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Avant Bard Blog

Adapting Molière When You Don’t Actually Like Molière. At All.

May 13, 2019

I never really liked Molière.

Hold on, don’t leave, this is going somewhere.

In early 2016 I was approached by Benita de Wit, a friend and talented director I’d met during graduate studies at Columbia. She wanted a Misanthrope. Maybe not THE Misanthrope. I’d whacked up a bit of street cred as a go-to for punch-ups of classic texts, but I balked at Molière. To me, this was puff and fluff, something I associated with Period Movement and broad, splashy commedia stylings. It also felt, dare I say, too surface—a lot of moralizing on a set of easy themes. Fake.

I was wrong. But we’ll get there. First, a field trip.

Oscar Wilde wrote, “We live, I regret to say, in an age of surfaces.” This was in The Importance of Being Earnest, about two centuries post-Misanthrope, but Molière would’ve had some thoughts. Born Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, Molière became Molière to save his family the shame of having an actor in the family, and dove into a world of surfaces headfirst.

See, French comedy at the time was mostly surface, based on Italian commedia dell’arte with stock characters and wacky hijinks.

Molière was having none of it. His characters existed in that Marx Brothers world of big schtick but displayed, in their exquisite language and action, an individualism that startled his bewigged and bodice’d audiences out of their wigs and bodices. It seemed that Molière was straddling two worlds in his work—the playful province of pure theatre and that of the squirmy all-too-real. Comedy was supposed to be just unreal enough to laugh at, expressions of le vraisemblable (a semblance of truth) but not just vrai. Some, like Jean Donneau de Visé, were miffed at Molière’s rule-breaking mix of the realism reserved for tragedy and the bawdry of farce: “When you paint heroes, you can do what you want.… But when you paint men, you must paint from life.”

But Molière made the critics eat their enormous feathered hats—his plays were real and funny. Audiences, it turned out, loved to laugh at the truth.

Now let’s be clear, when I say Molière understood surfaces, I also mean that he could play the surface game with the best of them. He loved to rouse a rabble, and his plays attacked the aristocracy, the church, the medical profession, academia, he had a whole (S)Hit List. But he never went after the monarchy, knowing that his best bet was to keep His Majesty batting for his team. Louis Quatorze (he of the gaudy furniture and frequent wars with everyone else in Europe) was a Molière stan of the first degree, and kept him from the teeth of detractors. Molière’s work brought him to verbal blows with a host of other writers and critics, some who attacked his style for being vulgar and inelegant, some who attacked his personal life. Molière sorta walked into that by marrying a famous actress 20 years younger who was also the daughter of a woman he might’ve had an affair with, so.

But Molière was a success! And unlike some writers who slipped into the canon after living obscure, Molière was #trending in his own lifetime. He went out in a fitting blaze, collapsing onstage during a performance of his own play The Imaginary Invalid—about a man who thinks he is dying of countless diseases. Jean-Baptiste Poquelin died on a punchline, and with his final breath he merged art and truth one last time.

So, let’s bop back to 2016 for a second.

I’m sitting in my closet-sized apartment in Upper Manhattan. I skim a few translations. Richard Wilbur’s is famously delightful and sparkly, if very old-fashioned. In-yer-face Brit dramatist Martin Crimp penned a ’96 adaptation that updated the setting to a world of media-slathered 20th Century showbiz, with Misanthrope Alceste as a playwright dating an actress (Celimene-now-“Jennifer”) who has barbs ready for contemporary politicians, news networks, and other Real Life playwrights (including “Tom F*cking Stoppard”). Crimp’s version, scathing in the extreme, felt however like it had dated itself.

For a moment, I despaired that this was the only way in. It had to be about something REAL.  Then Benita had some pretty sound advice (which I’m paraphrasing because this was three years ago probably over a beverage): “Just make it about real people, and make it fun.”

Oh. Alright?

Suddenly it was all, as Shakespeare says, “an art as lawful as eating”—the words flowed and the rhymes danced and, wow wow wow, I was having fun. No longer trying to figure out what the characters stood for, I fell in love with each of them. No longer panicky to freight each line with some Big Issue I wanted to take down, the sheer mastery of Molière’s words became a playground. The characters stumbled and bumbled over iambs and rhymes in a way that felt real. Or rather, it felt like real people faking it. Real people trying to sound like heroes.

The Misanthrope is about a world in which we all low-key follow the Kardashians on Twitter. It’s about how we watch those two Fyre Festival documentaries with horror and think: “That couldn’t be me. Could that be me? That’s not me. Is it me?” The reality is that Molière’s characters have the verve, intellect, wealth, and laissez-faire lives that we wish we had, but their foibles are our own magnified. We see in them both our ideal self and our worst iteration. They’re the High Comedy version of our own surfaces, our Insta handles and curated SoulCycle/juice cleanse selves and the masks we wear to apologize for being late to coffee or a meeting or not replying to a text.

And in this realism Molière takes pure joy. The satire may be as sharp as a set of stainless steel Cuisinart knives, but it’s also equal opportunity. No one is safe, so we might as well all laugh together.

By the time I was finished, I liked Molière. We did a few loosey-goosey “salons” of the adaptation by having friends assemble in apartment living rooms and serving French wine as actors blazed delectably over the words. It was joyful. The surface between Molière and me had gently crumbled.

I’ll admit, at mine own peril, that I still seldom see productions of Molière that tread this twanging tightrope effectively. Like a lot of the other classics, I think there’s a lot to be said for versions that embrace the vraisemblable (remember?) of Molière, big wigs and brocade coats and wide skirts and facing out and speechifying to the middle distance. But some of the vrai is what I miss. The truth under the surface. The us under the them.

When Martin Crimp’s adaptation was remounted in 2009 (with Keira Knightley fresh off Atonement), Crimp wrote a piece for The Guardian about his own crisis moment with Molière. In the article (you can find it here, it’s fun!), Crimp interviews Molière himself, who is bustling around modern London reading about David Cameron and staying at a budget hotel in Covent Garden. Crimp-as-Molière is worried that his play isn’t relevant. He’s worried that now people tell the truth too much, that the age of surfaces is over. He’s worried that there’s nothing for Alceste to be mad about. Crimp-as-Crimp reassures him. No there’s plenty to be pissed about. Politics. Social media. Theatre critics.

