Life > September 8, 2005

By Lauren Brown

Old Gold & Black Reporter

The first installment of the Studio Series, featuring three one-act plays chosen and directed by university seniors, will open at 7:30 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. Sept. 12 and 13 in the Ring Theatre.  The plays in this set are entitled “The American Century,” by Murphy Guyer, “Virtual Reality,” by Alan Arkin and “Hello Out There,” by William Saroyan.

The Studio Series is an annual event featuring the directing efforts of theatre majors in various plays of their choice.  The plays are a culmination of months of work by the students, who decided which plays to direct at the beginning of last spring and since then have been planning set design, props and costumes. 

The three plays that will premiere Sept. 12 will be the first in the series to be put on by the Nine Ball Players, the name of the production company, which includes the nine theatre majors directing plays this fall.

“Often the Studio Series provides an opportunity for underclassmen, especially freshmen, to have an experience on stage because the more experienced actors choose to audition for MainStage roles,” said director and senior Mike Kelly.  Despite a strong freshman turnout, you can still expect to find upperclassmen in the one-acts. 

Before choosing their individual plays, the Nine Ball Players met as a production team to discuss the appeal and relevance of the plays to students of the university and college students in general.  All of the plays are quite different in plot, subject matter and style, but the “atmosphere that will be created will flow very well,” said senior director Lindsey Hardegree.

Hardegree is directing “The American Century,” an absurd comedy that follows a son who travels back in time, from 1984 to 1945, to speak with his parents who have not yet conceived him.  He informs them about the bleak future that lies ahead of them, a future that will correspond to the experiences of the entire nation during the sixties and seventies. The chronicling of American history “gives the sense that this could happen to any family,” Hardegree said.

The difficulties that the son has with choosing a career and integrating into adult life, as told to his parents, are particularly relevant to students today.  “We are going through lots of decisions that will affect the course of our lives … The play addresses these in a way that emphasizes that we be mindful of our choices and once you make those choices, stick with them,” Hardegree said.

The second play of this set, “Virtual Reality,” takes a unique approach to theatre and presents itself in a way “very different from anything anyone has ever done in a Studio Series,” said senior director Alyssa Biber. 

The play involves the interactions of two characters, Lefty and DeRecha, and the imaginary, inane tasks that Lefty must perform on his first day of work for DeRecha.  No props are used and no set is present, so all of the actors’ interactions are pantomime.  The lack of tangible elements emphasizes the theme of the “power of imagination and what imagination can do to you,” Biber said.

Alan Arkin, a founding member of the Chicago-based comedy troupe Second City, originally wrote this one-act as an off-Broadway comedy sketch.  In fact, the play itself is “similar to Saturday Night Life comedy style … but not bawdy like that,” Biber said.  Another intriguing aspect of the play is the “element of being put to a test, almost like hazing,” without knowing the purpose of the task, a feeling that may resonate with many university students. 

Saroyan’s play, “Hello Out There,” tells the story of an unlikely romance that develops in a prison.  An inmate convicted of rape and a young woman who works at the prison fall in love.  Their relationship is circumstantial and develops out of mutual desperation.  The girl fears that she will never amount to anything if she does not leave her town of Matador, Texas, while the young man realizes that he must enlist her help to escape the mob gathering to lynch him. 

The play is fast-moving and director Mike Kelly chose it because he was “intrigued by his (Saroyan’s) use of ideas about mobs and group thought,” which are explored in the idea of the threatening mob as a single character, rather than independent personalities.  Kelly also sees the play as an interesting diversion from the prevalence of realism or avant-garde forms in contemporary theatre.  He hopes to emphasize that students “can be in a fraternity or sorority and have their own individuality,” Kelly said.

A preview of the action preceding “Hello Out There” will be presented between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Sept. 8 on the Mag Quad.

All three plays in this installment of the Studio Series promise to be intriguing, fresh, entertaining and impressively relevant to the lives of students at the university. Don’t pass up the opportunity to see great theatre and meet the faces that might soon grace the stages of Broadway or the silver screens of Hollywood. 

Tickets are available at the door for $2.  For more information call the Theatre Box Office at 336-358-5295.