hurry up please, it’s time.

This is not a poem, Columbia.

This is a report card.

My four-year-old came home wearing the solar system

on his head.  It’s a crown of many colors,

illegal in another place and time.

An emergent truth:  he is his brother and sister’s

explainer-in-chief, not me.  He says

his friends at school are going to kill the trees,

that they tore the garden out by its roots that day

and the teacher couldn’t stop them.

He never wants a playdate again.  He is afraid

they are coming for our magnolia.  He patrols

the yard, my sweet, solar boy.

The trees give us breath, he says.

My boy makes me breathless.

Last call, America. 

This is not a poem.

This is a lesson plan.

My four-year-old came home wearing the solar system

on his head.  The moon was pink last week,

the egg moon, the first of spring.  The rising water

still deeply brown.  Uneasy lies the hand

that crowned that crown, the mother who picks

it up when he puts it down.  The march is round

our trees and down our street,

over to the schoolyard where they play

for keeps.  The good Lord grant what I hope for him,

plenty of ink and a wide blue pen,

a curl of stars and marching feet,

strings to take soundings from below the deep,

a listening ear, and a voice to teach.

The things he wonders, I will work to know.

Tara Powell

I'm sorry, Officer - I forgot to rhyme: Poet Laureate Plays April Fools' Prank on Public

Poetry turned a lot of angry frowns to smiles today on Columbia’s Main Street as One Columbia for Arts and History and our Columbia city poet laureate Ed Madden played a big April Fools' joke on folks parking their cars downtown.

According to Madden, “I was brainstorming with my intern Luke Hodges about gorilla poetry projects—projects that would put poetry in places people would not expect it, projects that would put poetry in daily life. We came up with a lot of ideas, but this seemed the perfect one for this year since April 1st falls on a Saturday when the city does not ticket downtown.”

Along with the help of “a nice mob of folks” windshields throughout the area were slapped with pretty realistic looking parking poetry tickets, like those pictured below.

“It has been great,” Madden says. “Some folks were angry at first, and then laughed very hard.” He continues, “When I was going back into one of the parking garages a woman pulled over and stopped me and told me how mad she was when she first saw it but, then, what a great idea it was. She loved it!”

Lee Snelgrove, executive director of One Columbia agrees. “The project caught people off guard and made them take a moment to consider poetry as part of their daily experience. It was a fun project to be a part of.”

What's Your Idea for the New City of Columbia Flag?

Design is all around you in both loud and quiet ways. From the buildings we work in to the products we use, many times we experience design in ways that have been created for us. Sometimes, though, we are brought into the experience.

The re-imagination of the City of Columbia flag is one of those opportunities.

Last fall, the Columbia Design League hosted a lecture featuring noted vexillologist Ted Kaye, author of the flag design bible Good Flag, Bad Flag. As you might suspect, a quick Google search of the words “flag” and “Columbia, SC” delivers two distinct stories. First, comes the protracted battle to furl the Confederate flag from the state house grounds. On a more positive note (and included in Kaye’s fall presentation) is the other flag, the State of South Carolina’s official flag, which South Carolinians embroider, fly and stick on everything from silver jewelry to foam coozies to belts.

One flag decidedly absent from our conversations around the event was the City of Columbia flag. Before last fall’s event, most of us hadn’t a clue that the city even had a flag. When we evaluated the flag based on Kaye’s criteria, it was painfully clear. Our dynamic city deserved a flag upgrade.

With so many paths forward to a new flag, the question was our approach. One of the biggest issues with the current design is that the imagery — stalks of corn and cotton — is dated. When you add a seal to the mix, the flag says government and farming. What’s missing? People. People are what make up any city. That’s who the flag should represent.

That’s why both Columbia Design League and One Columbia for Arts and History overwhelmingly decided to partner on the project and bring it to life as a public initiative with a $2,000 award for the winning idea.

A city flag is not a logo or even a brand. It’s an object that represents all things in this city. The flag’s next iteration will represent the people, the various cultures, the physical features, and most of all represent the pride we share for our city.

The current design, created by Taylor School first grade teacher Kate Manning Magoffin in 1912, has served our community well. We encourage you to take the same pride as Mrs. Magoffin did and create your own vision of Columbia’s flag, too.

Visit Design a Better Flag to learn more about flag design and how you can submit your idea. Designs will be accepted through April 10, 2017.

- By Julie Turner

City of Columbia flag since 1912 -

Review: Trustus Theatre Presents Grey Gardens: A Musical

It’s hard to get over the fact that Grey Gardens: The Musical exists at all. 