But the age of surfaces isn’t over. It might never be. I think Crimp probably would disagree with, oh, everything I’ve said? Good for him, he’s quite well-known. He and many others might argue that Molière was a man whose plays were angry shish kebabs of the things he hated in the world. They’d say that Molière himself was The Misanthrope who hates society, but I think a fella doesn’t write a play that tells people what’s wrong with the world because he hates it. I think he writes that play because he loves the world, and wants everyone to look at themselves and make it better.

Matt Minnicino’s work has been developed around the country. Besides Molière, he has adapted Chekhov (three times), Strindberg, Ibsen, Gorky, Genet, Shakespeare, Aeschylus, Euripides, Sophocles, Homer, The Book of Genesis, poems by Rilke, art by Magritte, and more. He is an alumnus of Pipeline Theatre’s PlayLab, the Great Plains Theatre Conference, and SPACE on Ryder Farm and is the winner of the Arts & Letters Prize.

 

A Misanthrope begins previews May 30, 2019, and runs through June 30. Performances are at Gunston Arts Center, Theatre Two, 2700 South Lang Street, Arlington, VA 22206.

Tickets are $40 and available online or by calling 703-418-4808. Advance-purchase Pay What You Will tickets are also now available online for previews, and will be on sale online for all other performances beginning the Monday before.

Who’s Who in A Misanthrope

April 22, 2019

Meet the makers of Matt Minnicino’s side-splitting sendup of suckups and phonies.

THE WAGGISH WRITER

Matt Minnicino is a playwright, actor, teacher, and incorrigible tale-teller based in Manhattan. His work has been developed around the U.S. (and in Ireland).  Along with Molière, he has adapted Chekhov (three times), Strindberg, Ibsen, Gorky, Genet, Shakespeare, Aeschylus, Euripides, Sophocles, Homer, The Book of Genesis, poems by Rilke, art by Magritte, and more. He is an alumnus of Pipeline Theatre’s PlayLab, the Great Plains Theatre Conference, and SPACE on Ryder Farm and is the winner of the Arts & Letters Prize. MFA: Columbia. www.mattminnicino.com

THE FRISKY CAST

Photo by Teresa Castracane

Sara Barker (Arsinoe) has performed in numerous  Avant Bard productions including Emilie: La Marquise du Châtelet Defends Her Life Tonight (Emilie), King Lear (Edgar), Othello (Desdemona), Orlando (Orlando), Mary Stuart (Elizabeth), Six Characters in Search of an Author (Stepdaughter), The House of Yes (Jackie-O), The Cherry Orchard (Varya), The Mistorical Hystery of Henry (I)V (Hotspur), Lulu (Lulu), and The Miser (La Fleece). Other DC productions include Rainbow Theatre Project’s Clothes for a Summer Hotel (Zelda), Factory 449’s 4.48 Pyschosis, and Closetland; Rorschach’s A Maze (Oksana), This Storm Is What We Call Progress (Lily), and The Gallerist (Vanessa); Faction of Fool’s The Cherry Orchard (Madame Ranevsky); Scena’s A Woman of No Importance (Mrs. Arbuthnot), The Importance of Being Earnest (Algernon). NYC credits include The Brick’s King Lear (King Lear), Hipgnosis Theatre’s The Winter’s Tale (Paulina), and various devised works with directors Lear DeBessonet and Josh Fox. Sara is a graduate of St. John’s College and a company member with Avant Bard, Factory 449, Rorschach Theatre, and The Klunch. www.sarabarker.com

Jenna Berk (Philinte) was previously seen at Avant Bard in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. She most recently appeared in 4615 Theatre Company’s Separate Rooms by Joe Calarco. She has performed across the DC region, including at the Folger Theatre, Taffety Punk Theatre Company, Constellation Theatre Company, Imagination Stage, and Brave Spirits Theatre (Artistic Associate). Jenna is a proud graduate of the University of Virginia and LAMDA.

Erik Harrison (Oronte understudy) is an actor/writer and cofounder of The Coil Project. Acting credits include Sing to Me Now (Rorschach); Adult Entertainment (The Klunch); ’Tis Pity She’s a Whore, A King and No King (Brave Spirits); King Kirby, Completely Hollywood (abridged) (Off the Quill); Dead Dog’s Bone, A Bright Room Called Day (Nu Sass); #sexts, It Will All Make Sense in the Morning (Coil). His play A Slow Bullet was a 2018 DCMTA Best of Fringe.

Patrick Joy (Clitandre) is thrilled to be joining Avant Bard for the first time! He was last seen as Dylan Klebold in columbinus at 1st Stage. He’s also worked with Keegan Theatre, Rainbow Theatre Project, 4615 Theatre Co, and more. He holds a BA in Theatre and a BSc in Physics for some reason. www.PatrickJoyActor.com

Elliott Kashner (Alceste) is pleased to return to Avant Bard, having previously appeared as Pentheus in The Bacchae. Recent favorite credits include The Burn at The Hub Theatre and The Book of Joseph at Everyman Theatre. He is a grants writer and manager currently working for Everyman Theatre. He holds a BS in Economics from George Mason University.

Thais Menendez (Celimene) is a bilingual Cuban-American actress from Miami. Recent area credits include columbinus (1st Stage); Things That Are Round (Rep Stage); Richard III (Shakespeare Theatre Company, u/s); Don Cristobal (Pointless Theatre, Helen Hayes nomination Best Adaptation); Óyeme, the Beautiful (Imagination Stage); Señorita y Madame, Volcano, New Adventures of Don Quijote (GALA Hispanic Theatre); Neverwhere (Rorschach Theatre); What Every Girl Should Know, Dry Land (Forum Theatre); Abortion Road Trip (Theatre Prometheus). Thais received her BA in Theatre and English from Boston College.

