Polarity Ensemble Theatre Blog

Fourth in a series of four profiles of the playwrights of the 2013 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays.

He might call himself “Just a kid from Detroit,” however he’s anything but that. If there was one word to describe Steven Simoncic, we would describe him as cool. In speaking with other artists about Simoncic, they’ve described him as a renaissance man, and as an artist’s artist. He’s a musician, a film-maker, and a playwright, but there is far more to him than that.  We’ve come to view him as a man with an amazing giving  soul and it’s our belief that he is on his way to bringing cool back to the American Theatre. You get the chance to experience just a taste of that coolness with his newest play, Once Upon A Time in Detroit, directed by Jen Poulin at the Polarity Ensemble Theatre’s  Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays.

How long have you been writing plays? / What brought you into the world of playwriting?

My path to playwriting, like many paths in life, has been circuitous and a bit dubious. Growing up in Detroit, I was surrounded by characters and storytellers, the kind of folks that held court on front porches and card tables after the streetlights went off.  The brutal honestly and almost pathological lack of pretension of my home town informed, at an early age, the kind of stories I hoped to tell, and the lens through which I wanted tell them. The themes that consistently rise to the forefront of my obsessions have to do with race, class, culture, socio-economics and survival in the modern American urban village, and my work tends to focus on places where the collars are blue, the houses are brick, and the people don’t get a lot of stage time in the American theatre.

In terms of the craft, I began as a fiction writer — writing short stories — and ultimately received an MFA fiction. Living in Chicago, an amazing theatre town, I found myself getting more and more interested in writing for the stage. Like a lot of writers in this town, my first “ah ha” moment was when my very first 10 minute piece was accepted into the Saturday Series at Chicago Dramatists Theatre. I will never forget sitting in a water-stained rehearsal room at Dramatists and hearing, for the first time in my life, a trained, dedicated actor and a talented director bringing my words to life.  I was anxious and nauseous and excited and humbled – it was your first kiss, your first beer, your first pack of firecrackers and your first ride on the Tilt-a-Whirl all rolled into one.

Who are some of your artistic influences?

This is the kind of question one would like to answer with some obscure Eastern European playwright from the 15^th century whose tragically beautiful work is as brilliant as it is unbeknownst to the unwashed, uninformed masses.  But instead, I’m just going to be honest. Even though I love Miller, Beckett, O’Neill, Lonergan, Shanley, Norris and Letts… the writer who has had the most profound and enduring influence on me and my work is Richard Pryor. Yup. That Richard Pryor. As a kid in Detroit, I remember listening to his Live on the Sunset Strip cassette on a Sanyo Walkman tucked under the covers of my bed. While not technically a playwright, he is the greatest playwright I have even experienced.  In his work, everything is there — race, culture, honesty, integrity, love and lust, absurdity and intelligence, survival and pathos, the dignity and humiliation of the human experience skewered and revered, examined and challenged. His long form narratives always had an arc – a true beginning, middle and end – and he was able to seamlessly hop in and out of fully developed, fully rendered, fully realized characters creating car crash moments of conflict followed by moments of repose, relief and resolution. And the whole time he did this – by himself mind you without a single light cue, actor, director or set piece – he also took the piss out of the power structure, shining a light on the hypocrisy and hegemony of the king and his castle. This was purposeful art… powerful art…  honest and in-the-moment art… wrestling with demons art.  This was high art.  At least to me it was. And I’m not sure I’ve seen anyone do it better since.

What drew you to the Dionysos Cup Play Festival?

I have a ton of respect for Polarity Ensemble — so a big part of my desire to be a part of Dionysos was to have a meaningful experience with the artists in and around PET.  I also really like the structure of the Festival. The fact that you have time to work the script with a director and a dramaturg over the course of weeks and months is critical and incredibly helpful in the development process. Then to have it go up in a staged reading with some staging and blocking is a really valuable experience. The other huge appeal is getting to know the other playwrights — Chuck, Reggie and Darren are supremely talented writers and just good guys. I think it can be hard for a playwright to find, foster and develop community since it is such a singular pursuit — a festival like Dionysos builds community, and that is not only lovely — it’s necessary.

What inspired you to write this play?

Growing up in a lower middle class neighborhood in Detroit, I got the sense very early on that neighborhoods that had the capital (political or otherwise) to fight, could keep unpleasant things out of their community. The poorer neighborhoods with less clout and less representation ended up with the power lines, factories, land fills, incinerators, and retention ponds. That is — they literally got dumped on. The result was that people started to get sicker younger and die sooner.

