Dear Ivey
Please join us at Unboxed 2012 for a night of art, performance, food, and drink! Dozens of original works of art, all generously created for Sandbox by premier artists from all over the Twin Cities and the nation. All proceeds support Sandbox’s fall production: Beatnik Giselle.
Buy tickets now through PayPal!
Dear Ivey
Hennepin Theatre Trust presents the new theatrical event Standing On Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays, running May 31–June 16, 2012 at the New Century Theatre. Showcasing funny, heartfelt “mini works” that celebrate the courage to be in a relationship–any relationship, Standing On Ceremony’s smart and witty vignettes were penned by playwrights whose credits include two Pulitzer Prizes, four Obies, one Emmy and three Tony nominations. Wendy Knox of Frank Theatre will direct a stellar cast of six Twin Cities actors including Laura Adams, Shawn Hamilton, Aimee K. Bryant, Jim Lichtscheidl, Mark Rhein, and Shanan Custer. With this production, the Trust is working in cooperation with Minnesotans United for All Families, the official statewide campaign working to defeat the constitutional amendment that would exclude gays and lesbians from marriage in Minnesota.
As part of Standing On Ceremony each actor performs multiple roles in short pieces by an “A List” cadre of writers including the Minnesota-based Edgar Award winning playwright Jeffrey Hatcher, Heideman Award winner Jordan Harrison, Tony Award nominee Moisés Kaufman, Mo Gaffney, Tony Award nominee Neil LaBute, Sundance Jury Prize winner Wendy MacLeod, Obie Award winner José Rivera, Obie and Outer Critics Circle Award winner Paul Rudnick and Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winner Doug Wright.
These artists came together to respond to one of the defining issues of our day, the on-going battle for marriage equality. In Minnesota, forces as diverse as the artistic community, the Minnesota Rabbinical Association and the Episcopal Church of Minnesota are aligning to defeat the upcoming November ballet amendment that would change the state constitution.
The Plays of Standing on Ceremony are:
- Traditional Wedding by Mo Gaffney a long-married lesbian couple reminisce about their wedding.
- White Marriage by Jeffrey Hatcher, a long-married couple take some old suspicions out of the closet when their son announces his pending nuptials.
- The Revision by Jordan Harrison, an amusing look at how two men might rewrite their vows to more accurately reflect the limited options available to a gay couple.
- This Flight Tonight by Wendy MacLeod asks if there is any hope for happiness when a lesbian marriage begins in Iowa.
- On Facebook by Doug Wright was adapted from an actual Facebook thread chronicling one long fight among friends on the subject of gay marriage.
- Strange Fruit by Neil LaBute is the story of two men in love whose plans to get married “the old-fashioned way” are stymied when reality rears its ugly head.
- The Gay Agenda by Paul Rudnick is a sadly hilarious plea for understanding by an Ohio homemaker and member of Focus on the Family.
- My Husband by Paul Rudnick puts a hilarious gay twist on the stereotype of the Jewish mother desperate to marry off her children.
- London Mosquitoes by Moisés Kaufman is a poignant story in which a widower tries to make sense of the loss of his longtime lover.
- Pablo and Andrew at the Altar of Words by José Rivera is a moving play about two men who use their marriage vows to “say the things we never really say.
Standing On Ceremony returns to the New Century Theatre after its November 7, 2011, one-night-only Minnesota debut. It was performed simultaneously that evening at more than 40 theatres across the country and in Sydney and Toronto, including the Minetta Lane Theatre in New York City which hosted the Off-Broadway premiere, to encourage discussion about marriage equality. Standing on Ceremony, conceived by Brian Shnipper and directed by Stuart Ross, began as a series of benefit events in Los Angeles and took on a life of its own under the auspices of the Tectonic Theater Project with producers Joan Stein and Richard Frankel. Tectonic’s Moisés Kaufman, Artistic Director and Greg Reiner, Executive Director, have been involved in other groundbreaking plays including The Laramie Project, I Am My Own Wife, and Gross Indecency: The Three Trials of Oscar Wilde which have helped spark national discourse about far reaching issues. For more information visit www.standingonceremony.net.