Chloe Mikala (Eliante) is excited to be working with this crazy group of people! She was just recently seen in The Burn with The Hub Theatre. Locally she’s worked with Second City (Kennedy Center and Woolly Mammoth Theatre), Rorschach Theatre, NextStop Theatre Co., The Welders, Keegan Theatre, Pointless Theatre Co., Single Carrot Theatre, Baltimore Center Stage, Everyman Theatre, and others. When she’s not acting, you can be sure to catch her at an open mic doing stand up. She may or may not be funny. No promises. Training: Towson University, iO Theatre Chicago. Instagram: @chloe_mikala. www.chloemikala.com

Tendo Nsubuga (Acaste) is thankful to make his debut at Avant Bard. His previous credits include Native Son (Mosaic Theater Company of DC), The Farnsworth Invention and Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (1st Stage), and Looking for Roberto Clemente (Imagination Stage). Tendo holds a BA in Theatre from the University of Maryland.

Matthew Sparacino (Oronte) is thrilled to be back at Avant Bard after playing the mustachioed club owner Orsino in Illyria, or What You Will earlier this season. A native of the DC area, Matt has performed with many local theaters over the past decade. Select credits include The Farnsworth Invention (HHA nomination – Best Ensemble) and Lobby Hero (1st Stage); Six Degrees of Separation (Keegan Theatre); Don Cristóbal, Hugo Ball, Doctor Caligari, and A Very Pointless Holiday Spectacular (Pointless Theatre, with whom he is an artistic associate); The Winter’s Tale and Antony & Cleopatra (Folger Theatre); and Fever/Dream (Woolly Mammoth). Special thanks and lots of love to Kyra for sharing me with the stage in the month before our wedding!  www.matthewsparacino.com

Hannah Sweet (Basque/DuBois) was most recently in Avant Bard’s remount of A Two Woman Hamlet as a part of its 2019 Scripts in Play Festival.  Local credits include Faction of Fools’ Henry V (Dauphin, Boy),  Don Juan (Charlotte, Don Louis), and Pinocchio! (Cat); Brave Spirits Theatre’s The Bloody Banquet (Roxana) and Henry IV Parts 1 and 2 in rep (Lady Percy, Warwick, etc.); Nu Sass’s A Bright Room Called Day (Zillah); Naked Theatre Company’s Bitch: A Play About Antigone (Antigone); Theatre Prometheus’ Twelfth Night (Maria); and Lean and Hungry’s Taming of the Shrew (Bianca).  She is an artistic associate with Brave Spirits and a company member of Faction of Fools.

THE CRAFTY CREATIVE AND PRODUCTION TEAM

Photo by Clinton Brandhagen

Megan Behm (Director) is delighted to be making her Avant Bard debut! Previous directing credits include To Tell My Story (Helen Hayes Nomination, Best Original Adaptation) and Switch (The Welders), 45 Plays for 45 Presidents (NextStop Theatre), Cymbeline (Virginia Shakespeare Festival), Safe as Houses (Pinky Swear Productions), The Comedy of Errors (Lean & Hungry Theater), The Campsite Rule (The Washington Rogues), Minus You and Edward Cullen Ruined My Mother’s Love Life (The Source Festival), A Midsummer Night’s Dream and According to Shakespeare (InterAct Story Theatre). Training: College of William & Mary, LAMDA, Studio Theater Conservatory. www.megan-behm.com

Megan Holden (Set Designer) is a longtime theatre lover from Harrisonburg, VA. She studied theatre design and film production at James Madison University. Recently, she has moved to Washington, DC, and been involved with several theatre companies, including Studio Theatre, Anacostia Playhouse, and Scena Theatre Company, either painting or designing scenery.

Alison Samantha Johnson (Costume Designer) is super pleased to be working with Avant Bard for the first time! Some previous area designs include Heisenberg at Signature Theatre, Hands on a Hardbody at Keegan Theatre, Cyrano de Bergerac at Synetic Theater. Up next: Little Shop of Horrors with ArtsCentric. www.alisonsamantha.com

Elizabeth Roth (Lighting Designer) is a DC transplant from Ohio. Elizabeth is currently the resident lighting designer for Washington International School, and some of her favorite designs were Dogg’s Hamlet, Cahoot’s Macbeth and Treasure Island.  Her selected credits include designs for Catholic University (Suor Angelica), Séber Method Academy, and the Welders (Switch).  In her free time, Elizabeth also crochets tiny animals. www.ElizabethRothProductions.com

Kevin Alexander (Sound Designer)

Liz Long (Properties Designer) returns to Avant Bard having recently worked her magic for Topdog/Underdog and Ilyria, or What You Will.  Other recent designs include Puffs, Coraline, and 1776 (Landless Theatre Company), The Man Who, The River, and Happy Hour (Spooky Action Theatre), and Five Lesbians Eating a Quiche (Monumental Theatre).  When not making theater magic, Liz is the Production Manager for Encore Decor Event Design and Production.

Abigail Wasserman (Stage Manager) is thrilled to be working on her first show with Avant Bard! She is a Freelance Stage Manager in the DC Metro Area with a BA in Theatre from The University of Maryland College Park. She has worked with Monumental, Brave Spirits, Solas Nua, and Rorschach.

Ralph Derbyshire (Technical Director) is an Arlington native. He has worked throughout the DC region for the last 15 years, though most notably with The Smithsonian Folklife Festival (2002-08, 2010-15), GWU’s Lisner Auditorium (2007-12), as well as many local crewing companies setting up special events. He has held the titles Master Carpenter, Master Flyman, Assistant Stage Manager, and Shop Foreman. He also works and volunteers with the National Folk Festival as well as several other festivals locally and around the country. This is his fifth show as Technical Director with Avant Bard—following The Gospel at Colonus (2018), The Tempest, Illyria, or What You Will and Topdog/Underdog—and he is excited to bring his skills back to real theatre.

A Misanthrope plays May 30 to June 30, 2019, at Gunston Arts Center, Theatre Two, 2700 South Lang Street, Arlington, VA 22206. Ample free parking.For driving directions and easy public-transportation info click here.

Pay What You Will previews are May 30 to June 1 and June 3 at 7:30 pm. Opening/Press Night is June 4 at 7:30 pm. Saturday matinees are followed by Unscripted Afterchats with members of the cast and creative team.