I saw the same thing here in Chicago at Volo Bog in Altgeld Gardens. My wife is a former science teacher who started a charter school to serve the kids of West Garfield Park. As part of the amazing work she did in that community, she took her kids to Volo Bog to do water and air quality tests. The water and air quality was not only alarmingly bad — it was dangerous. It still is dangerous. The cancer rates, asthma incidence, and pulmonary disease run rampant in that area, and it is three zip codes away from the Gold Coast.

But my play isn’t an Erin Brockavich storm-the-castle-and-close-the-plant kind of story. It is about the people in these kinds of communities trying to survive — not just physically — but spiritually and emotionally as well. When I was writing this piece, I was far more interested in the tiny human victories of dignity and resilience than I was in taking on city hall.

What some of the challenges you faced in terms of this script?

There are several characters with several story lines — it was/is challenging to find the right balance of developing each story line while still maintaining the integrity of the protagonist’s journey — navigating that tension between the tangential threads and the core of the story was a challenge. In general, plot is where I tend to struggle, so I guess this piece was not unlike the others in terms of the challenges it presented.

Redemption and second chances seems to be a strong theme within this play, can you talk about that? 

I think the theme of redemption runs deep in the veins of everything I write. In some ways, I think it is perhaps the ultimate dramatic theme. If you believe that the human condition is that of being flawed (and I do), then it follows that at some point there will be mistakes, transgressions and betrayals. But it also follows that there will be a chance for redemption — a glimmer of hope that we can somehow undo, amend, or at least explain and come to terms with the things we have or haven’t done. In some ways I think that is the story of our lives — so it has become the story of my plays.

What are you working on next?

My play Broken Fences debuts in NY in May and here in Chicago at 16th Street Theatre with the fabulous Ann Filmer in September so I am working on getting that script landed and tight for those productions. I also have a commission for a short piece from Step Up Theatre that I am working on. Other than that, I am excited to hop into a new play that may or may not have something to do with bingo and gun ownership.

Read more about the Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays. Buy tickets.

Richard Engling

This is the third in a series of four profiles of the playwrights of the 2013 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays. 2013 will be the sixth Dionysos Cup in our nine year history. We are particularly proud right now because in the past twelve months, three Dionysos Cup plays have gone on to their world premieres in Chicago–and the most recent of these, Bill Jepsen’s Never the Bridesmaid, is nominated for Best New Play in the Jeff Awards. (Cast member Lindsey Pearlman is also nominated for Best Actress). We believe the success of the Festival as a launchpad for new work is due to its intense Chicago roots. We bring local playwrights together with local directors, dramaturgs and actors to provide a full six month development process with talented collaborators. We place no restrictions on what the playwrights write–only that their work excites us and that they are locally based to work in the room with us.
–Richard Engling, Artistic Director

“I love to stir the pot. I want to get the audience to ask themselves questions they might not otherwise.” And with that Reginald Edmund (Reggie to his friends) explains his writing’s raison d’être. He is a writer who leans towards questions of social justice and in so doing seeks to “put America on trial.” But his passion is not that of the hell-fire preacher, wielding righteous indignation, but rather is the compassionate voice of Holy Scripture’s wisdom literature, seeking understanding through insight, without excusing or ignoring the problem of evil.

One hears humanists of earlier eras like Walt Whitman or Dudley Randall when listening to Reggie. Like Whitman he contains multitudes, drawing upon a variety of eclectic theater artists. He cites as inspiration August Wilson, Charles Smith, Lydia Diamond, Jose Rivera, Thomas Meloncon, Gregg Henry, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King, Jeremy Cohen, Russ Tutterow, and Gary Garrison. He calls them “brilliant minds with giving and open hearts towards the craft and towards the world around them.” And his commentary on America echoes that of Randall, who in serio-comic form, explicated the political tensions of his day, with the thesis that a writer must write “what agitates his heart and sets his pen in motion.”

“Reggie’s plays are personal and spiritual, and also fearless statements about society,” says Russ Tutterow, Artistic Director of Chicago Dramatists Theater, where Reggie is Resident Playwright and where his play Southbridge recently enjoyed its world premiere. He is also a noted teacher at Dramatists where he guides young playwrights through the possibilities of the form.