Hennepin Theatre Trust is pleased to be working again with director Wendy Knox of Frank Theatre for Standing on Ceremony. Frank is a professional theatre company recently recognized by City Pages for Best Musical, Best Director and Best Actor. Frank is committed to producing unique work which stretches the skills of the artists involved while simultaneously challenging everyday perceptions through the exploration of social, political and cultural issues.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=fJAItFA2nxU
For tickets and more information, click here.
Adoptive Art
Not all theater communities are as exceptional as the one DQ enjoys. She has kept her maternal feelings toward the theater community satisfied because she lives in a hotbed of creative incubation. Her hometown has a strong tradition of encouraging innovation among thespians, and the 2012 theater season has proved particularly fertile.
Recognizing her good fortune, DQ also feels sympathy for theater lovers who miss out on the bounty by not living in her town. Friends who have moved away bemoan the paucity of theater in other cities. Even in California. So on a recent visit to Palm Springs, DQ was thrilled to learn her friends arranged to attend a play reading contest.
A local arts organization, DezartPerforms, was holding its Fourth Annual Play Reading Series. They put out a call for new scripts early last winter. It yielded 121 entries, which were winnowed down to eight. Excerpts from the finalists were presented to audiences over two weekends in April, and the winner will be staged during their upcoming season.
Although she didn’t attend all eight readings, Drama Queen is rooting for a script titled after a cat named Lorraine. As a lover of dogs and cats, it resonated with her in spite of its imperfections. The story featured a pretty feline who gets banished to the animal shelter after missing the litter box one too many times. The best friend of Lorraine’s callous owners is horrified when he learns of their feline abandonment, questions their relationship, and even considers rescuing the hapless kitty from her undeserved providence.
It’s just the sort of tale that would attract an adoptive mother to the arts, dogs, and cats.
+ Faith Christine (a.k.a. “the Drama Queen”) blogs every week for METRO. See more of her work here.
A “Pinteresque” Performance
By Faith Christine
After being caught recently in the crossfire of an argument, and then a post-performance outburst, by her Partner for Life, Drama Queen believes without question that bringing up Harold Pinter can incite powerful emotions. She can vouch that people she knows either love or despise plays by him. And even the lovers of his work acquired their taste for it gradually.
DQ’s latest brush with Pinter was the Jungle Theatre’s production of The Birthday Party. The argument erupted just prior to the performance, when a close friend, a woman with real theater chops, annouced the two things she hates intensely: plays by Pinter and sushi. While she allowed that the latter may be a curable condition, her disdain for Pinter was not.
The Birthday Party, one of Pinter’s early works, bombed on stage in London, his hometown, and among critics – except for one devout supporter. The play became associated with the disparaging dub by literary types that something was “Pinteresque.” It meant being characterized by minimal plot, menace, long pauses, and featuring characters that are self-absorbed, somewhat dull people who lead narrow lives and are convinced they’re being pursued.
Not surprisingly, Pinter’s plays provide great fodder for parody, which has happened often and hilariously.
DQ suspects somewhere in Pinter’s bio there is an explanation for his obsessions. The playwright had a nervous childhood due to the WWII Blitz. As a student, he tried to be an actor, playwright and director. As an adult, he continued to keep his hand in all things theatrical while adding the role of philandering husband, one who married twice to gorgeous, successful women.
Although his works are certainly controversial, Drama Queen thinks they’re still worth trying to understand, precisely because they excite such criticism. Among her circle, however, Pinter’s plays usually do not inspire lavish praise. In fact, she doubts many among them are likely to seek opportunities to change their opinion of his work.
+ Faith Christine (a.k.a. “the Drama Queen”) blogs every week for METRO. See more of her work here.
TURN RIGHT AT THE PHYLLIS DILLER SCHOOL OF COSMETOLOGY
What may be the funniest school in the country will be producing their first production beginning this May. The BNW Student Union, the non-profit, educational wing of the Brave New Workshop, is producing FOTERSON: Man Lady Funny Time every Friday and Saturday in May at their location at 2605 Hennepin Ave. S. The production stars Mike Fotis and Lauren Anderson, who brought down the Ivey house a few years with her rendition of Frosty the Snowman. Fotis and Anderson describe themselves as being as close as possible without ever having had sex, and Ivey rarely, if ever, disputes a claim.
