Theatre Arts Program2011 - 2012 Season
spring 2012
Group Project: Zombie Apocalypse
Theatre Arts Suite
Group Project: Zombie Apocalypse, a devised theatre piece by students of THAR250
directed by David O’Connor
A sextet of graduating Penn students think they are competing for an internship by participating in a Reality TV Gameshow, but find themselves competing to determine who is best prepared to survive the upcoming Zombie Apocalypse. You play the studio audience, and participate in determining who wins, and who is left behind.
Performances at:
Kings Court English College House
Game Room
Saturday, April 21 at 7:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m.
Sunday, April 22 at 12:00 noon
A Year of Games Project
Co- sponsored by:
Kings Court English College House
Theatre Arts Program
On the Town
Bruce Montgomery Theatre
Music by Leonard Bernstein
Book and Lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green
March 14 – 17, 2012
HAROLD PRINCE THEATRE
ANNENBERG CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS
Directed by David A. Fox and Dr. Rosemary Malague
Musical Direction by Zachary Wiseley
Lighting Design by Peter Whinnery
Costume Design by Millie Hiibel
Scenic Design by Eric Baratta
On the Town is a classic American musical, composed by Leonard Bernstein, with libretto and lyrics by the famous writing team Betty Comden and Adolph Green. The setting is New York in World War II, when three young sailors hit the town for a day’s leave in the big city (the show’s most famous song is “New York, New York”). Over the course of the day, they encounter three young women, an anthropologist, a taxi driver, and an aspiring performer—and adventures ensue.
The musical is both exuberant and poignant, featuring six vibrant young people, eager to embrace life; their exciting day in New York is set against the backdrop of war—and their own uncertain futures.
Penn’s Theatre Arts Program is very pleased to produce this musical, which has not had a revival in Philadelphia for a great many years. The production was directed by faculty members David Fox and Rose Malague.
Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992
Bruce Montgomery Theatre
A Workshop Production
February 16 and 17, 2012 at 7:30pm
Bruce Montgomery Theatre, Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts
Directed by Danielle Bainbridge
Faculty project advisor: Cary M. Mazer
Featuring a company of senior Theatre Arts majors.
A documentary theatre piece that critically evaluates American racial politics in the wake of the 1992 Los Angeles riots, Anna Deveare Smith’s Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992 presents as many problems as it refuses to offer solutions. Originally researched, written and performed by Deveare Smith as a one woman show, Twilight is a series of candid interviews with LA residents in the aftermath of the events that shook this nation. The trial of the police officers responsible for beating Rodney King, a young African American man, was widely televised. The events surrounding King’s arrest and the subsequent trial sparked national debate about the nature of race, privilege and police brutality in America. Here Deveare Smith seamlessly represents the full spectrum of experiences, interviewing such diverse candidates as famed opera singer Jessye Norman, former Black Panther Party member and activist Elaine Brown, philosopher and critic Cornel West alongside a juror from the court case, the aunt of Rodney King and one of the police officers responsible for the attack on King. This piece is equal parts gripping, horrifying and empathetic as it grapples with an American landscape, irreparably changed by the controversial trial and the reverberations of the aftermath.
fall 2011
The Rover
Directed By: James Schlatter
Bruce Montgomery Theatre
Bruce Montgomery Theatre
November 16-19, 2011 at 7pm
In her brilliant, witty, and provocative play, Behn, England’s first professional female playwright, sets her young characters free--or rather turns them loose--at Carnivale to seek libertine pleasures, fantastic new identities, and, just possibly, true love. Capturing her own time, Restoration London, Behn speaks very much to ours, when the boundaries between the faces of reality and the masks of reality TV, between love and the games of seduction, and between who we are and who we pretend we are become dangerously blurred.
Cast List for THE ROVER
FLORINDA…………………………………ELYSSA EDELMAN
HELENA……………………………………MARISA BRAU
ANGELLICA……………………………….DEANNA SUPPLEE
BELVILLE………………………………….BEN LERNER
FREDERICK……………………………….JAY RODRIGUES
BLUNT………………………………………ADAM HAMILTON
WILLMORE………………………………..PETER MILLER
PEDRO……………………………………..JEFFREY JOHNSON
ANTONIO…………………………………..RAWSON FAUX
SPIRITS OF THE MASQUERADE:
RACHEL CATTO
ANNA PAN
ARIEL KOREN
DIRECTOR…………………………………DR. JAMES F. SCHLATTER
STAGE MANAGER……………………….NICOLE MCGARRY
LOOK/ALIVE
Directed By: Cary M. Mazer
Bruce Montgomery Theatre
A Penn Humanties Forum Co-Sponsored Event, presented as part of the Philadelphia Fringe Festival, 2011
September 15-17 7:30pm
Devised collaboratively by the company of six actors, director Cary Mazer, and their theatrical colleagues in Philadelphia, Look/Alive uses narration and movement to retell myths, fairy tales and folktales from Ovid, Grimm, Anderson and others, about avatars, statues, echoes, mirrors, reflections, and demonic possession, all of which depict the seductive danger of images. Wii players fall in love with their avatars; a puppeteer wishes his marionettes could come to life; a sculptor falls in love with his statue; a nymph fails to capture the attention of her beloved when she can only verbally mirror his words; a young man falls in love with his own reflection; a witch sucks her victims into a mirror; and an over-protective mother, succumbing to a voice echoing inside of her, kills her step-son, only to discover that his essence, protected by the spirit of his late mother, has returned to take his revenge.