The 1975 documentary delves intimately into both the lives of the eccentric, fallen aristocrats of “Little Edie” and “Big Edie” Bouvier Beale, the latter the aunt of Jackie Onassis Kennedy, as well as their dilapidated, equally fallen mansion in the Hamptons, Grey Gardens, in a cinéma vérité fashion, something which felt like a distinct, if odd, product of the American New Wave. The film achieved cult status for its memorable turns of phrase and its voyeuristic exploration of both the women’s nostalgia and their cat and raccoon-infested mansion, but it hardly felt like the natural basis of a musical.  

Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, then, the musical adaptation’s formalism (book by Doug Wright, music by Scott Frankel, and lyrics by Michael Korie) is particularly striking. Neatly bifurcated into two acts,  the first captures the two women prior to their fall and at the height of their wealth,  playing up Big Edie’s slightly-delusional preoccupation with her singing as well as planting the contentious seeds of the relationship we see thirty years later in the second act. 

Because of this structure, there’s a certain musical-by-numbers feel to the long first half of the play. Taking place in the hours prior to an ill-fated engagement party for Little Edie and a young Joseph Kennedy, Jr. (something which has no real-life basis, although the younger Beale would lay claim to it), much of the commotion in preparing for the party centers on whether Big Edie is deliberately sabotaging her daughter’s courting in an effort to keep her at home, as well as her desire to always be (quite literally) center stage. Act one mostly functions as a way to introduce us to a couple of familiar set piece characters. Thankfully, much of the Trustus-assembled cast shines here. Cody Lovell delivers a slick and striking young Kennedy, with all of the privilege and chauvinistic charm that implies, and Rob Sprankle brings a sly bit of whimsy to the dithering patriarch of the clan,  while Kevin Bush hams it up as the wry and withering resident piano player.  The butler, played by Samuel McWhite, proves to be an adroit straight man. Too, the young Clare Kerwin (as little Lee) and Ella Rescigno (playing Jackie O as a child) are apt and able, the latter managing a sense of poise that both belies her age and serves as a distinct contrast to the silliness of the adults around her. 

For all that, though, the best moments of Act I belong to Haley Sprankle as Little Edie. Showcasing her pure vocal chops and a distinct brogue tempered only by her ability to channel the sort of aristocratic coquettishness that defines her role, much of the joy of the show comes from simply watching her perform, whether dueting with Lovell and the upbeat courtship-cum-ambition tune “Goin’ Places,” locking souls with Mandy Applegate Bloom as Big Edie on “Two Peas in a Pod,” or taking on a stirring, if discomforting, ballad with "Daddy's Little Girl." 

Bloom is great, of course, as the middle-aged Big Edie in Act I, but it's when she pivots to playing the older Little Edie in Act II that she sends the play into overdrive. As her voice rings out across the stage with lines cribbed directly from the documentary you would almost swear that the real-life Edie was in the room, so thoroughly did she capture the bizarre inflection and thick accent. Add to that her eerily accurate body language and you have the makings of a star turn as Bloom fully embodies the larger than life cult figure that gave the documentary its longevity.  

It helps as well that the second half of the play gets to borrow some of the most memorable bits of dialogue from the film, but Bloom and Caroline Weidner, as the octogenarian Big Edie, (are also adept at bringing to light the swirling realities of nostalgia and the overwrought toxicity that has developed in the two women through the years. They are both great whether singing songs that are stirring, (“Will You?,” “Another Winter in a Summer Town”) or humorous and ribald (“The Revolutionary Costume Today,” “Jerry Likes My Corn”). 

By the play's end, director Milena Herring and this Trustus crew have proven that there's something distinctly less peculiar about the idea of a Grey Gardens musical, even if the characters remain both laughably ludicrous and fragile and familiar. Thanks to several star turns and a well-managed production, the way in which the play allows the construct of the genre to toy compellingly with the real-life narrative of the Beale women is understated, yet undeniable.  

In other words, a production that offers a nice balance of smart and edgy, makes for an enjoyable night on the town.   

-Kyle Petersen

CityBallet presents Beauty and the Beast

Columbia City Ballet invites you to be their guest as they grace the Koger Center stage with its production of Beauty & The Beast, for two spellbinding performances only.

This production features choreography from Executive Director, William Starrett and music composed by Léon Fyodorovich Minkus and will be held on Saturday, March 18 at 3:00 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. at the Koger Center for the Arts.

A love story perfect for ages 9-90, Beauty & The Beast is a captivating fairytale as old as time that blends magic with artistry. The dancers of Columbia City Ballet couple beautiful lines and riveting stage presence to tell a classic tale where love conquers all.

Over 80 local children from the midlands area are incorporated throughout the performance. This musical and romantic fantasy creates a love story, where a frightening beast and a beautiful woman fall for each other despite their differences.

First performed in the Spring of 1991 as a Koger Center box office sell out, Columbia City Ballet brings a newly updated and revived Beauty and the Beast to the stage just in time for the classic Disney film to hit theatres.

