BREAKING NEWS...
Re-Imagining Theatre
Marcus Dilliard, Theatre
Arts & Dance chair and Tom Burrup, Arts & Cultural Leadership Program
director announce a very special event bringing together four artistic
directors for a public conversation:
Re-Imagining Theatre, December 11 in the Rarig Center’s Stoll Thrust
Theatre.
Artistic Directors: Sarah Bellamy, Joe Haj, Sarah Rasmussen, Randy Reyes
This spirited conversation
with the new generation of Twin Cities’ theatrical leaders Sarah Bellamy,
Penumbra Theatre; Joe Haj, Guthrie Theater; Sarah Rasmussen, Jungle Theater and
Randy Reyes, Mu Performing Arts will be moderated by Minnesota Public Radio’s
Arts correspondent, Marianne Combs. A recent New York Times article identifying these four theatre artists as
harbingers of change indicates they “are reconsidering what words like
collaboration and equity mean, and how they play out, both onstage and
offstage.” The conversation will also explore questions about diversity, and who frames the story in
interpreting the classics. The
evening’s discussion on compelling theatre, to be recorded by Minnesota Public
Radio, will include an opportunity for questions from the audience. The Re-Imagining Theatre conversation will
be presented December 11, 2015 at 7:00pm in the Rarig Center’s Stoll Thrust
Theatre. General admission tickets are available for $5; no charge for
students with valid ID cards.
For tickets and information call: U of M Arts /Events Ticket Office at 612 624-2345 or visit: theatre.umn.edu (click
BUY TICKETS). Tickets are also
available at the door one hour prior to performance.
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STUDENT NEWS
Following the shooting of five Black Lives
Matter protesters by three assailants at the Minneapolis Police Department’s
4th Precinct, 150 University of Minnesota students called for a fundamental
change to law enforcement in front of Northrop Auditorium Tuesday, November 24.
Dance
program majors responded to the protest with an improvised
dance on the Northrop stairs, expressing their individual and collective
feelings. Click link:
Brian
Grossman (BA ‘16) worked assisting director Joel Sass on the
current production of Conor McPhersons’s The Night Alive which continues through December 20.
Megan
Winter (MFA ’16) in Theatre Design and Technology has
been gaining professional experience as a lighting designer, electrician and
programmer this fall semester. Her
credits as an electrician include Sweeney
Todd (Theatre Latte Da); The Night
Alive (Jungle Theatre); An Octoroon
(Mixed Blood) Daughter of the Regiment
(Mill City Summer Opera); as lighting designer for “Pat A Cake” one of the
pieces in UDT: Dance Revolutions opening
December 10 at Rarig Center.
ALUMNI SPOTLIGHTS
Grant
Sorrenson
Nate
Stanger (B.A.’13) is making his professional debut at assistant stage
manager for
Ordway Center’s Sound of
Music while humming “My Favorite Things”, December 10- January 2. On the
Showboat served as deck manager (The Vampire!
’12) and and the following summer stage manager (Sweet Revenge! ’13).
Paul
Hackenmueller, (MFA) knows how to light up the holidays. He
created the lighting design for Children’s Theatre Company’s Wizard of Oz which is winning high
praise from the local press -- “will take you by storm” and “massively
entertaining.” For the Dallas Opera, he
will light-up Becoming Santa, the
world premiere of a holiday opera with Scottish director Paul Curran; Paul will
be featured in January’s issue of Applause.
You’ll meet more U of M
theatre alums on the yellow brick road to Oz at Children’s Theater. Reed
Sigmund (BA. Minneapolis) plays the Cowardly Lion along with Mary Fox (BA, Duluth) who plays the
Wicked Witch of the West.
Jesse
Cogswell (MFA ‘14) is a lighting designer unafraid of a
challenge. This being the darkest month of the year, Cogswell takes on Walking
Shadow’s productions of A Mid-Winter’s
Night’s Revel playing December 4-30 at Red Eye Theater in Minneapolis.