“I feel I have a duty as an African-American writer to speak on things that aren’t often said, or that people are scared to say. But even more, I see myself as an American artist where I get to wrestle with the ugliness and beauty that is America.”

His latest work, White America, on display in the Polarity Ensemble Theatre 2013 Dionysos Cup is a continuance of his search for the American aesthetic. In White America, it’s Thanksgiving dinner for the illustrious Whites, a political powerhouse family within the Republican Party that proudly traces its roots to the founding of the United States. Dinner turns to a debacle when the son, Justin, brings home his new wife and a secret that could shake the family tree to its core.

“One of the things that drew me to Reggie’s work is how he combines the political with the intensely personal,” says Polarity’s Artistic Director, Richard Engling. “In White America, the political situation is played out in the struggle between a father and a son. Racial strife is played out in the relationship between a husband and a wife and winds out into the relationships with the in-laws. He brings the large questions home into a familiar, intimate setting.”

The motivation for the play was the current state of our country where Reggie “noticed that upon the rise of the supposed Post-Racial America that emerged when President Obama came to office, a strange boil of bitter racism seemed to fester upon the flesh of America. I wanted to explore that. Try to at least get a glimpse of who we are as a country.” Reggie’s goal with this piece is to “show that in some way we are all guilty in some way shape or another of this nation. This house we live in has a weak foundation.”

Reggie’s choice to engage this theme is indication of his courage. His use of a comic form to tell this story is indication of his craftsmanship. “You do three things for the audience and one thing for you. You start with something easy, that’s where the comedy comes in, and then look to challenge yourself, which ultimately will challenge the audience.”

He sought out Polarity Ensemble Theatre and the Dionysos Cupas a way to continue his craftsmanship because he felt, “that the opportunity to work with an exciting company like Polarity was a chance that I couldn’t pass up. Polarity is a great company dedicated to new works, and I want very much to be part of this artistic family.”

Reggie brings a unique voice to the ensemble and one that should raise questions many might not have pondered but will be worth asking, and answering.

Information and tickets for the 2013 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays.

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Reginald Edmund, is a resident playwright of Chicago Dramatists. He was previously a 2009-2010, 2010-2011 Many Voices Fellow playwright. Originally from Houston, Texas, he served Artistic Director for the Silver House Theatre, as well as the founder and producer for the Silver House Playwrights Festival and the Houston Urban Theatre Series. His play Southbridge was the 2009 National Runner-up for the Lorraine Hansberry and Rosa Parks Playwriting Award, Winner of the 2011 Southern Playwrights’ Competition, and a 2012 Finalist for the Edgerton Foundation New Play Award.

He received his BFA in Theatre-Performance from Texas Southern University, and his MFA in Playwriting at Ohio University under the guidance of Charles Smith.

In 2009 he founded the Unit Collective and in 2010 he was named Winner of The Southern Writers Competition and recognized by TCG as a 2011 Young Leader of Color. His plays, The Ordained Smile of Sadie May Jenkins, Southbridge, Juneteenth Street, and The Redemption of Allah Black, all part of his nine-play series The City of the Bayou Collection, were developed at esteemed theaters including Ensemble Theatre of Houston, Silver House Theatre, Penumbra Theatre, the Playwrights’ Center, Boston Playwrights’ Theatre, Moving Arts, Karamu House, Pangea World Theater, the MacDowell Colony, Yaddo, Texas State University Black and Latino Theatre Conference, the Last Frontier Theater Conference, and the Kennedy Center. Most recently he traveled to Colombia to serve as the guest speaker at the Intercolegiado de Teatro de Buenaventura. He is currently Founder and Artistic Director of New Voices/ Barebones Theatre, a company dedicated to playwrights and their works as well as emphasizing the development of an ethnically and culturally diverse community of artists for the Minneapolis/St. Paul and Chicago area and an associate artist for Chicago’s Pegasus Players Theatre.

Information and tickets for the 2013 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays.

Second in a series of four profiles of the playwrights of the 2013 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays.

Hey kid! How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice, says the old jokester. It may sound like vaudeville, but it stings like truth.

A musician practices and practices and then plays for the public. Writing is the same – only instead of musical scales, the writer practices on story, dialog, character, and plot. The piece changes over time: characters appear, characters vanish, conversations start long and then become short, plot points are reordered, the story is moved from New York to New Prussia – like a doing complex puzzle until the picture is clear.

Is it every really done, though? Ray Bradbury once famously said he can’t read any of his classic books because he wants to start changing things. It’s part of any writer’s process.

