Tag: Theater

REVIEW: BFA Design and Production Portfolios

musicalsoup Leave a comment

The Duderstadt Center presents a gallery showcasing the talent of select BFA Design and Production students. Within this immersive exhibition, visitors encounter an array of displays from students from many disciplines in the D&P major. This multifaceted degree program includes stage management, lighting design, set design, prop masters, and costume design, and while many specialize, some students take on multiple facets of theater production.

There are many essential assets to creating theater beyond actors and directors. The D&P students take on an immeasurable amount of creative liberty and manual labor work for theatrical productions and oftentimes will go unnoticed.

Each student brings their own flare to the gallery, creating individualized and quite elaborate portfolio presentations. They feature work from all sorts of productions around campus, including directing student’s senior thesis, University Productions, and work from student theater organizations. If you tend to frequent SMTD performances much of their work has been featured here in real life.

To the left, we have Esther Hwang‘s meticulously curated stage management portfolio. The collection is complete with binders of her stage management work (schedules, daily calls, cues.. and more!) her resume, business cards, and performance photos, all beautifully organized for your viewing convenience. It is clear Hwang’s attention to detail is extraordinary—the exhibit is brilliantly organized and thoughtful while revealing many aspects of stage management I was unaware of!

 

To the right are Ethan Hoffman’s lighting portfolio and Kayti Sanchez’s costume design and construction portfolios. Hoffman presents a comprehensive variety of the many positions he has held at Michigan. In addition to lighting design, he has experience in associate producing and electrician positions. His portfolio presents a keen eye for captivating lighting schemes. With a blend of precision and creativity, Sanchez shares her costuming work along with set designs and a thematic object presentation. Her portfolio was a testament to her original artistic vision and professionalism.

It was inspiring to see the innovative artistry and dedication of those ‘behind the stage’. Each portfolio is truly unique—you must see them for yourself! The gallery will be available to view until February 10th in the Duderstadt Center. More information here.

 

Image thanks to Univeristy of Michigan SMTD.

REVIEW: Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower

Joann Leave a comment

Concisely told a non-cliche, non-overdramatic tale of the apocalypse with a real and rich cultural background.

Parable of the Sower was a visually and sonically satisfying opera. Based on the Science fiction novel written by Octavia Butler, Toshi Reagon had created an apocalypse opera that tells the story concisely with limitedly-selected stage designs. The story follows a young teenager, Lauren, who questions the belief of her father, who is a professor and a figure in Baptist, while she lives in a protected community in her neighborhood and later set out on an uncertain journey to find a new home after an attack that destroys her community. Even though the story has quite a drama in it, it is not reflected in the stage design. Instead of visualizing the dramatic events in the plot on stage, the stage focused on three designs: a bench and a structure covered in white cloth to symbolize the peaceful, secure, closed area where Lauren and her community are staying, blackout with the spotlight only on Lauren’s face, drawing all attention on her and her tragic expression, when she sings that her father had not returned after going to work, and later on, an empty stage where people wondered all around it to emphasize the people’s wandering after they lost their community with an abstract painting that changed the shades according to the beat of the scene.

My main interest in viewing this production was 1) how the traditional genre of opera had connected with the new modern theme of Apocalypse and 2) how the musical heritage of African-Americans was integrated into the performance. For the first question, the production team has proven that operas do not have to be combined with traditional themes and with dresses with ruffles. Moreover, the emphasis on the songs was made clear with the limited stage designs. If the production team had tried to bring too much of what was going on stage to stage design, that would have diffused the audience’s attention, not to mention that those explosions and violence would have been hard to create satisfactorily. Instead, the production team went beyond by pointing out the resemblance between the Apocalyptic world and the current society – during the part where Toshi broke the fourth wall and invited the audience to sing along, the mention of some real and very familiar companies’ names made the connection clear. For the second part, some music definitely made clear the reference to Gospel and Rap. However, they went beyond to integrate different formats of music – rock, folk, and R&B, making this performance a culturally interesting work.

In all, this performance tosses an interesting food of thoughts and was visually and sonically satisfying in itself. I hope more performances like these will fill our stages.

REVIEW: Choir Boy by the Rude Mechanicals

Himaja Leave a comment

The subtitle “…A moving story of sexuality, race, hope, gospel music, and a young gay man finding his voice” was already enough to get me to the Lydia Mendelssohn Theater on a Saturday night to see this play. Then I found out that Choir Boy was written by Tarell Alvin McCraney, the Academy Award-winning writer of the film Moonlight, and I was doubly sold. Something to know about me: I love any chance to walk in someone else’s shoes for a bit, especially those with vastly different stories than mine.

This production was put on by Rude Mechanicals, a student-run theater group on campus. They produce one play a semester and run everything themselves, from costumes to set design to the actors and crew. This was the first Rude Mechanicals production I’d ever been to and I was impressed. The trailer they made for the play was really cool and just shows how much work they put into it:

I won’t spoil the plot for anyone who has yet to see this gem of a play, but I will say that it is so very RELEVANT. A recurring theme throughout the story is intimacy: who gets deprived of it in society, who you’re allowed to have it with. The actors were so incredibly talented and displayed the intimacy of the play so well. My favorite character was Anthony, the main character’s roommate, for this reason. Whenever the cast sang together it filled the entire theater and gave me chills. They harmonized like they could do it in their sleep. The audience was super into it – cheering and clapping after each musical number, ooh-ing in sympathy when characters got hurt, hmm-ing to the lines of dialogue that struck the deepest.