Costume Designer, Alexis Doktor has crafted a one of a kind Belle gown to debut in the performance. The production will also feature enchanting medieval sets including the mysterious castle nestled in old France. Columbia City Ballet invites you be their guest for an evening of magic and excitement for this captivating performance of Beauty & The Beast at the Koger Center for the Arts. For more information and tickets, visit www.kogercenterforthearts.com or call the box offices at 803-251-2222. Military and student discounts available at the box office or Koger Center kiosk.

Two Reviews of the Same Book - Secondhand, by Maya Marshall (dancing girl press, 2016)

In Secondhand, Maya Marshall invites us to examine the everyday intimacies that our bodies share with strangers through the lens of the secondhand item. She shines light on the way in which we (are forced to) carve sensual moments out of the remnants of someone else’s similar moments.

One such instance is the opening poem, “Dressing Room: Thrift Store,” in which someone is trying on a blue slip: “…you think you/ Can sew the tear and how slick the blue slip will be/ between you and your sheets.” Marshall forces the reader to acknowledge that desire is not only as old as history and memory, but is equally used and well-worn.

“Secondhand Lingerie” expands on this theme by evoking the images of domesticity. We witness women in possession of “a black nightie/ to upcycle into passion/ after another night of chicken/ and pasta.” Marshall does not shy away from the fact that sex and its trappings are tied to both race and class and gender. If the speak bucks at the suggestion that same-sex attraction is a “phase” in the poem “Lust,” then that idea is deepened by the much more intimate lines of “Someone Borrowed”: “a girl will send you home/ in clean panties of her own.” This echoing across poems, the thrifted and reused, permeates the first section of the chapbook, “The Dressing Room.”

These echoes take on more depth in the second half, “What is Handed Down.” Here we read poems of the family and the question of what can be given, exchanged, or inherited takes on additional weight.  

In “My Father’s House,” Marshall plays with language, deconstructing the idea of family only to reassemble it, much as one might repair a blue slip, using newer parts as seen in “The Youngest: Addendum.” Here the speaker states: “I watched him breastfeed at my mother’s table./ His mother, mistress, feeding him at my mother mother’s table.” Relationships, roles, even family structure can be secondhand.

The reusing, the repair, the handing down both changes the object and the speaker and, yet, changes nothing about the nature of intimacy itself. Nothing but a miracle could spare the speaker – or the reader – from the cycle of want and use, but as Marshall writes “Grace is cheaper than a miracle.”

-Nicole Homer

Nicole Homer’s debut poetry collection, Pecking Order, will be out spring of 2017 on Write Bloody press.

~~*~~

The poems in Maya Marshall's slim chapbook, Secondhand, are arranged in two groups, Dressing Room and What Is Handed Down.

Opening in Dressing Room we consider poems operating in a psychic space of privacy, intimacy. This is self-facing clothing that cherishes those aspects of our bodies which relate to - or create - other bodies. Marshall's words thread together into a network of organized ambiguities (like the mesh and lace of some of the garments referenced in the poems).

The reader becomes more aware of the intimacy Marshall has created when sharp violent moments arrive. Momentary violence roots the poems in reality. In “Port of Entry,” Marshall unfolds a series of images which masterfully engage the reader's imagination.

The last poem in this group, “Someone Borrowed,” is the most concrete, acting as a hinge for the collection. Marshall pulls us into a new zone for self-identity (mirrored with lover). The poems’ internal rhythmic repetitions echo other poems in the group, but this poem's hardness, its 'broken-piece' structure, and its question of self give it a handle that I come back to after finishing the last poem in the book.

“What is Handed Down” brings us to the locus of inheritance. Now intimacy is not chosen, but instead was given to (forced upon?) us - by the culture (American Girl Movies) by the father or mother chosen for us, our siblings. Here the language becomes more direct (The Youngest: Addendum) as the body is direct. The relatedness describes lives in exchanges of language, instead of gestures (Baptism). Marshall has arranged this series of poems along a continuum of self-perceiving-self-and other, from the imagined to the embodied, with remarkable subtlety and control. I look forward to reconsidering these poems in the future, and reading her next work.

-Jessica Fenlon

Jessica Fenlon is developing code-based projection sculpture for her March 2017 gallery show. Her second book of poetry, Manual for Wayward Angels, arrived in February of 2017 from 6 Gallery Press.

~~*~~

Someone Borrowed      

           Think of the hands that have touched this cotton.

           What wisdom do you get from hunger?

________

Note:   You are a woman loosed.

________

            Naked over her panties,

            I consider how

            a girl will send a girl home

            in clean panties of her own.

            I took the bus with my underwear

            in my pocket.