Tickets are $40, and available online or by phone at 703-418-4808. For every performance, an allotment of tickets are Pay What You Will, which means you can name your price. You can reserve PWYW tickets online the Monday before each performance for a small service minimum, or at the door with no minimum.

Who’s Who in Topdog/Underdog

March 8, 2019

Meet the team of talents behind this explosive dark comedy.

THE PLAYWRIGHT

Playwright Suzan-Lori Parks. Photo: Stephanie Diani.

Suzan-Lori Parks — a playwright, screenwriter, novelist, and songwriter — won the 2002 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for Topdog/Underdog. In 2001 she received a MacArthur Fellows “Genius” Grant. And in 2018 she received the Steinberg Distinguished Playwright Award.  She holds Honorary Doctor of Fine Arts Degrees from Mount Holyoke College and Spelman College. Her work is the subject of the PBS film The Topdog/Underdog Diaries, and her plays are published by Theatre Communications Group and Dramatists Play Service, Inc. Her first feature-length screenplay was girl 6, for Spike Lee. She has also written screenplays for Jodie Foster, Danny Glover, and Oprah Winfrey. Other screenplays include adaptations of Toni Morrison’s novel Paradise, Zora Neale Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, and screenplays for Miramax and Brad Pitt. Her plays include In the Blood (2000 Pulitzer nominee), Venus  (1996 Obie Award), Fucking A, The America Play, Imperceptible Mutabilities in the Third Kingdom (1990 Obie Award), The Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World, and 365 Days/365 Plays. Topdog/Underdog (2002 Tony nominee) has had successful runs on Broadway, in cities throughout the United States, and in London at the Royal Court Theatre. Additional recognition includes two NEA playwriting fellowships, a W. Alton Jones Grant, a grant from The Kennedy Center Fund For New American Plays, the Whiting Award, and grants from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the CalArts/Alpert Award, the PEW Charitable Trusts, and The Guggenheim Foundation. Suzan-Lori is a professor at the California Institute for the Arts, where she heads the Dramatic Writing Program. Her first novel, Getting Mother’s Body, is published by Random House. www.suzanloriparks.com

THE CAST

Louis E. Davis (Booth) was a member of the Helen Hayes Award-winning ensemble in the Theater Alliance production of Marc Bamuthi Joseph’s hip-hop choreopoem Word Becomes Flesh. His other credits include Solas Nua’s The Frederick Douglass Project (Helen Hayes Award nomination, outstanding supporting actor in a play), Taffety Punk’s Don Juan, Avant Bard’s King Lear, Imagination Stage’s The Freshest Snow Whyte, Mosaic Theater Company’s Charm, and Folger Theatre’s The Second Shepherds’ Play. He recently appeared in Constellation Theatre’s The Master and Margarita.

Jeremy Keith Hunter (Lincoln), making his Avant Bard debut, is one of the dopest artists you’ll ever meet. Hailing out of the DMV, Jeremy is a multidisciplinary artist with a strong focus in theatre and film acting, writing, and graphic design. His previous theatre credits include The Painted Rocks at Revolver Creek (Metrostage), The Farnsworth Invention (1st Stage); Rabbit Summer (Ally Theatre Company); Word Becomes Flesh (us) (Theater Alliance); Hooded, Or Being Black for Dummies, Milk Like Sugar, When January Feels Like Summer (Mosaic Theatre Company); Arabian Nights (Constellation Theater); and The Effect (us) (Studio Theatre). www.iammercury.com

 

THE CREATIVE AND PRODUCTION TEAM

DeMone Seraphin (Director) is founding artistic director of The New American Theatre Co. in New York City and is excited to return to Avant Bard, after appearing as Singer Oedipus in its hit production of The Gospel at Colonus (2017). Selected directing credits include The Exonerated, Dutchman, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Jitney, Split Second, Endangered Species (world premiere), The Mountaintop, Runaways, Winter’s Tale, and Barnum. DeMone is the recipient of a regional Emmy Award and the Joseph Jefferson Award.

Nephelie Andonyadis (Set Designer) has been designing scenery and costumes (and sometimes puppets) from coast to coast for more than twenty-five years. She is an ensemble member of Cornerstone Theater Company and has worked with Seattle Repertory Theatre, Pittsburgh Public Theater, SITI Company, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Playmakers Repertory, and South Coast Repertory among many others. She has recently returned to Washington, DC, the city of her birth, after a long hiatus. Upcoming projects in the area include designs with Studio Theatre, Adventure Theatre, Urban Arias, and Theatre J. Nephelie earned her BS from Cornell University and her MFA from Yale University’s School of Drama and was a recipient of the NEA/TCG Design Fellowship. www.nepheliemaria.com

Danielle (Danie) Harrow (Costume Designer) is excited for her first show with Avant Bard. Recent designs include Mystery of Love and Sex, The Laramie Project, and The Rocky Horror Show, all for Iron Crow Theatre. When not focused on costuming, Danie also designs custom clothing for special events. www.seaminglydanie.com

John D. Alexander (Lighting and Projections Designer) is excited to return to Avant Bard. His recent designs include A Civil War Christmas by Paula Vogel (1st Stage), American Moor by Keith Hamilton Cobb (Anacostia Playhouse), the national tour of The Migration: Reflections of Jacob Lawrence presented by Step Afrika!, the national tour of Anne and Emmett by Janet Langhart Cohen, Marie and Rosetta by George Brant (Mosaic Theater Company), and Skeleton Crew by Dominique Morisseau (TheatreSquared). Upcoming designs include HERstory by Goldie Patrick (The Kennedy Center).

e’Marcus Harper-Short (Composer and Sound Designer) received the Helen Hayes Award (2015) for Outstanding Musical Direction for Black Nativity by Langston Hughes (Theater Alliance); a Grammy Award nomination (1998) for Best Traditional Gospel Recording as Conductor for Love Alive V: Walter Hawkins and the Love Center Choir; and a Hollywood NAACP Theater Image Award Nomination (2004) for Best Musical Direction for Da Kink in My Hair by Trey Anthony. He was Musical Director and played Creon in Avant Bard’s 2017 production of The Gospel at Colonus (nominated for a Helen Hayes award for Outstanding Ensemble) and its 2018 revival. Other credits include Musical Arranger for Three Mo’ Divas (PBS Special National) conceived by Marion J. Caffey, and Musical Direction for Invisible Life (Apollo Theater, New York) based on a book by E. Lynn Harris. In 2017 he was named a United States Arts Envoy by the U.S. Department of State.