All The World’s A Stage
As a child, Drama Queen learned to be wary of strangers and to avoid conversations with people she didn’t know. She also developed a dislike for being singled out in a crowd, which is why audience participation shows make her nervous.
So when the folks behind Swandive Theater’s “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare” promised the audience would “not be passive viewers, but true participants,” her nerve-endings started to twitch.
Her fears were further fanned when an oddly attired young man sat down beside her and immediately began a dialogue about her. Knowing that “cowards die many times before their deaths; (while) the valiant never taste of death but once,” she politely disclosed as little personal information as she could.
It proved to be a smart choice, as the odd young man was a cast member, one of three depicting a rollickingly audacious compendium of the bard’s 37 works.
The show plays out in 97 minutes of hyperkinetic performances in which Shakespeare’s words are hilariously bastardized, depicting tragic figures as ridiculous and dropping malapropisms like cheap tricks – all of this in attempt to make Shakespeare appealing to those “intellectually flaccid” who had been “systematically sodomized by soap operas.”
Performers also sought to make the work engaging by drawing willing audience members into Shakespearean banter. When the limelight inevitably turned to Drama Queen, the odd young man, now attired in a platinum blonde wig, introduced her to the audience as a theater junkie, who… ” DQ flinched. She had been made into a “true participant” in the bard’s classic works.
Her partner-for-life, not about to be left out of this literary crime gushed: “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances; and one woman plays many parts.”
+ Faith Christine (a.k.a. “the Drama Queen”) blogs every week for METRO. See more of her work here.
Dear Ivey
A lot has been brewing in the Live Action Set pot! One project brings them back into the rehearsal room, working on a new treteau piece — a bunch of actors on a tiny platform with no set or props. This time, they’re going to try to pull off the Kill Bill volumes. And, this time around, they had to give themselves an even greater challenge, so they’ve limited the actors up on the platform to just 4! Catch the new piece on July 8 at the annual CONvergence in Bloomington, and check out the rest of Live Action Set’s upcoming work here.
The Real World
Sometimes Drama Queen gets so drawn into a story she forgets she’s actually watching a play. That happened recently as she watched a preview performance of the Guthrie’s “Time Stands Still.” Gradually the line between her life and the characters on stage became more nebulous as she found herself recognizing people, especially journalists, she knew in a previous life.
In the play, a war correspondent photographer named Sara returns home to recover from her injuries after being seriously wounded in a roadside bomb explosion. Like many of the women DQ worked with, she is smart, courageous, and utterly passionate in her commitment to her work. The kind of woman who reminded her of iconic women journalists like Mary Hemingway, Sylvia Poggioli, and Marie Colvin, women of great accomplishment.
Yet while DQ greatly admired these women, she never aspired to become like them. Their zealous pursuit of their work, bringing the cold realities of war into our living rooms, put them in personal danger, risking their lives. It cost them physically and psychologically, as well as wreaking havoc on their personal relationships. This was too great a price for a timid soul like DQ.
The character of Sara also paid for her career choice. Upon returning home, she and the war reporter she lived with for eight years, find themselves dealing with things they had never before faced in their long association. He is mentally fragile and recovering from a breakdown brought on by too much close-up carnage. She struggles with her physical wounds and her guilt over photographing people in pain – “getting blood on her camera lens.”
They impulsively decide to get married, but soon discover it does not bring them any closer. Sara’s brush with death hasn’t diminished her journalistic zeal, but her war-weary husband finds he prefers the quietude and comfort of normal living. Just like people DQ has known who have grown apart, they go their separate ways. Sara heads off to her next assignment and hubby finds comfort in the arms of another woman, one who offers the promise of domesticity and family.
Their split also reminded DQ’s partner-for-life of other break-ups. As he wistfully remarked, it was “Another perfectly good friendship ruined by marriage.”
+ Faith Christine (a.k.a. “the Drama Queen”) blogs every week for METRO. See more of her work here.
You’re Invited to a Special Lecture Series!