________

Note:    When you write about a black woman

            lusting after

            a black woman,

            You write about a ghost chasing

            herselfherself

________

            I took the bus

________

            There is desire and

            Shame and relief

            In this story, (though

            It isn’t yet

            Fully a story (where

Is the middle?) She runs

Her nails down my thigh:

Denim resists),

But there is no healing touch.

(She howls out, yes. It is her performance.)

________

Note:    when you write about this borrowed woman,

you write about a woman who sells herself—

                Punishment for some sin she can’t identify.

________

                I consider how I took the bus

                with no panties on,

                                                to a borrowed room.

I took the bus naked over her

                                naked over

                her panties.

A queer question: am I into myself?

                (Is it me?) Is she myself?

~~*~~

To purchase Secondhand by Maya Marshall contact the author at mayamarshallpoetry@gmail.com

Or the publisher at https://dulcetshop.myshopify.com/products/secondhand-maya-marshall

Review: Trustus Theatre Presents Marcus, or the Secret of Sweet -- a Play for our Times

Marcus or The Secret of Sweet is the third installment of The Brother/Sister Plays by noted playwright Tarell Alvin McCraney whose work inspired the now Golden Globe-winning and Oscar-nominated film Moonlight. Marcus is a coming-of-age story for the title character Marcus Eshu who is haunted by dreams and memories of his father Elegba that lead Marcus on a path to discovering his secret of sweetness, or key to his sexuality.

The play begins with two powerful images. The first occurs when Marcus’ dreams are dramatized by the full cast and narrated by cast member Chris Jackson while he is showered upon symbolizing a storm soon to come either within Marcus or the impending Hurricane Katrina to his town in Louisiana. The second occurs at the dynamic funeral procession for Marcus’ father where the cast marches around the theatre singing a Negro spiritual to honor Elegba’s death.

The play takes risks as the characters themselves verbalize their own asides, stage instructions and emotions, to the audience. At times in the play, this is helpful and even humorous, and at other times, it can appear condescending. The play also narrates the history of homophobia within the African American community all the way back to slavery, purporting that homosexuality would have been unprofitable for plantation owners, thereby eventually unaccepted and discouraged by black people. There is, finally, the running motif of Marcus’ sexuality perhaps being inherited from his father, embracing the theory of the so-called gay gene.

Marcus’ mother played by Celeste Moore declares in the play, “Ain’t nothing sweet about having a soft son.” The word sweet is a colloquialism used in the town for gay. Marcus labors intensely to unearth his father’s sweetness leading him to long for the affection of his uncle played by Jabar Hankins. Marcus’ dreams intensify the closer he gets to this secret that somehow everyone knows but him.

The cast complements each other well. Katrina Blanding nails her performance as Aunt Elegua with the candor and humor of Tyler Perry’s Madea character. John Floyd as Marcus Eshu is believable and engaging.

Marcus or The Secret of Sweet at Trustus is an education in drama and black culture. The play teaches the process of weathering the storms of internal and external conflict within the paradigms of family and community. 

-- Len Lawson

Len Lawson is the co-editor of the poetry anthology, Hand in Hand: Poets Respond to Race, releasing on February 19th from Muddy Ford Press. https://www.facebook.com/events/398977450447357/

REVIEW: Trustus Theatre’s production of BOY

by Kyle Petersen

Trustus Theatre’s production of BOY, the Anna Ziegler play which has won critical praise for its depiction of a heartbreaking attempt to “decide” a young boy’s sexual identity following a botched circumcision as an infant, is one of those plays that runs the risk of being too tightly-constructed without the emotional intimacy of the performances. Opening and closing with mirroring, highly symbolic set pieces at a Halloween party, the play flashes back and forth between a “present” time in the late 1980s as we learn about the young man known as Adam Turner and how we was raised as a girl, “Samantha,” in the 1960s. Rounding out the cast, there’s bewildered parents, a fussy and overconfident psychologist, and, of course, a love interest for the protagonist.

There’s a certain predictable, although occasionally frustrating, momentum which carries through Adam’s early years as his parents and doctor make ineffectual attempts at strictly socializing him as a girl so as to make sure the operation and hormones “take,” and it’s probably here the play lands its sharpest blows. Much of that comes from how acutely Stann Gwynn portrays Dr. Wendell Barnes, the gender specialist convinced of the absolute power of nurture over nature. Gwynn lends that character both a sense of brilliance inextricably linked to a pompous sense of superiority that often seems to plague status-driven academics and researchers. He’s a delight, a next-gen Freud with a tantalizing intimate relationship with Adam that eventually shatters his clinical remove. Gwynn’s fully-realized performance sits comfortably next to strong performances by Jennifer Little and Harrison Saunders, who play Adam’s parents Trudy and Doug Turner. The desperate drive and sense of helplessness that pervades Little’s performance, as well as the blue-collar distrust that Saunders’ Doug brings to the proceedings feel true to type. While some of their behavior can feel almost too pat and accommodating to the liminal uncertainty surrounding sexual identity, the actors make these characters real and heartbreaking in the tight quarters of Trustus’ Side Door. Doug’s rare, beer-assisted conversation with Adam about how we was raised is a special theatrical moment, and one that depends deeply on the actors to bring to life. 