In many forms, the process is kept within the writer – held privately over varying amounts of time. Occasionally, a novelist or poet will emerge early and share the work with a few confidants. Playwriting, however, takes iteration to a high extreme.

Actors, directors, dramaturges, and the playwright’s natural instincts shape a work, sometimes over years or decades until the locked production script is on stage. There are examples of plays premiering, having a successful run, then being rewritten before a remount. (Big Fish, for example, having its own dry run in Chicago in spring 2013, will, hopefully, be nothing like the show Broadway audiences will endure… I mean enjoy.)

So when playwright Chuck O’Connor is asked what draft his new play Miracles in the Fall is numbered, he answers, “Somewhere in the hundreds.”

Take note! Anyone who thinks they can just have an idea for a play, knock it out, stick it in an envelope, send it off to a theatre, have it produced, and have it be a hit will either be considered a genius savant or incredibly naïve.

“I started the play in February 2009 and began to share scenes in my writer’s group right away,” tells O’Connor. “I wrote it when I was a member of Will Dunne’s scene-shop class at Chicago Dramatists, so the first version of the play was developed one scene at a time over the course of six months.” The first feedback O’Connor received on a completed draft was in the autumn of 2009, when Dunne gave O’Connor page-by-page feedback. Simultaneously, Margaret Lewis, another playwright in residence at Chicago Dramatists, gave a thorough critique of the play. “I then did rewrites, making changes through my next scene-shop class and another analysis by Margaret Lewis. That took another eighteen months.” After a table reading in May 2012, yet another round of revisions commenced until, at last, O’Connor had the confidence to submit to the Dionysos Cup.

Miracles in the Fall was selected as one of four finalists from a bevy of Chicago plays submitted to Polarity Ensemble Theatre’s annual festival of new works, The Dionysos Cup. This respected fest, now in its seventh year, is a unique opportunity for playwrights to develop their scripts to the highest potential, working alongside directors and casts specifically chosen to represent their world. The fest culminates in two exclusive performances of each of the four plays, where the playwright gets an audience reaction without the pressures of opening night.

“When I was part of another festival last summer that was similar to Polarity’s, I met a great set of writers and actors who recommended the Dionysos Cup. I started following Polarity on Facebook and, when they announced they were accepting scripts, I felt Miracles in the Fall was ready to send.”

Ready was an understatement; the play zoomed through the rounds of judging to earn a well-deserved place as one of four plays to be featured in the event.

The story in Miracles in the Fall concerns Clare Connelly, a Dominican Sister in 1968 Detroit. As the caretaker of her alcoholic father and the keeper of her dead mother’s virtue, she is challenged by the indignity of her infirmed father, the confidence of a maverick priest’s intimacy, and the self-crippling family secret revealed upon the return of her prodigal brother. It’s not an easy story and not a typical one, either.

“I’m very surprised I am in the final four,” O’Connor admits. “The writing talent in Chicago is strong. There are a lot of smart people here and the Dionysos Cup is a respected institution. Richard Engling, Polarity’s Artistic Director, has done a great job of making Polarity an attractive place for writers to develop meaningful work. The other writers in the finals have a dedication to their writing that goes back a lot longer than me. I feel honored to be in their company.”

The peer networking is a part of the festival and is invaluable for playwrights. Bringing four directors, four dramaturges, four playwrights, and approximately 40 actors into each other’s world, even for a short time, makes for a creative and social stew that can be very satisfying. The chance of industry people seeing and responding to new work has risk, but also offers a great opportunity to be seen and to learn.

O’Connor enters this fray with some well-deserved confidence in his play. “Miracles in the Fall has had a lot of support from a variety of talented people. It received a staged reading with The Williamston Theater in Michigan this past October and was selected as part of The Performance Network’s Fireside Festival in Ann Arbor, where it received another reading. I worked with a talented director, John Manfreddi of Etico Productions, in polishing the script further before and after those readings. People I admire for their sensitivity and intelligence have been complimentary of the script. That continues with my partners for the Polarity event: director Josh Sobel and dramaturg Michael Manocchio.”

Working and re-working Miracles in the Fall for nearly three years and facing the potential for more rewrites after the festival, one might suspect that O’Connor is weary of his story. “I didn’t intend for it to be all this work,” he laughs, “but I’ve learned I like rewriting.”