Liz Long (Properties Designer) returns to Avant Bard having recently worked her magic for Ilyria, or What You Will. Other recent designs include Puffs, Coraline, and 1776 (Landless Theatre Company), The Man Who, The River, and Happy Hour (Spooky Action Theatre), and Five Lesbians Eating a Quiche (Monumental Theatre). When not making theater magic, Liz is the Production Manager for Encore Decor Event Design and Production.

Casey Kaleba (Fight Choreographer) returns to Avant Bard having worked on previous productions of King Lear, Othello, Night and Day, and Lulu. Recent work includes productions at the Chesapeake Shakespeare Company (Henry IV), Signature Theatre (Billy Elliot, The Scottsboro Boys), and Rorschach Theatre (Reykjavic). www.toothandclawcombat.com

Keta Newborn (Production Stage Manager) is thrilled to be joining Avant Bard for her fourth production, having been the Stage Manager on King Lear and both the 2017 and 2018 stagings of The Gospel at Colonus. As a freelancer, Keta has worked in the world of theatre for over 10 years. She has held several titles including Stage Manaager, Assistant Stage Manager, Venue Manager, Production Assistant, Light & Sound Board Ops, and now Production Manager. Her past credits include The New Play Festival (Young Playwrights’ Theater), Little Thing, Big Thing (Solas Nua), Yellowman (Anacostia Playhouse), Black Nativity and Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea (Theater Alliance), Leto Legend and Failure: A Love Story (The Hub), Disgraced, Secret Garden, and Gidion’s Knot (Next Stop), and The Last Days of Judas Iscariot, How We Got On, and Gidion’s Knot (Forum), The Flick and How We Got On (Company One). Keta would like to thank the whole Avant Bard cast, crew, and the Gunston Theatre for being a part of amazing shows! She thanks G_d for the opportunity to be used as one of His vessels, working to bring His work of art into the hearts of many while doing what she loves. www.newbornketa.com

Andrew Wilkinson (Rehearsal Stage Manager) is extremely grateful for this opportunity to participate in Topdog/Underdog. This is Andrew’s first show with Avant Bard. Previous credits include Catch Me If You Can, Side Show, and Les Miserables at Montgomery College Summer Dinner Theatre; Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and The Hunchback of Notre Dame at Alluvion Stage Company; Young Frankenstein, Newsies, Momma Mia, Ain’t Misbehavin’, The Little Mermaid, and Gypsy at Toby’s Dinner Theatre; and Hairspray, Honk Jr., Blueberries for Sal, Pirates!, and Fancy Nancy’s Splendiferous Christmas at Adventure Theatre.

Krysta Hibbard (Associate Director) is a New York–based director and self-proclaimed “artist wrangler.” She is currently an Artistic Associate for Shrunken Shakespeare Company and previously served as the Associate Producer for the nonprofit organization Throughline Artists, producing the Summer Shorts festival at 59E59, as well as Stage to Screen. Past works include The Exonerated, Arrabal, For Hope, Acolyte, Seafarer, Dark Clothes of Night, Love Letters to a Dictator, Everybody Dies, Certifiable. Upcoming projects: Origin Stories, Belle of Amherst. www.krystahibbard.com

Ashley D. Buster (Assistant Director) is a DC Metro native from Silver Spring, MD. She is a member of the Actors’ Equity Association and is currently School Programs Manager at Shakespeare Theatre Company. She excited to be back at Avant Bard but this time as an Assistant Director! Ashley’s area credits as an actor include The Gospel at Colonus (Avant Bard), The Wiz and Freedom’s Song (Ford’s), Elmer Gantry (Signature), and Godspell (Infinity). She is excited to have her first experience as an Assistant Director with this team!

A. Lorraine Robinson (Dramaturg) is a freelance Director/Dramaturg. She received the Central Ohio Theatre Critics Circle Award: Best Director & Production in 2002 (The Laramie Project, Contemporary American Theatre Company) and 2017 and 2018 Tony Awards: Excellence in Theatre Education — Honorable Mention Awards for her directing work at Sitar Arts Center. She was formerly Co-Founding/Artistic Producing Director of MuseFire Productions. www.linkedin.com/in/arobinson4

Victor Vazquez (Casting Director) serves as the Casting Director/Line Producer at Arena Stage in Washington DC. Previous employment includes Center Theatre Group, The Pasadena Playhouse, Cornerstone Theatre Company, and DAQRI. Originally from Los Angeles, he now splits his time between DC, New York, and London.

Ralph Derbyshire (Technical Director) is an Arlington native. He has worked throughout the DC region for the last 15 years, most notably with The Smithsonian Folklife Festival (2002-08, 2010-15), GWU’s Lisner Auditorium (2007-12), as well as many local crewing companies setting up special events. He has held the titles Master Carpenter, Master Flyman, Assistant Stage Manager, and Shop Foreman. He also works and volunteers with the National Folk Festival as well as several other festivals locally and around the country. This is his fourth show as Technical Director with Avant Bard—his first was The Gospel at Colonus (2018)—and he is excited to bring his skills to real theatre.

An Antigone for the 21st Century

February 28, 2019

Dramaturg Noa Gelb delves into Matt Minnicino’s comedic adaptation of Sophocles’ classic tragedy.

“We have only a little time to please the living. But all eternity to love the dead.” —Sophocles, Antigone

When approaching the Greek Tragedies, Sophocles’ quote rings truer than ever. While in his case, he uses it as a theme in his play Antigone, in mine, as a dramaturg, it means honoring the dead and bringing more meaning to the words that make a play. As a dramaturg, it is my job to make sure the artists have all of the information needed to turn words into living, breathing people. This takes many forms, including history, context, definitions, references, and pronunciations—basically any information needed to fill the gap between actor and character. This is especially important in adaptations, as new blends with old, and history becomes modern. Honoring the past is just as important as celebrating the new interpretation. So when director Jon Jon Johnson asked me to create a dramaturgy packet for a Scripts in Play Festival reading of Matt Minnicino’s new adaptation of Antigone, I was ready for the challenge.