Despite strong performances, there’s an almost documentary-like impulse towards this gender identity-confused coming-of-age narrative. It’s as if in the desire to craft a teachable moment, Ziegler is a bit too dismissive of the thorny ways that socialization still cuts deep, in unpredictable ways, across every person’s complicated sense of self.

This is perhaps even more apparent in the parallel, “present” time plot involving Adam’s romance with Jenny Lafferty, played by Martha Hearn with a quirky confidence that feels straight out of a mid-2000s indie flick. Hearn clearly sketches out her own take on Jenny, something which doesn’t always seems to jibe with the shallowness of the character in the script or with the expected drama of a young woman in the 1980s discovering puzzling, even betraying secrets about her romantic partner’s past. That’s not to say Hearn doesn’t turn in a solid performance, just that it stretches the believability just a bit. 

Where Trustus’s production shines brightest, though, is in the performance of Patrick Dodds as Adam. Dodds is a young actor who has dazzled in other Trustus productions like Spring Awakening and American Idiot but who here, with his musical showmanship set entirely aside, he proves his formidable acting chops as he jumps through the nervous and kindly self-effacing version of his character to the belligerent and angry 23-year-old still struggling with his tumultuous upbringing. Dodds heightens every gut-wrenching moment that Adam faces, only to disappear, often just seconds later, into the childlike wonder and puzzlement of the young “Samantha,” something he does without the benefit of a costume or makeup change (after all, he’s still “Adam”). His potent performance alone is worth the price of admission, a masterly effort that places him firmly in the top tier of Columbia’s theatre talent.

The set itself is relatively bare, a small, utilizing bright lights and a raggedly zig-zagging stage set up in the round with just a few crucial props to block off the scenes and a desk off to one side with a helpful calendar to denote which moment in time we’ve bounced around to. It’s simple and effective, with subtle flourishes of panache, something also true of Ilene Fins’ direction, moving these actors in careful concert in keeping with the taunt framework of Ziegler’s play. 

Although not without some minor flaws, it feels wrong to undercut the emotional impact of this production. While I have quibbles with the overarching narrative, particularly as its gleans a much happier story than the one that inspired it, tender, nuanced moments abound as the characters work their way through some of the earliest clinical attempts at addressing the uncertainties and hardships of pressing a binary understanding of gender identity and sexual biology onto a messy, complex world. Fins and her troupe of actors nails both the 21st century lens that we have as well as the realities of the situation decades earlier which is both revelatory and necessary. This is the kind of play that you might do well to start off 2017 with.

BOY plays on the Cohn Side Door Stage at Trustus Theatre through January 21. For times and tickets go to trustus.org.

New Review of an Old Book - Joan Didion's Slouching Towards Bethlehem by Mary Catherine Ballou

Published in 1968, Joan Didion’s first nonfiction book, Slouching Towards Bethlehem, recounts and muses upon various vignettes of social, political, and existential occurrences in American lives during the 1960s. She especially reflects on life in California, showing how its particular history and environment shapes and morphs the psyches of its inhabitants. Trained as a reporter, Didion began her journalism career working at Vogue for two years. Much of her writing resembles the style of seasoned reporters, appearing like evidence from eyewitness accounts. With an objective clarity, keen wit, and shrewd outlook, she composes each essay and eschews personal judgment, yet still implies tragic bents that cut to the heart of matters with descriptive analyses of people and their environments.

Didion prefaces her book with the poem written by William Butler Yeats in 1919 entitled “The Second Coming.” It contains the closing lines: “And what rough beast, its hour come round at last / Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?” Written in the aftermath of World War I, Yeats’s poem is a reaction to the death and destruction of the war, in conjunction with the rapid rise of industrialization. The effects were widespread, unanticipated, and horrendous, and Yeats, among countless others, felt the world was falling apart.

Didion divulges the reasoning behind her book’s poem-derived title, stating, “…For several years now certain lines from the Yeats poem…have reverberated in my inner ear as if they were surgically implanted there. The widening gyre, the falcon which does not hear the falconer, the gaze blank and pitiless as the sun; those have been my points of reference, the only images against which much of what I was seeing and hearing and thinking seemed to make any pattern” (p. xxv). Didion uses the imagery of the poem to echo and propel her attempt to comprehend the chaos she senses around her during the 1960s. With this in mind, it becomes clear why she chose to transpose Yeats’s poem onto the feelings she emits through her collected writing.