The University of Minnesota and Penumbra Theatre present
Reshaping the Black Image on the American Stage: Penumbra’s Legacy and Influence
A series of four lectures and conversations moderated by Dominic Taylor, Associate Artistic Director - New Play Development at Penumbra Theatre and Associate Professor at the University of Minnesota.
Hear from renowned scholars, engage in conversation and enjoy a dessert reception.
Join us for the last two lectures of this series!
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Thursday, April 19, 7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.
“Black Cultural Traffic and the Black Arts Movement”
Presented by Harry Elam Jr., Professor of Humanities, Stanford University
Professor Elam is author of Black Cultural Traffic: Crossroads in Global Performance and Popular Culture. He will share a philosophical, as well as a historical perspective to the creation and maintenance of cultural property. In addition, he will make evident the historical relevance of intellectual and popular efforts toward ownership and definition of black ethos.
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Thursday, April 26, 7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.
“The Future of the Black Arts Movement”
Presented by Paul Carter Harrison, playwright and scholar
Mr. Harrison is the author of The Drama of Nomm, a collection of essays identifying African retentions in the American experience that are the aesthetic root of black expression. He will share an assessment of the polarity of positions within today’s black community, a look toward the building of alliances between institutions that strengthen and empower black people, and offer suggestions for future direction within the black arts community.
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The events will take place at the Regis Center for Art, In-Flux Auditorium (U of M, West Bank) from 7:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. The events will be free and open to the public - no reservation required.
Toy Theatre After Dark
Open Eye Figure Theatre
Presents
Toy Theatre after Dark
A Two Week Festival of Puppetry and Object Theatre of Miniature Proportions
April 13-21, 2012
(Minneapolis) — Open Eyepresents its annual Toy Theatre After Dark Festival offering two distinct programsfeaturing guest artists from California, Chicago, and Connecticut, along with several puppetry artists from the Twin Cities.
The Toy Theatre after Dark Festival takes the historic definition of Toy Theatre (2-dimensional, table top theatre with a proscenium) and breaks the rules. Presenting shows in suitcases, shadow puppetry, weird object animation and tabletop cantastorias (sung stories), a few actors in wigs and throw in a stuffed rabbits, you’ll see this collection of artists as they explore contemporary approaches to an old art form.
Open Eye began showcasing short puppetry works locally in 2007 and it has grown to span two weekends, with two programs – one for all ages and one for adults, three workshops open to the public, and an artist panel discussion, and a late night festival closing Puppet Cabaret. The Festival gives everyone – artists and audiences alike, an opportunity to enjoy the vast array of approaches to puppetry. If you want to experience puppetry of all sorts – this is a great opportunity!
This year Toy Theatre after Dark features performance artist and film animator, Chris Sullivan, and a new young company Rough House Theatre, both from Chicago. Nicky Heart comes from Connecticut and Little Blue Moon Theatre from California. Local artists in this year’s festival include Kristi Ternes, Rachel Leaf, Kurt Hunter, Michael Sommers, and Alex Alexander.
Tickets: $18 general admission | $15 Students and Seniors 65+ | $12 for Children to age 12
Available online at BrownPaperTIckets.com All Performances are at Open Eye Theatre, 506 East 24th St. (2 Blocks south of Franklin just on the east side of 35W). Free Parking is available in the Lutheran Social Service lot at Portland Avenue and 24th Street.
About Open Eye Figure Theatre (OEFT)
OEFT creates original figure theatre, animating the inanimate on an intimate scale; trains the next generation of figure theatre artists; and advances adventurous, artist-driven programming in the Open Eye theater space.
Open Eye is nationally recognized for bringing a visual feast of evocative figure theater to the stage. The company’s whimsical yet profound work surprises and delights whether experienced in the company’s historic jewel box theater in Minneapolis or in neighborhoods throughout the Twin Cities with the Driveway Tour. From experimental object works to puppet shows in backyards to community pageants to miniature spectacles, Open Eye consistently creates a unique, contagious exchange between artists and audiences. More information available at www.openeyetheatre.org.