After making Miracles in the Fall all it can be, O’Connor does have plans for other works and fully expects this same cycle to continue. “I’ve been writing another full-length play following the same process. The working title is Madness in a Fine-Tuned Universe. It investigates mental illness as a way of questioning how purpose is created out of incomplete or untrustworthy information. The script has been accepted as a participant in The Fine Print Theater’s 2013 Citizen’s Playwright’s Festival and will get development with selected scenes getting workshop readings in June here in Chicago.”

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Chuck O’Connor is a Network Playwright with Chicago Dramatists Theater. Recent credits include: High Hard Ones (Playwright) – Official Selection Festival of One-Act Plays – Chicago Dramatists, Route 66, 2012 Heideman Award Finalist – National Ten-Minute Play Festival – Actor’s Theater of Louisville; Date of Admission (Playwright) Official Selection Fireside Festival of New Plays – Performance Network Theater, Ann Arbor, Michigan; Miracles in the Fall (Playwright) Official Selection Sceneshop Showcase – Chicago Dramatists Theater; Miscarriage is Murder (Playwright) Official Selection The Fine Print Theater 2012 Citizen’s Playwright’s Festival; The Vanishing Point (Screenwriter) – Official Festival Selection “Dances with Films” Mann’s Chinese Theatre Hollywood, California; HowlRound Theater Commons at Emerson College/Arena Stage (Essayist). He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Liberal Arts from Michigan State University and a Master’s Degree from Loyola University-Chicago.

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The Dionysos Cup performances are at 1500 N. Bell Street in Wicker Park. Full festival passes are $10. Individual performance tickets are $5. Showtimes are Thursday, Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30pm, and Sundays at 2pm. Seating is general admission. Click here to purchase tickets online or call the box office at 800-838-3006.

The Schedule:
Thursday, May 16th @ 7:30pm: Once Upon a Time in Detroit
Friday, May 17th @ 7:30pm: Miracles in the Fall
Saturday, May 18th @ 7:30pm: Witness to an Accident
Sunday, May 19th @ 2:00pm: White America

Thursday, May 23rd @ 7:30pm: Witness to an Accident
Friday, May 24th @ 7:30pm: White America
Saturday, May 25th @ 7:30pm: Once Upon a Time in Detroit
Sunday, May 26th @ 2:00pm: Miracles in the Fall

First in a series of four profiles of the playwrights of the 2013 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays.

The Hotel – a Hollywood insane asylum for fallen starlets: all young, all beautiful, all damaged. In walks Agatha Moll. She seems perfectly normal. She’s a rising actress with a hit beach movie. Agatha has her whole career in front of her. Yet instead of lining up her next big paycheck, she finds herself at the Hotel. She’s more than willing to square things. She’s got a plan. But then the wall moves. By itself. Behind that wall is her dead sister. What is this place?

Witness to an Accident, a new play by Darren Callahan, puts the spotlight on Hollywood of the 1950s. Not on debonair musical numbers or red carpet premiers, but on tragic disappointments and illicit affairs, on powerful executives brought down by poverty wage thugs, on electrocution and subterfuge, on failed ingénues and, yes, dead sisters. In May 2013, the play, directed by Wm. Bullion, will be featured in the Polarity Ensemble Theatre’s Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays, an annual event garnering stacks of submissions from local contenders, whittled down to only four selections by a committee of the best and brightest theatre artists that Polarity can find.

Known for bringing something different to the stage, Callahan’s plots are often full of contradictions or misinformation, featuring beautiful women and handsome men wading through sex, violence, and labyrinthine plots with sharp dialog that, at times, is tough for actors to get their tongues around. Rooted in the genre thrillers of the past, his work is mostly known as horror, sometimes as mystery, rarely as romantic, and his plays successfully stand out from the crowd.

“Some consider my work experimental,” he explains in an interview from his Chicago home, “but I’m really trying to be commercial! I guess my idea of commercial is a little bent. My plays are exploitation cinema for the stage, injected a bit with high art. I just want the stretch the form. There are enough plays that are realistic; they seem like TV shows. Probably the only two plays in the last five years that rocked me were Daniel Caffrey’s Ozma and Harriet and Bob Fisher’s The Meatlocker.”