Comprised of three main sections, each containing several short nonfiction stories, Slouching Towards Bethlehem also serves as the title of a piece within the section called “Life Styles in the Golden Land.” The other section called “Personals” includes essays published in various magazines that contain didactic tones, while “Seven Places of the Mind” portrays intimate anecdotes about Didion’s time in different locales, such as New York City, Hawaii, and Alcatraz Island. In “Lifestyles in the Golden Land,” Didion illuminates eccentric, sordid details surrounding the lives of West Coast residents, covering a broad range of social strata from stories of murderous housewives in the Los Angeles suburbs, to smoke-and-mirror, cash-strapped, dubious think tank centers in Santa Barbara, to the harmony-seeking school of musician Joan Baez in the Carmel Valley, to the ignoble proclivities of Hollywood, to the drug-induced, alternatively-minded haze of 1960s San Francisco youth culture replete with hippies, flower power, and anti-establishment mindsets.

Didion declares, “‘Slouching Towards Bethlehem’ is also the title of one piece in the book, and that piece, which derived from some time spent in the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco, was for me both the most imperative of all these pieces to write and the only one that made me despondent after it was printed. It was the first time I had dealt directly and flatly with the evidence of atomization, the proof that things fall apart: I went to San Francisco because I had not been able to work in some months, had been paralyzed by the conviction that writing was an irrelevant act, that the world as I had understood it no longer existed. If I was to work again at all, it would be necessary for me to come to terms with disorder” (p. xxv-xxvi). Didion did not write this piece merely to expose the lives of displaced youth in San Francisco – she wrote it in an effort to observe and hopefully come to terms with the inevitability of disorder. While this degeneration may be most apparent in her essay “Slouching Towards Bethlehem,” the entire book acknowledges the inclination for matter to tend toward entropy.  

Didion discloses the unpredictable nature of her own life in the last section. “Seven Places of the Mind” is a compilation of firsthand narrations, ranging from Didion’s upbringing in Sacramento, California to the fickle, unpredictable experience of her young adult years. She unveils aspects of her time living in New York City as a young woman, not exactly knowing what path she wants to pursue in life or where she will ultimately end up. Even though Slouching Towards Bethlehem was written and published 48 years ago, its lessons will always remain relevant. In addition to its expressive depictions of myriad lifestyles and mindsets, this book concedes that while chaos is inevitable, one must continue to think and act, because life moves on and the opportunities to rebuild are endless. People and circumstances change, but that is OK because change, although sometimes scary, is inevitable and translates to progress, and without change there is no progress, and without progress there is no hope.

Didion also emphasizes the importance of archives however futile they may seem, the enigmatic recollection of memories, and the silent cords of hysteria and subversive thought running through the undercurrents of society. Her essays assert, in both obvious and subtle ways, the difficult realization found in Yeats’s poem: “Things fall apart; the center cannot hold / Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world / The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere / The Ceremony of innocence is drowned / The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity.” Still, Didion knows that things can always be rearranged and reassembled, and she confirms this by the simple fact that she herself found the courage and will to write this book, creating a documentation of both her life and the lives around her. These records help prove and sustain the worth and purpose of our existence, enlightening readers of the infinite ways life can morph but nonetheless carry on. 

Kendall Jason Writes About Being a 2nd Act Filmmaker

 

This is new…..

I was trying something different.

I am a “fan”… of art, music, film and generally anything you might consider “nerd” culture. I use this to deconstruct my own identity, masculine persona and cultural expectations of masculinity in hopes it will take me out of my comfort zone and keep me from doing the same thing over and over. The approach provides a launching pad for my ideas to develop and change while tackling new projects, which keeps my studio practice fresh and unpredictable.

This process is what drove me to enter the 2^nd Act Film Festival this year. I needed to push my practice in a new direction and engage a different audience within the context of film culture. In past years the 2^nd Act Film Festival has produced some amazing films by a talented set of filmmakers. Honestly, I had no expectation of getting in, since I was coming from an art making background. Although I tell stories in my art, I use a different approach that incorporates the manipulation of objects, image and space. I tend to allow the subject matter and materials to dictate what the final embodiment becomes, without considering constraints like length, cast and crew. So, when I received notification that I was chosen as one of the ten filmmakers I was in uncharted territory.

Before receiving the Artistic obstructions I considered a setting for this story. I wanted to use objects and locations that contained their own character and could hold up against another person’s actions. I also used my Dad’s recently sold elevator business to document the existence of a life long endeavor while allowing it to take on a life of it’s own in the film. This opened up the possibility to explore my relationship with my father in an unexpected way.