# # #
Open Eye Figure Theatre Presents Toy Theatre after Dark
April 13 – 21, 2012
Show Schedule
Program 1 (Contains adult language and content)
Featured Artists
Nicky Heart (Connecticut), Rough House Puppet Theatre (Chicago), Chris Sullivan (Chicago)
Alex Alexander, (Minneapolis), Little Blue Moon (California)
Program 1 Performance Schedule
Friday April 13th 7:30PM followed by Opening Reception
Saturday April 14th 2:00PM followed by Artist Q&A
Thursday April 19th 7:30PM
Saturday April 21st 7:30PM
Program 2 (Appropriate for All Ages)
Featured Minneapolis Artists
Michael Sommers, Rachel Leaf, Kristi Ternes, Liz Schachterle, Kurt Hunter
Performance Schedule
Sat April 14th 7:30PM followed by Opening Reception
Sun April 15th 4:00PM followed by Artist Q&A
Fri April 20th 7:30PM
Sat April 21st 2:00PM
Full details for workshops, discussions and the cabaret are at openeyetheatre.org
For more information contact Susan Haas at 612.226.0402
Live and Learn
The explosion of new works has swept her up with such fervor that she’s already fighting urges to plant tomatoes outdoors.
The most recent premier Drama Queen took in wasAmerican Family, playwright Carlyle Brown’s work that is just finishing up on the Park Square stage.
Brown, a recognized talent in his field, was inspired by a mostly-forgotten movie called One Potato, Two Potato, in which a white divorcee marries an African-American man. Her child is then taken away by a vindictive ex-husband who has her declared unfit as a mother because of her marriage to a black man.
Brown was further influenced by the John Lennon song “Working Class Hero,” a song about how life tarnishes the purity of a newborn’s soul yielding damaged adults.
The play, told from the daughter’s perspective, follows the thread of a child’s feelings over being abandoned to a young woman’s sadness and emptiness, when it’s too late. The angry child in her had coped with feelings of rejection by projecting that ire back upon her mother. Years later she recovers some of the mother she lost by reading her letters.
DQ, always willing to extrapolate to ridiculous extremes, saw a karmic metaphor for the life of a new play.
Like an infant, it comes out slippery and hollering, but time and outside influences cause it to change. It can become damaged from exposure to the elements – or evolve like a rough-edged rock into a beautifully polished stone.
She expects this year’s harvest of new works to yield some of each.
+ Faith Christine (a.k.a. “the Drama Queen”) blogs every week for METRO. See more of her work here.
Too Much, Too Soon
By Faith Christine
Drama Queen has always been conflicted over whether it’s better to confront young children with the cruel realities of life so they’re prepared or to indulge their ignorance, at least until they are teenagers and a little bad news may actually serve as a potent motivator.
That was her quandary with Children’s Theatre Company’s production of Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy. The story is about a Maine town, Phippsburg, and its abysmal treatment of African-American outcasts who occupied the island of Malaga, just off its coast. It was the late 1800’s and, despite being forced to live in the ostracized and isolated community, a young inhabitant named Lizzie Bright thrived. She was one of those irrepressibly optimistic children who saw all that life hands them as one big opportunity.
One day while on a clamming expedition to the mainland, Lizzie struck up a relationship with the new kid in town, the sullen, geeky son of the recently arrived preacher. Soon their inter-racial friendship is discovered and the town is scandalized, bringing the preacher’s morals into question and putting his job at risk.
Phippsburg’s leading citizens then hatch a plan to develop the island. The first step calls for evicting all of the island’s current inhabitants, who not surprisingly are unable to prove any “legal” claim to their island. Events unfold predictably, ending sadly for the residents of Malaga and shamefully for the town.
It’s the utter sorrow of this historical account that made DQ think it was too heavy for young kids. This isn’t just supposition, either. During her viewing, one young audience member, a girl who bore an uncanny resemblance to Lizzie Bright, was overwhelmed with sadness and burst into tears.
Although the playwright did inject some levity via the character of Mrs. Cobb, a pious, shrill widow, who is obsessed over getting her last words right, the play was for the most part a heartbreaking statement about racism. Not even the unexpected and sardonically funny twist at the end could raise the spirits of the tearful girl sitting behind DQ.
For a young audience, it may have been too much, too soon.