I will say that I don’t think this was a very accessible production. None of the performers wore microphones which made it hard to hear them at times, especially when they were speaking with their backs to the audience. More than once I would hear the audience burst out into laughter around me and wonder what joke I had just missed on stage. The seating arrangement of the Lydia Mendelssohn theater is also not my favorite and isn’t tiered in a way that allows you to see the stage well from the rows that are not at the front. It’s a historic theater which is something to keep in mind. All in all I think the students did what they could with the space they had.

If you have a chance to go see the Rude Mechanicals’ production of Animal Farm next March, I highly recommend you take it!

REVIEW: Blue moon over Memphis

Abby Z Leave a comment

The Power Center is one of my favorite venues on campus, With the steep incline of it’s auditorium, floor to ceiling windows, and grey concrete staircases lifting off of the lobby floor I always feel like I’m stepping into the Senate Rotunda from Star Wars when attending an event there. The uniquely sci-fi setting proved to be yet another simultaneously clashing and complementary element in the night’s unique performance, a hybrid of American pop culture featuring the myth around “the king” himself, and Japanese traditional Noh theater, the most ancient theater practice in the world that is still being regularly performed today.  

After spotting flyers for the performance scattered across practically every free space on campus, I was curious as to how many people would actually show for the unique event.  When I first arrived a half and hour early I was surprised and slightly disheartened to see only a scattering of people in the section of the audience left open for the show, to say nothing of the empty seats above and to either side. Thankfully, as the show’s start time drew nearer more and more people trickled in until before I knew it, the crowd was sizably filled out.  Before the performance we had several esteemed guests including the head of UM’s Center for Japanese Studies warmly introduce the nights performance as well as acknowledge the Toyota Visiting Professor program that made the entire event possible.

As someone with little-to-no experience in… well… noh, I only had a vague idea of what we were about to witness.  I knew that noh involved slow methodic movement, painstakingly crafted masks, and very little else. Thankfully Theater Ongaku, the troupe that would be treating us to the performance that night first showed off two segments of other performances that they do, to give the audience a sort of “warm up.”  I also found it fascinating when they explained that the troupe had members flying in from quite literally all across the world to be there in person, and had done most of their rehearsing in the last few days leading up to the performance, although their polished performance certainly didn’t give the impression of being rushed.

 

Much to my expectation, the performance was very purposeful and deliberate, which some might also describe as painstakingly slow if they are used to the high energy plays and musicals so popular these days.  Additionally, there is no other way to word it, but several of the moments in the performance seemed to be unintentionally comical, with the dissonance between the subject matter and the art itself feeling slightly awkward and the intense acting on the part of the actors far from what most Americans are used to. I certainly spotted a few other audience members in the crowd trying to stifle their laugher as I was myself out of respect for the performers and the art form itself.  However it wasn’t until near the end of the performance when the groundskeeper character launched into his lengthy monologue that easily made up a quarter of the script that I realized that many of these moments were intentionally meant to be funny, as the groundskeeper himself acted like a jester, dancing around stage whirling about a pair of women’s panties as a prop.

My personal favorite element of the performance was not even the performance itself, but the beautiful and uniquely crafted garments made for it.  The main character of Judy was wearing what appeared to be a traditional Japanese garment sewn out of patched-together denim scraps, combining the American and Japanese elements quite literally.  The costumes worn by Elvis were striking as well, especially the enormous gilded cream outfit that he wore, subtly decorated by an elegant feather motif. The photo below, while not taken at the local performance, shows the interesting design of these two garments, especially in contrast with the plain black clothes most of the other performers were wearing.

While I can’t exactly ascertain how faithful the play was to traditional noh theater, it was evident that the troupe had a deep love and appreciation of noh theater, as well as extensive knowledge and training in the subject, so I can only assume that they did it justice.  

PREVIEW: Let The Right One In

Emma Pinchak Leave a comment

I don’t know about you, but I refuse to let go of Halloween right after October 31st. The people who start maniacally Christmas shopping and decorating with Rudolph and snowmen are psychopaths. Give the rest of us Halloween purists some time to grieve, ok?

It seems there is a fellow Halloween lover planning events on campus, because student-run theater group the Rude Mechanicals is performing Let The Right One In this weekend!

The play is adapted from a Swedish film of the same name, telling the story of a shy boy who makes friends with the strange new neighbor girl, who just might be connected to a series of brutal homicides in the town.

Let The Right One In is presented at the Lydia Mendelssohn theater at the following times:

Friday, November 2 at 8:00 pm

Saturday, November 3 at 8:00 pm

Sunday, November 4 at 2:00 pm

Tickets are $10 for adults, $7 for seniors, and FREE with your Passport to the Arts.

Come on out to support Halloween’s immortal soul.

PREVIEW: Blue Moon over Memphis

Abby Z Leave a comment

Friday the 12th of October, the Univeristy of Michigan will be treated to to a unique take on Japanese Noh Theater, with a performance of Blue Moon over Memphis by the English speaking noh-drama troupe THEATER NOHGAKU.  It will be at the Power Center located right off central campus and completely free to the public. This unique east-meets-west theater experience explores one of the most revered and influential figures in American pop-culture history, through the unexpected lens of a several century-old form of Japanese theater.

This event is a part of the Toyota Visiting Professor 30th Anniversary Special Lecture Series and made possible by the Japanese Studies Department. The play itself  will explore one woman’s haunting loneliness as she makes a pilgrimage to Graceland on the anniversary of Elvis’s death, where she has an otherworldly encounter with the spirit world .

If you plan on attending, please head over to Eventbrite and RSVP for Blue Moon Over Memphis here.   The event is entirely free, but space is limited so don’t forget to RSVP and check for an email confirmation.

Additionally, if your interest has been thoroughly piqued as mine has, definitely check out the play’s brief promotional video bellow to get an idea what’s in store!