With a sustained cult following, Callahan’s work has been produced and published since the middle 1990s. He hasn’t had a mainstream hit, but that may come in time. “I’ve been the next big thing for a few years,” he says. “I stay focused on what I like. If I like it, a few other people might like it, too. But I’m not kidding anyone – what I’m doing isn’t fast food, it’s a big meal – bigger than it looks – and it can be frustrating for a first-time audience not used to my sensibilities and influences. I don’t mind if something is confusing, either. A lot of writers explain too much. Not just plot exposition, but by making everything neat. Confusion is an honest state and should be dramatized without critics thinking you’re lazy. People enjoy my work with one viewing, but it is absolutely better the second time.”

This is the third play of Callahan’s to be featured since the festival’s inception. His first, The White Airplane, was in 2006 and received a 2009 production. His second, The Double Negative, was featured in 2008. “I get no special favors having been in the fest before. I’m there to work – as are the other talented playwrights. We’re notified months in advance so there is time for multiple drafts, readings, and other collaborations.”

“The committee unanimously felt the play was strong,” says director Bullion. “During the selection process, the play jumped right out at me as a very dynamic, theatrical piece, full of suspense and high energy. I’m still getting chills during my fifth reading of the script imagining how we’re going to play it out in the festival.”

Adds dramaturg and committee juror Sarah Grant: “I was drawn to Witness to an Accident for its playful style and homage to those 1950s noir films, so full of psychological horror. The play is about Hollywood, which makes it intriguingly self-reflexive. It’s a play about movies. There is a dark and, I think, fairly serious subtext: try as they may, these women cannot help but get lost in Hollywood. We can only hope none of this is real.”

Callahan’s work has always had visceral response. The first Dionysos Cup reader for The White Airplane threw the script in the trash in disgust, where it was rescued by another committee member who nominated the play as a semi-finalist (thus leading to the rule that all scripts must be read by multiple people).

Even with detractors, Callahan has remained a presence on the national scene for some time. Diversification is his secret weapon. As the author of several novels, screenplays, and stage plays, Callahan’s work is becoming more and more known. This summer, cameras roll on a new feature-length horror movie entitled Desperate Dolls. Like Witness to an Accident, that script features more Hollywood doom, leading one to wonder if Callahan despises L.A. and all its trappings. “On the contrary, I love that town! I have lots of friends and opportunities on the West Coast. But!” he reminds, “A happy Hollywood story is not nearly as cool as a messed-up one.”

Read more about the Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays.

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Darren Callahan has written drama for the BBC, SyFy Channel, National Public Radio, and Radio Pacifica New York. As the author of several successful stage plays, including The White Airplane and Horror Academy, both published by Polarity Ensemble Theatre Books, he is highly involved in Chicago theatre as a writer and a director. His novels include The Audrey Green Chronicles and City of Human Remains. Screenplays include Documentia, Nerves, and Summer of Ghosts.

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http://darrencallahan.com (WEBSITE)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2122517/ (IMDB)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darren_Callahan (WIKIPEDIA)
http://desperatedollsmovie.com (LATEST FLICK)

by Richard Engling

It’s two weeks before we open Bill Jepsen’s Never the Bridesmaid and we’ve already sold more tickets than many of our other shows sold during their entire run. You can never be sure before it happens, but this gives every indication of turning into a hit.

I’d seen what a crowd-pleaser the script was when we presented it in the 2011 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays. Bill has a rare gift for writing characters that audiences love. Credit also goes to Dionysos director Mary Ellen O’Hara and her wonderful cast. They brought out the rich, warm flavors of the play–but they could not have done that if Bill hadn’t embued the script with that richness in the first place.

Development Heaven

The greatest pleasure for me is seeing the play grow and improve throughout the development process into production. Never the Bridesmaid first had some development work with our friends at Chicago Dramatists, then it went through the six-month process in our Dionysos Cup, and then back into development again once we had selected it for this season. I invited Richard Shavzin to direct, which has proved to be one of my better moves as the producer of the show. Richard is an artistic associate at Chicago Dramatists and had worked with Bill on the first round of development. When I saw first hand their working relationship and the resulting improvements in the script as Bill worked with Richard and with the cast, making final rewrites to his script, I was really delighted.

Richard and Bill Draw Them In

Having a director of Richard’s stature has other benefits, as well. Richard Shavzin is a Jeff award-winning director, and his reputation draws a high calibre of actor to auditions. Given the multiple attractions of script, company and director, we’ve been able to assemble a truly awesome cast. It’s a pleasure to watch them work.

However, it’s Bill’s reputation that is mainly to thank for the brisk sales of advance tickets. Bill’s last play was the best-selling production in the thirty-four year history of Chicago Dramatists. Bill has an eager following who are purchasing their tickets early to witness this new outing from their favorite playwright.