Santino Fontana, (BFA
‘04) starred in ACT
ONE,on the Live from Lincoln Center’s broadcast on PBS television
stations last month. Lincoln Center Theater's
presentation of James Lapine's vivid play about the great playwright Moss Hart,
re-imagined from Hart's memoir also starred Tony Shalhoub, and Andrea Martin. Check out his
interview with scene inserts from the Broadway show click http://video.pbs.org/video/2365604164/
Park Square Theater’s The
Snow Queen plays through December
27 and features alums Elyse Edelman (BFA ‘12) and current BFA seniors Michael Liebhauser and
Silas Sellnow. Anita Killing (BA’10) provides sound
design. For more information, visit: http://parksquaretheatre.org/box-office/shows/2015-16/the-snow-queen/
Note: Snow
Queen Director Doug Scholz-Carlson, who is also artistic director at Great
River Shakespeare Festival, will be a visiting artist on campus. He will co-direct
Shakespeare’s Henry IV, performed by
the University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theatre Actor’s Training Sophomore class in
the spring. For information and tickets visit: theatre.umn.edu
Bear
Brummel (BFA ‘15), Virginia
Burke (BA) Eleonore Dendy( BFA ‘11),
Stuart Gates, (BFA), Summer Hagan (BFA), Katie Kleiger ( BFA’15) Suzane Warmanen (BFA, MFA) are enjoying
a dickens of a holiday season playing in Guthrie’s A Christmas Carol. The costumes for this holiday favorite were
designed by faculty member and 2015 Ivey Award winner Mathew LeFevbre.
FACULTY
Engaging: from Minneapolis, to Addis
Ababa, to London
See YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qU5weENMupA
(Minneapolis)—After a five
year hiatus, The Holiday Pageant
created by faculty member Michael Sommer
returns December 10, marking 30 years since the first Holiday Pageant was
staged in the living room of Open Eye founders Michael Sommers and Susan Haas.
Growing from that venue and several others (including the Southern Theatre) through
the years, The Holiday Pageant is
ready to conjure its magic one last time in this farewell production on the
Open Eye Figure Theatre stage. This “delightful and original retelling of the
Mystery Plays and the Second Shepherds's Play, the stage fills with angels and
devils, Mary and Joseph, the shepherds, and Fluffsie the lamb.”
Written and directed by
Sommers, who also plays Lucifer, this production reassembles many of its original
cast including faculty member Luverne Seifert and actor/playwright Kevin Kling, plus Sarah Agnew, and Liz Schachterle (B.A.‘06). The Holiday
Pageant is presented plays December 10- 21. More information and tickets
SEPT.
24, 2015. PHOTO BY CROSSING BOUNDARIES ETHIOPIA
(Addis Ababa) -- Dance faculty member Professor Ananya Chatterjea, founder and artistic
director of Ananya Dance Theatre (ADT), enjoyed a very rich harvest of
experiences this autumn. Awarded the Sage Award as the year’s Outstanding Dance
Educator, Dr. Chatterjea also was creating her latest dance work bringing audiences
to their feet in St. Paul and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. On September 18th ADT
presented the world premiere of Roktim:
Nurture Incarnadine in the O’Shaughnessy Auditorium at St. Catherine
University and just a week later was performing it in Africa.
The company of 10 performers and a stage production manager travelled to
East Africa to represent the United States and Minnesota for two unique events in
Ethiopia’s capital of approximately 3.4 million. Sponsored by the U.S. State
Department, Ananya Dance Theatre arrived days before they took center stage at
National Theatre to present the festival’s keynote performance, Roktim: Nurture Incarnadine a transformative, interdisciplinary food story that
honors the work of women in the agricultural sector of global societies
and how it influences the food system. “People
were so surprised to experience an American dance company comprised totally of
women of color,” commented one of the ADT performers.
In addition the U.S. Embassy sponsored a reception for alumni of
educational and cultural exchanges between the United States and Ethiopia, as
part of a month-long series of activities honoring 75 years of the two nations working together through cross-cultural sharing. According to the Asian American Press, “Ambassador
Patricia Haslach, delivered welcoming remarks, and Burnsville native Learned Dees, the embassy’s
Cultural Affairs Officer, introduced Ananya Dance Theatre and its performance which included a sung poem linking the Mississippi and Nile
rivers, and dancers circulating throughout the ballroom.”
U.S.Congressman (Fifth District) Keith Ellison later remarked, “Ananya
Dance Theatre traveled thousands of miles to Addis Ababa to help the U.S.
embassy celebrate 75 years of diplomatic
relations between the US and Ethiopia. I can’t imagine a more fitting
representative of my district than ADT, and I’m so proud that their hard work
has given them the opportunity to share their craft with people all over the
world.”
The Minnesotan visitors also participated in numerous workshops with
Addis Ababa Theatre and Culture Hall, and the Cultural Arts Center of Addis
Ababa University. They also met with14 law students -- all young women who
organized themselves as the Yellow Movement focusing on women’s issues – who accompanied
the dance company members to a shelter for victims of domestic violence. Reaching
out to the local community they participated in a joint workshop with members
of the Destino Dance Company, an Ethiopian ensemble established to help
underprivileged young people develop their potential through dance. At the Goethe Institute of Addis Ababa University, Dr. Chatterjea
participated in a round-table discussion on “Movement, Ideas, and Bodies” with
fellow academic scholars. The ADT company returned to the Twin Cities on
September 29th.