These lines of thought lead me back some music I wrote. It was a song that told a story that turned into an instrumental that bounced back and forth between different configurations within the same chord structure. In sections it reminded me of an engine or even crying. This birthed the idea of the guitar creating the atmosphere and dialogue in the film. As it started to become a lead character in the film I wondered how it would fit into the final film. I knew I could borrow from Jim Jarmusch, especially since I am a fan of his film “Deadman”.

When I received the script perimeters I labored to write the script. I could see the film in my head, but putting it down on paper was forced and didn’t flow with the images I was seeing in my head. I turned to what was familiar, drawing. I storyboarded the whole film, which fleshed out the entire narrative sequence. Then the script basically wrote itself. This in turned was used informed the cast and crew. The storyboards were a perfect tool to use to direct, without having to be behind the camera.

I have always been the sole contributor in the video based projects I have created over the years. With the exception of using my brother or other friends as camerapersons, I have rarely depended anyone else. Jasper’s film editor Wade Sellers suggested that I talk to other artists/ filmmakers who deal with similar issues in their work and have the same taste in films. He connected me with local artist Alex Smith. This was a true turning point in the development of the project. I sent Alex the storyboards and a few notes on what I was thinking about in terms of direction. When we met to talk about what he thought. The discussion sparked a friendship and provided a fresh take on how I could realize the vision I had on paper. One of the conversations brought to mind Pink Floyd’s song “Wish You Were Here.” It begins and ends in an old radio broadcast while the clean song plays throughout the middle. I wanted to attempt to incorporate that approach somehow. Little did I know the basis for the narrative would revolve around that concept.

Once the shooting began I captured as much footage as possible. Since I was accustomed to shooting live performances or approaching a video shoot as a live performance and in this process I was accumulating footage over several days was foreign. I was used to a one shot deal and using only what I had from that one take of the action. During this experience I could shoot, reshoot and if I thought of a new idea I could create a whole new scene right on the spot. As the footage was uploaded I broke up the scenes into sequences that represented each act and I started to “sculpt” the shots to reflect the narrative in the storyboards.

As the different section of the film became finalized I recorded the music. Most of those recordings simply got scrapped or didn’t work, but I eventually began to hear the sounds that would be part of the film. As the final version started to emerge, the ability to react organically to the project faded away, I found myself in an uncomfortable position of having to make editing decisions that only contributed to the strength of the film. I felt like a surgeon with a scalpel carefully slicing the ends of flesh or a butcher just hacking away whole sections of meat that might taste good but weren’t right for the meal I was serving.

All of a sudden the deadline had arrived and the film was somehow finished. Hesitation and self-doubt crept in like a demon in the night. I reached out to friends and colleagues to help calm my nerves. I was scared to death. I wasn’t a filmmaker. I’m a sculptor. A performance artist.

The night of the screening arrived. I took a deep breath and walked in the door at Tapp’s.

The lights went down…..I started sweating profusely.