A new adaption of Antigone by Matt Minnicino (above) was read in the Avant Bard Scripts in Play Festival March 8, 2019, at Gunston Arts Center Theatre Two, directed by Jon Jon Johnson. Noa Gelb was dramaturg. Cast: Antigone: Ezra Tozian, Ismene: Noa Gelb, Eurydice: Annette Mooney Wasno, Creon: Tom Howley, Haimon: Dan Westbrook, Tireisias: Shaq Stewart, Soldier: Riley Bartlebaugh, Intern: Kara Turner.
About the play: A body rots in the sun. A girl takes a stand against the new regime. What is she fighting for? How far can she go? A collision of Sophocles’ masterpiece and modern America, a mixed-media myth for modern times about fear, tyranny, justice, revolution, revelation, and hope.

We were lucky to have Minnicino in the room during rehearsals, available for questions and clarifications. Minnicino’s script is written in modern verse, with no punctuation, reminiscent of Sophocles’ own tragedy. For fans of Sophocles’ play, Minnicino’s adaptation may bring comfort in how closely it follows the original story. Others may find it hard to believe that this often comedic retelling contains not only our stock characters (Antigone, Creon, and the rest of the motley House of Cadmus), but also sassy staffers, reporters, and most uniquely, an intern. We asked Minnicino what changes he made to the script and why.

The Intern

In Minnicino’s Antigone, the character of the Intern plays an important role in telling Antigone’s story. She is a modern take on a Greek Chorus. The Greek Chorus, traditionally, was a theatrical device intended to represent groups of people, frequently the common townspeople. The Chorus was also used to describe the events of the play as they happened offstage and provide emotional context, as special effects were far more limited. The Intern serves as our inside man, a commoner placed inside the palace, with access to the news and secrets of royalty. Unlike our protagonist, Antigone, who exists for the people but was raised inside the royal bubble, our Intern grew up among the people. She offers us a more authentic voice for the masses, and her station, while lower than Antigone’s, proves to be more valuable, as Creon considers her more of a representative of the people. She is the people’s voice, while Antigone is their leader.

Eurydice

Minnicino’s adaptation focuses on updating the female characters in Sophocles’ play. Often forgotten (if not the protagonist), the women in Greek tragedies are seen very briefly before dying. Minnicino gives Sophocles’ female characters much more life. Eurydice, the Queen of Thebes, only appears at the end of Sophocles’ play before committing suicide as a result of grief over the death of her son. In the adaption, however, she lives, a queen who serves as the ear and shoulder of the tyrannical king, the comfort of the staff, and, ultimately, a leader in her own right. She makes the impossible choice to stay with her murderous husband, whom she blames for her son’s death, for the sake of her people and the stability of Thebes. She is a rock, a constant throughout the entire play, and a character audiences can rely on throughout the distressing events of the play.

Ismene

Antigone and Ismene, her sister, have a very fraught relationship in Sophocles’ play.  Ismene disagrees with Antigone’s choices completely, choosing instead to obey the law of the land. Antigone is left alone in her choice to bury her brother and the consequences thereafter. In the adaption, we, as an audience, are privy to a more loving sisterly bond, one of trust, patience, and solidarity in the face of tyranny, violence and injustice. In fact, with Ismene ending the play, one is left with the question, what happens to Oedipus’ family now? Ismene is left alone, entrusted with continuing her sister’s fight for justice and peace. It leaves the audience with the sense of a continuing world, one that does not end with the final words of a script.

Modernity

Why place the script in modern times? Why not just update the language? Minnicino’s answer is simple: relatability. When originally penned in 2016, the central themes of Antigone stood out as timeless in a rapidly changing society. As Antigone fought for justice on the page, so too were thousands marching in the streets. As Ismene stood in solidarity with her sister, so too did thousands on social media. Even as Antigone stood for what she knew to be right, even if the lawmaker saw it as wrong, her struggle in Thebes was mirrored across the world. Sophocles’ script held true no matter the era. All that needed updating was the antiquated language. In our culture, in which action speaks louder than words, Minnicino found a way to take a script written in a speech-based theatrical tradition and make it more nuanced, and more engaging. Whether laughing or crying, audiences can find a character to resonate with, even if it’s just a staffer working late trying to order some dinner.

Noa Gelb is a Washington, DC, native and a graduate of the University of Michigan. She is a local theatre artist and writer, working primarily as an actor and freelance dramaturg. She has lived in Dublin, Ireland, and Athens, Greece, and loved every minute of it. She enjoys traveling, reading, cooking, eating Chinese food, and being with her friends and family. Noagelb.com

 

 

A Misanthrope, Matt Minnicino’s new distillation of Molière’s The Misanthrope, directed by Megan Behm, will play May 31 to July 8 at Gunston Arts Center Theatre Two. Tickets are available now online.

 

“To create something raw and real”: DeMone Seraphin on Directing Topdog/Underdog

February 25, 2019

Avant Bard: What is the experience you would like the audience to take away from Topdog/Underdog?

DeMone: Topdog/Underdog is an incredible play and it’s massive. It’s a two-person play, it’s an intimate two-hander, but the themes and the ideas in the play and the relationships between the two brothers in the play are enormous. I want our audiences to walk away having had a tangible, intimate experience of this enormous landscape that I want to place them in the center of.

What’s Topdog/Underdog about?

At the center of this story are two brothers, who were left by their parents to fend for themselves, with the moniker of Lincoln and Booth—two huge characters in American history, obviously, Lincoln and Booth, Lincoln our president and then Booth, the one who assassinated the president.

These two human beings—these two black men who were left to fend for themselves in the time and space that did not offer much support for them as brown people, and then for them as abandoned brown people—they took to the streets, with this great hustle, Three-card Monte. They had to learn to survive. Their survival was centered around this hustle, at which Lincoln was top. He’s the top dog. He was the best at it, really good, then he had an experience that shook his life, that caused him to walk away from it.