With a focus on women of color, Chatterjea’s choreographic creation not
only sought to educate people on the practices of female agricultural labor,
but more importantly, sought to honor the women who invested their love, labor,
and lives into the cultivation of the land for the utilitarian sake of
sustaining communities of people. “I tell stories through dance and try to
express social issues with audiences through personal stories which are partly
remembered, partly researched, and partly imagined,” Dr. Chatterjea explained.
Ananya Dance Theatre’s global journey demonstrates how the fine arts produce
powerful social messages that know no borders, and create limitless
opportunities.
Tate Modern
(London)
…. Professor Michal Kobialka, was invited to speak at London’s Tate
Modern, home of the distinguished museum’s international modern and
contemporary art collection, on October 30, 2015. This speaking
engagement was part of his lecture tour celebrating Tadeusz Kantor’s
centennial. His other lectures included a talk, “Why Kantor?” at the
Royal Holloway College/University of London, a lecture, “Of Memory and History:
Tadeusz Kantor’s Theatre of Minima Moralia,” the Goldsmiths’ College,
and a presentation on “Late Style” at the University of London’s Senate House.
In each venue, Kobialka explored different topics related to this Polish visual
artist and theatre director’s artistic practice. “The breadth and diversity
of his artistic endeavors align him with such diverse artists as, for example,
Marcel Duchamp, Vsevelod Meyerhold, Oscar Schlemmer, Jackson Pollock, Jerzy
Grotowski, Christo, Allan Kaprow, Robert Wilson, or Pina Bausch,” contends
Kobialka. As a theatre artist, Kantor redefined performance space as he
reflected upon and refracted the concept of memory.
In
September, U of M students had the opportunity to learn about Kantor’s
representational practices during a week-long course Professor Kobialka taught featuring
a special guest actor Ludmila Ryba from Kantor’s Cricot 2 Theatre who provided
rich and insightful commentary.
On
December 7, 2015, Professor Kobialka will present “A Requiem for Tadeusz
Kantor” at the Cricoteka in Kraków, Poland to close the centennial celebrations
and to commemorate the twenty fifth anniversary of Kantor’s death on December
8, 1990.
At
the Tate Modern during the year the BMW TateLive 2015: Staging Situations:
Art and Theatre series selected artists, curators, actors, theatre
directors and writers to create unique situations for the public to engage with
ideas around the museum. Using its collection as a stage for performance,
speech, choreography and dramatization, the museum then offered in response
follow-up forums with artists, theatre-makers, and art historians to frame
further questions and evoke discussions.
In
September, artist Paulina Olowska presented a site-specific theatre performance
within Tate Modern’s collection displays. ‘The Mother An Unsavoury Play in Two
Acts and an Epilogue’ is an adaptation of avant-garde
playwright Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz’s play from 1924. The story takes place
in a bourgeois setting in which hallucinations, schizophrenia, alcoholism,
madness and drug addiction turn into surrealist mayhem. Two professional actors
played the role of the mother and the son, while Olowska’s friends and
collaborators took on characters including the maid, the prostitute, the
aristocratic party boy and the suspicious individual.
Olowska
transformed a room in the Tate’s Poetry and Dream collection display into the
theatre set which was open during the day as an installation. The room
became a domestic interior inhabited by works by artists including Meredith
Frampton, Dora Carrington and Henri Matisse and shows Olowska’s continued
interest in the appropriation of histories and the function of painting as a
fictional space.
To
view an introduction and scenes from the piece click below:
http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/performance-and-music/paulina-olowska-mother-unsavoury-play-two-acts-and
On
October 30, artist Paulina Olowska,
together with Professor Kobialka and Thomas Oberender, Director of Berliner
Festspiel to participate in a program titled “On Stage/Off Stage: Performance
and the Theatrical.” They responded to
this site-specific theatre performance and questions it provoked. The event was
chaired by Professor Rebecca Schneider of Brown University.
The
program explored questions that included:
What is the relationship between art and theatre in relation to liveness, the audience and the site of the theatre/museum ? What role does performance and live art play in increasingly blurring the boundaries between art and theatre? How do discourses coming out of theatre performance studies, art history and related disciplines differently frame and understand these art practices ? To what extent can the artist be considered a dramaturge/actor or director? See the video of the introduction, Professor Kobialka’s presentation and panel discussion at the Tate Modern, click below. |
London's Tate Modern
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