This changes everything……

You wanted something different.

~~~~~

Kendall Jason or kendallprojects (Jason Kendall) depending on what artistic context you catch him in is a local artist creating multi-dimensional work (sculpture, performance, video installations and drawings) that rest on the conviction that art should generate an experience for the viewer which challenges them on a variety of sensory levels. His investigations are transformed into conflicts that engage the viewer on a visceral level. The encounters he creates exploit different stimuli to affect the viewer’s perceptions by using a combination of images, sound, smells or text to leave the viewers curious about what they are witnessing. In his first official endeavor into film making he attempted to balance his studio practice with the obstructions of creating a film.

Visit us at www.JasperProject.org

Ony's Bands -- Cazador releases new album "Can I Leave?"

Local power violence band, Cazador, released a new album on October 1 entitled Can I Leave?, their second release since their debut at the beginning of this year. This album gives us more power and more agony-drenched heaviness. With a few re-recordings from their first demo, which was released in January, Can I Leave? makes the heavy guitars and seething vocals more prominent. Brandon Johnson, both the vocalist and drummer of the group, with splintering snarls, presents images of suffering, isolation, and disintegration within a society. Overall, the sound and the musicianship are tighter and more thought-out, as their sound has evolved, just from playing and writing more.

The use of sound bites moves the album along and sets the tone for the anguish to come. One of the album’s heaviest and most eminent songs, “Backyard Tomb,” opens with a sound clip of a man threatening to remove someone’s flesh with a cheese grater (for all the True Detective fans). “Drawing Strings,” the album’s single, starts off with a catchier riff and moves toward a darker and more dismal breakdown shouting “Hang the fake, die in chains.” Alex Strickland, vocalist of local aggressive bands, Bathe and Abacus, appears on this song doing guest vocals.

My favorite track is “Imprisoned,” which showcases more of the spirited nature in Cazador’s song structures. “We try to incorporate a heavy noise rock influence, while speeding it up a bit with a touch of power violence,” Johnson says, citing his main influences as Infest, Crossed Out, and Unsane. It’s clear that the group shares an array of musical influences, leaving them not only limited to one strict genre description. There’s a little something for everyone on this album, which is heavy, raging, and dense.

Columbia native Jeff Miller to screen new horror film “Clowntown” at the Nickelodeon Theater

 

“If you’re terrified of clowns, don’t see this movie.” Jeff Miller says. Miller adds that his new film Clowntown has nothing to do with the South Carolina clowns that have been popping up in news reports around the state lately.

It is a bit of a coincidence though. Miller is a graduate of Brookland-Cayce high school and the University of South Carolina Media Arts program. His first steps in producing horror films came in and around Columbia with credits on Paul Talbot’s film Hellblock 13 and his own directorial debut Head Cheerleader, Dead Cheerleader.

In 2001 Miller made the move to Los Angeles and continued producing several features, mostly horror, such as Axe Giant: The Wrath of Paul Bunyan (which aired on the Syfy channel).

Clowntown is receiving heavily positive reviews around the country from many standard bearing horror film outlets. The film is inspired by the clown who terrorized Bakersfield, CA in 2014. Miller wrote the script and produced the film. The film also features music from Columbia metal stalwarts Isabelle’s Gift and South Carolina native Hick’ry Hawkins.

“I’d love to come back to South Carolina and make another movie” says Miller. But in the meantime he has his hands full as Executive Producer on the action film Kill ‘Em All starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, currently filming in Mississippi.

CLOWNTOWN screens at the Nickelodeon Theater on Main St. on Friday, October 21^st at 11pm. Tickets available at nickelodeon.org

-- Wade Sellers

REVIEW: Jason Isbell @ The Township Auditorium

By: Kyle Petersen

When Jason Isbell took the stage at the Township Auditorium this past Sunday, I wanted to tell you that it felt a little weird, mixed with a little sense of triumph. As if this was the apotheosis of the hard-touring rock ‘n’ roll musician done good, a story that countless musicians toiling in tour vans day in and day out could look up to and aspire to. I wish I could say that.

But the reality is, over the last few years Isbell seems to have matured seamlessly from seedy 300-person rock clubs to stately 3,000 seater auditoriums, and it felt surprisingly inevitable. Four years into sobriety and three years removed from the breakthrough success of 2013’s Southeastern, Isbell looked trim and dapper on stage, carrying himself with the air of a consummate, perhaps even slightly bored, professional. That’s not to say that the performance wasn’t amazing—after all, he is undisputedly one of the preeminent songwriters of his generation, with the kind of hotshot guitar skills and booming, soulful voice that would allow him to get away with songs as tenth as good. As he generally does these days, Isbell opened with a salvo of electric rock songs (including the old Drive-by Trucker Southern rock staple “Decoration Day” and the 2016 Americana Music Awards “Song of the Year” winner “24 Frames”) before switching to acoustic guitar and diving deep into his last two more songwriting-oriented efforts. The fact that the set is loaded with stunners (“Speed Trap Town,” “Cover Me Up,” “Alabama Pines”) helps, along with the fact that Isbell is at this point adept at balancing the more somber acoustic tunes with more sprightly ones like “Codeine” or “If It Takes a Lifetime.”

Still, there were relatively few moments or features that genuinely stuck out thanks to the unerring professional consistency. One notable element for sure, though, was the elegant, top-notch staging and lighting, a new feature for longtime Isbell fans. Backed by pseudo-stained glass windows and often bathed in multiple spotlights when he stepped out to take a solo, there was an element of grandeur to the proceedings which felt wholly new. Another great moment was the knowing inclusion of “Palmetto Rose,” a welcome nod to the audience with its South Carolina subject matter. And, ever so slightly, the genuine joy the bandleader seemed to take in the ostentatious stage interplay he had briefly with keyboard/accordionist Derry DeBorja on "Codeine" and then, later, with guitarist (and SC native) Sadler Vaden during a staged-but-electrifying guitar duel. That latter moment, which took place during an extended take on the gnarly and riveting “Never Gonna Change,” felt like the most significant addition to the band’s live show and allowed them to end the regular set with a bang.

Perhaps the most telling moment, though, was when Isbell brought opener (and contemporary) Josh Ritter out during the encore to cover John Prine’s “Storm Windows.” Isbell briefly mentioned that he used to pay to go to Ritter’s show rather than bringing him on tour, an oblique reference to his newfound stature, but really it was the cover choice itself, along with the “Prine/Isbell” campaign ticket shirts at the merch table, that suggested the songwriter’s intended route in the coming decades. Having arrived at the upper echelon of the music world on his own terms and on the strength of his artistry, Isbell clearly intends to stay on that level with the consistency and persistence of his 70-year-old forbear.

And, judging by Sunday night's show, that shouldn't be a problem.