His younger brother Booth sees a vision of them working together to continue their mode of survival. Three-card Monte is a sleight-of-hand hustle, popular in the streets of New York and Chicago, huge cities where people are forced to survive by any means necessary. Because this hustle, this sleight-of-hand Three-card Monte, lies at the center of this experience, I want our audiences to have the experience of navigating the streets and the different hustles that we experience on the street as they walk into this intimate yet enormous situation of these two brothers who have to survive by any means necessary.

Ultimately, the hustle costs both men their lives.

Topdog/Underdog won the Pulitzer 25 years ago.

Indeed it did win, and it was a huge win at that! No other black female playwright had ever been awarded that incredible honor.

What if anything will the play mean today that it didn’t yet then?

In the age that we’re living in now, black and brown people have been abandoned and taken from their native dwellings and then dropped into these yet-to-be-United States of America. And they’re abandoned here, forced to cultivate a land that was stolen, and then abandoned on that land as second-class citizens, considered less than human.

And so black and brown people have had to figure out a way to survive in a space that is not their own, in a culture that offers no support for them. Many black and brown people were successful in the endeavor to survive and make a life, but then there were many who resorted to a way of life that is not so aboveboard, seedy, maybe even illegal, as a means of survival. They were not bad people; they were people taken from their native land, cast into a space that is not theirs, forced to cultivate it, and then left to fend for themselves. Being brought over through the slave trades, coming through the antebellum South, moving through the Jim Crow South through to the North, only to find that kind of abandonment and disqualification was just manicured and dressed in the North.

And now  today you have Trump and Trump sympathizers making way for those who remembered when America was “great.” I don’t know if great was ever a reality for this country. I don’t know if we’ve ever been great, because you can’t be great with a legacy of theft and murder and destruction and dishonor. So the play is still relevant because these two brothers have been forced to live in this space in order to facilitate their survival without any real means of support.

Lincoln stops dealing the cards to go get what he calls a square job, an honest job. What does he do? He dresses up as President Lincoln, he puts on a white face, in a carnival, where he is murdered on the daily, not even in the face, but people come as he sits with his back to them and they shoot at him, and they murder him daily. It is the daily murder that black and brown people deal with, shot in the back by legislation that is backhanded. And now it’s just overt that your lives are ruthlessly taken, snuffed out right up front, recorded for the world to see, and those who were charged with your destruction get promotions and raises and paid vacation. The play is still very relevant.

It’s a long history, and it’s a long history that seems like it’s playing on loop.

It sounds like a parable that people will interpret depending on what experiences they bring to it.

If you asked Suzan-Lori Parks, “Suzan, what were you thinking about when you wrote this play?,” she would say, “Well, I just wrote this play for two men. You want to talk about it being Cain and Abel, Esau and Jacob, I wasn’t thinking about that. I wanted to create a space where two brown men, two brown actors with a brown director, can come into a room and grapple. We don’t have that kind of experience in the theater where three black men, brown men, men of color, can just come into a room and grapple with amazing text.”

Sure, it is a huge parable. It was parables that Jesus used—I’m a theologian too—as a means of commentary on the issues and ills and isms of the day. What a great parable Suzan has written as a commentary on the ills and ails and isms of today. But Suzan would say, “Yeah, I wasn’t thinking about all that other stuff. Sure, if that’s what you want it to be, great, it can be that. But that’s not what I was thinking about when I wrote the play. I just wanted to create a space where three brown men can get in a room and grapple.”

For more information about the play, the performance schedule, and tickets, CLICK HERE.

DeMone Seraphin.

How would you describe what she gave them to grapple with?

Enormous and intense ideas to fight through! Am I my brother’s keeper? And is it the older brother who looks out for the younger brother? Or is it the younger brother who covers the brother? Are the isms and schisms that happen in a family powerful enough to bring that kind of destruction that we were named as a joke, so we come into the world the butt of a joke? That’s enough right there to fight over.

Then you’re split between these two parents and you’re left with this “inheritance,” and how do you safeguard that inheritance, and what does that inheritance do for your life, and what happens when you’re duped out of your inheritance? Here is the parallel to Jacob, about what happens when you’re duped out of your birthright—what do you do?

Yeah, three black men can get in the room and grapple, but they grapple with these amazing and enormous things. Yeah, it’s relevant today, and I’m excited that there are three black men who will be able to get into a room and grapple.

It’s what she wrote. It’s the reason she wrote this small yet powerful play, so that these men can get together and really rough-house in the room to create something artistic and strong and powerful and beautiful and violent and ugly and raw and real.

These two men who have to grapple with the reality of their lives. That Booth and Lincoln are in this eternal fight for their lives. It is a fight that is historic, obviously, Booth killed Lincoln. Booth kills him again, Booth, who at one point lived as somewhat celebrated actor who had a fall, who is relegated to the outskirts of his family practice, and so in order to gain some sense of notoriety again, attention and fame, he kills the president, who he feels has in some way manipulated him out of his space. That the things that Lincoln stood for made it even that much harder for Booth.

It’s an interesting fight, the younger brother, violent in every way, towards his older brother, whom he was charged to take care of. Booth sleeps with Lincoln’s wife, you can’t get any more violent than that before you kill him. There is this constant fight. “Come back to the cards, Lincoln. Come on, do it, let’s do it, we can do it together. We could be the top, we can run the streets, and we can get all the money, and all the girls.” There is this constant fight, this push and pull. I think it’s the image of these two brothers with this push and pull.

There is something about the play that’s so sad, because it’s like they lack the power to fight the power. That is, the power that is overdetermining their lives, and it turns into this blood match between brothers.

I mean, the lack of education is profound. They were abandoned as children, and we meet them as adults who have not really progressed beyond childhood. Did they make through school? Do they have the academic or intellectual capacity to really fight the power?

Right. They don’t.

Then in the street Lincoln turns his back on the thing that he was very good at, so he’s forced to sit as a target in a carnival. I mean, do they have the social facility to fight the power? There is a lot of lack, and in the space of lack there is violence—I mean, wow, what people do to survive, the thing that you’re driven to in a space of lack.