+ Faith Christine (a.k.a. “the Drama Queen”) blogs every week for METRO. See more of her work here.
Dear Ivey
Greetings Tenfest lovers and new comers,
It’s time to make the 11th Annual Tenfest! Come one, come all.
Since 2002, the Bedlam Community Ten Minute Play Festival has been a venue to welcome newcomers to Bedlam (and to the stage!), to work with Bedlam veterans, and create new short works of performance. Our goal this year is to channel all the input for this year’s fest into 12 pieces - to fuel more in depth collaboration.
Tenfest is ready for your ideas, desires, creative impulses!
We have a crew of lead collaborators and project artists who will work together with participants to hone, coordinate, and collaborate among the collective impulses to arrive at the list of twelve projects for this years fest.
These are all interactive Playdates, open space style - the form/content/process reflective the impulses that arrive.
Your impulse could be a content impulse (I want to help make a piece about marriage equality!) It could be a style impulse (I want to work on a movement theater piece!) It could also be to simply show up and engage in the process and see what happens.
Your impulse could be a ten minute play script that you’d been intending on submitting to the festival.
Ideathon Playdates will take place April 1 and 2 from 6:30 pm - 9:30 pm at Mixed Blood Theater (1501 South 4th Street, Minneapolis). You are welcome to come show us a script you have written, showcase your acting or directing skills, or showcase any other talent you have that you believe would be beneficial to the project.
We look forward to seeing you! Email questions to tenfest@bedlamtheatre.org.
Sally Turns 20
Ivey attended Sally’s 20th awards event at the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts on Monday, March 26 and was charmed equally by the eloquent acceptance remarks and benevolent introductions.
While almost all words spoken were artistic in and of themselves, the biggest audience chuckle came when Rick Jacobson compared his trophy to a roll-on deodorant tube, then attributed the comparison to T. Mychael Rambo. Because Ivey trophy comparison comments abound, Ivey knows that Rick’s comments are terms of endearment.
The winners and the categories in which they received recognition are as follows:
ARTS ACCESS: Rick Jacobson
EDUCATION: Ross Sutter
COMMITMENT: Kevin Smith
VISION: Ta-Coumba T. Aiken
INITIATIVE: TU Dance
Wonderful awards, wonderful recipients!
Heads or Tails
It’s been a few years since Drama Queen marked her thirteenth year of life, but a recent birthday gift compelled her to reflect upon that period of adolescence.
It was a book called Through No Fault of My Own, the diary of a 13-year-old girl named Clotilde “Coco” Irvine who recorded her thoughts in 1927 while residing in what is now the governor’s mansion on Summit Avenue. Irvine’s life was one of wealth and privilege, yet the girl reflected in the diary’s pages was not a spoiled brat. She sounded instead like a bright, precocious young person with surprisingly modern views and concerns.
Her recollections are the basis of the History Theatre’s current play Coco’s Diary, about a pubescent girl who is actually quite likable. The diary revealed a curious, inventive, and refreshingly balanced young woman, much in contrast with DQ’s own memories of that age. Unlike Coco’s recorded life, hers was a time of pain and angst when raging hormones alternately fueled a roller coaster ride of childish tantrums and seductive urges.
That’s not to say Coco’s life was stress-free or without sexual tension. Her allowance wasn’t enough and she acknowledged a strong preoccupation with boys. Yet she always seemed to maintain her confidence that He really did like her, and she never mentioned uncontrollable emotions or a body that seemed to not be her own.
But in spite of its potential as a stage play, DQ knew it would be almost impossible to get her partner-for-life to join her at the show. She so wanted to avoid the likely torrent of pathetic whining about being made to sit through another play about uninteresting people that she never even tried to persuade him. Instead, Drama Queen has settled for hearsay reports from others.
Perhaps somebody will let her know if the joke Coco told at her family’s dinner table – the one that so upset her parents – made it to the stage.
The joke was: “A dog went across the railroad track and a train ran over his tail. He looked back to see where his tail was and a train came the other way and cut off his head. Moral: Don’t lose your head over a little piece of tail.”
+ Faith Christine (a.k.a. “the Drama Queen”) blogs every week for METRO. See more of her work here.