It’s an unsettling play to think about, to watch.

Oh, yeah. It’s a hard play.

One of the things that’s striking about the script is what a sendup it is of all the posing and manhood posturing that these two guys are doing to each other and in their lives. It’s like Parks has this bead on it, she’s just tracking every beat, what’s going on in terms of their presentation of themselves. This false front, basically, that they were putting up, it’s  part of the survival gesture.

Yeah.

One of the real core strengths of the play is Parks’s lens on that.

I mean, it’s no secret in the culture that the black woman has really had to become the backbone of the black family, with the man often not being present, either because of the breakdown of the relationship or because they have to work so hard that their physical presence isn’t always felt because they’re out trying to provide a life, a living. I think Suzan has taken that position as a black woman to create a safe space for these men to grapple with these issues, trying to work through their stuff.

 

 

The Little-Known Script That Could

February 6, 2019

The curator of the Scripts in Play Festival has a good story to tell you.

By Quill Nebeker

I’m going to tell you a story about a script…in play…in Scripts in Play. It’s a story about what stories mean, who gets to tell them, and how some of the most important stories are ones that, through the telling of them, let us see the story we thought we knew in a new light. Those values drive what we do at Avant Bard, and never are they felt more than during Scripts in Play.

In 2015, before I joined the staff of Avant Bard, I was invited by then Director of Audience Engagement Maegan Clearwood to join the reading committee for a new program called Scripts in Play. A reading committee is often convened when a theatre company has more scripts to sift through than any one person can manage to read sanely. Such committees also happen when a company is trying to select a season, curate new works, or (as in this case) program a brand-new staged reading festival.

Afterchat with the audience about the 2016 Scripts in Play reading of Emilie: La Marquise Du Châtelet Defends Her Life Tonight: Executive and Artistic Director Tom Prewitt, Bruce Rauscher (who read the part of Voltaire), Quill Nebeker, and Sara Barker (who read Emilie).

I don’t know exactly how many plays we read for that festival, but I recall it felt herculean. Maegan as the curator of the festival was tasked with building the script pool. An exceedingly thorough dramaturg, she saturated the pool with 2,500 years worth of scripts. I read Greek adaptations, early modern works, children’s folklore, and a little-known play by Lauren Gunderson called Emilie: La Marquise Du Châtelet Defends Her Life Tonight.

For a complete guide to the 2019 Scripts in Play Festival, click here.

In committee Maegan and I both advocated for the play fiercely, but Tom Prewitt, our Artistic and Executive Director, was not convinced. At the time, he was concerned about if or how it fit into our classically-based ouvre (remember this: I’ll come back to it). Nevertheless, Maegan and I press-ganged him into giving it a second read. To this day I’m not sure exactly what changed Tom’s mind—the play, the twenty-something odd artists on either ear, or some combination of both. But he did finally decide Emilie was worth programming and said he wanted me to direct it.

Emilie was an important part of my growth as a storyteller. It was the first time I was to lead actors with much, much more experience than me. Acting Company Member Sara Barker agreed to play Emilie (a role she would reprise magnificently in full production). I have never said this to her face, but her patience with me as a verbose young director taught me a lot about the value of saying little.

Emilie on stage in 2017: Sara Barker as Emilie with Steve Lebens (Gentleman), Billie Krishawn (Soubrette), and Lisa Hodsoll (Madam). Photo by DJ Corey Photography.

Emilie was a festival fan favorite, drawing an unusually large crowd for a staged reading. It was at that reading that Tom, I believe, was won over by Gunderson’s charm, by Sara’s passion and nuance. It is also distinctly possible that he was won over from the beginning but wanted to entertain our youthful vigor—he can be mentorly in that way. Avant Bard would produce the play in 2017, and it would go on to inspire audiences well beyond that surprisingly large crowd in 2016.

During its rehearsal period and full run, Emilie attained a whole new meaning, one that Lauren put there waiting to find the right ears. The play found an audience of young women, passionate about science and mathematics, longing to see themselves in a history from which they have been historically and systematically erased. Never in my career have I seen more teenagers excited to be sitting in a theatre than during Emilie, and it was a privilege to witness that experience.

For a complete guide to the 2019 Scripts in Play Festival, click here.

With every staged reading in the Scripts in Play Festival, you get a small taste of a story coming to life, but also a story in flux, a story playing around with what it has been and might become. In witnessing a reading, you become a part of that story’s story—you help it find a shape, find new meaning, and eventually connect to audiences as Emilie did to those young scientists.

What’s more, though, the readings of Scripts in Play are our opportunity to explore with you, our audience, what makes an Avant Bard play. Recall earlier Tom’s hesitation about Emilie: does it fit into our classically-based ouvre? By now, we know the answer to that question–an emphatic “yes!”–yet at the time it was an important one to ask. In a subtle but significant way, Emilie challenged us to think about what is is that makes a “classic” in the first place.

Now, take a look at this year’s lineup: One modern adaptation, two classical remixes, and four (4!) plays that in some way or another challenge a conventional historical narrative. That is no accident, and is a reflection of the lasting lessons from Madame Du Châtelet.

So please: see a show (see several!) and tell us about what you saw. Because Scripts in Play is such a big part of Avant Bard’s present and future, it’s also your chance to let us know what resonated with you, what surprised you or inspired you. We hope that in doing so, you’ll also become a part of Avant Bard’s story.

Quill Nebeker (Director of Audience Engagement) is a community builder, connecting Avant Bard with local groups to create artistic space for community-driven dialogue. Quill has previously worked with Creative Cauldron, The Hub Theatre, Forum Theatre, Capital Fringe, and The Wolf Trap Foundation. Quill is also a creative with a fascination for interactivity and the intersection between reality and mythology. With Avant Bard, he was theAssistant Director on King John (2013) and King Lear (2017), and he curates Avant Bard’s Scripts in Play series. Quill also created and produces The Tarot Reading, an interactive
variety show where your presence is an experience. The series is called “fresh and daring” by DC Theatre Scene and “one of the city’s more unique offerings” by DCist (www.thetarotreading.org).

 

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