When things start coming together like this, I feel like a lucky artistic director.

Meanwhile, there are more new plays brewing…

The finalist playwrights for our 2013 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays are Darren Callahan, Reginald Edmund, Chuck O’Connor and Steven Simoncic. While they are at work with their dramaturgs and directors, Dionysos playwright Reginald Edmund also has a world premiere currently playing at Chicago Dramatists. The show is SOUTHBRIDGE, directed by Russ Tutterow, playing through March 3rd with a very impressive cast doing deeply emotional work. “A white woman has been brutally killed and an angry mob is at the jailhouse door demanding the sheriff lynch the accused murderer. The only way to untangle the truth is for the accused, a young black man called “Stranger” to relive the events that lead him to the hangman’s tree in Athens, Ohio, in the year 1881.” Highly recommended.

Plus a special event!

The Thursday, March 7th performance of Never The Bridesmaid will be followed by a panel discussion on new play development featuring playwright Bill Jepsen, director Richard Shavzin, artistic director Richard Engling and 2012 Dionysos Cup winning playwright Ron Hirsen. Ron will be awarded the Dionysos Cup for his play Land Where My Fathers Died on this occasion. And our friends at DAVIDsTEA will provide their custom teas for the event. February 28 and March 7 will be our only Thursday performances. Get tickets now.

by Richard Engling

Polarity Ensemble Theatre is already deep into a season of all-new-plays-all-the-time, and I am very excited. We are totally immersed in new scripts by Chicago playwrights, and we are working with some wonderful material. We started our season early this year at the Greenhouse Theatre Center with a critically-heralded world premiere of David Alex’s Adrift, directed by Polarity’s own Maggie Speer in a co-production with Azusa Productions, July 26 – August 26. I’d been wanting to produce a play by Mr. Alex since we first worked with him in 2008. Many thanks to the Illinois Arts Council who offered a grant that helped make the production possible!

Next up we’ve got two Polarity projects in development. On November 16 and 17 we will present a staged reading of Darren Callahan’s Beautiful Women in Terrible Trouble. A truly exciting project that you can read about in our last blog post. Please join us for that. Click here for tickets.

On November 30th we present a workshop presentation of my script, Anna in the Afterlife directed by Beth Wolf, artistic director of Promethean Theatre Ensemble. Anna was seen in an earlier incarnation as Absolution in our 2011 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays. The play has been re-envisioned as a result of feedback from that event, as well as further table readings with Polarity members and friends as well as critique sessions from director Susan Padveen, playwright and director Darren Callahan and my long-time collaborator Ann Keen. I am very excited to put it up before a public audience once again. Please join us to help shape this script as it moves toward a world premiere production. The cast will include Kim Boler, Molly Lyons, Meghann Tabor, Richard Engling, Tristan Brandon, Catherine Hermes, Caroline Rau, Tina Thuerwachter, Martin Michaels, Jared Dennis and Julia Farrell. Click here for tickets.

Meanwhile we’ve read 55 scripts submitted by Chicago area playwrights to select the 4 that will be presented in the 2013 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays. What a wonderful collection of fine new work! It was tremendously difficult to narrow it down to 10 semifinalists. And I have to say, I feel sad about some of the scripts that were excluded. But I am delighted with the brilliant and talented staff we have for this year’s festival. Jen Poulin, Josh Sobel, David Amaral and Billy Bullion will be directing. Michael Manocchio, April-Dawn Gladu, Sarah Grant and Brittany Westfall will be dramaturgs. They are now working with me to reduce our 10 semifinalists to the 4 scripts that will be featured in the festival. The 10 semifinalists are: Badfic Love by Adam Pasen, Blisters on My Fingers by Jeremy Schaefer, Miracles in the Fall by Chuck O’Connor, More Than a House by Jane Goldenberg, Netta at Ninety by Susan Lieberman, Once Upon a Time in Detroit by Steven Simoncic, The Runaway Gene by Skye Robinson Hillis, Traveller of Tenby by Jenny Seidelman, White America by Reginald Edmund and Witness to an Accident by Darren Callahan. We will announce the 4 finalists in January. the Festival will run in May. Good luck to all the playwrights!

Most exciting of all, we are preparing for the world premiere of Bill Jepsen’s Never the Bridesmaid. Directed by award-winning director, Richard Shavzin, and featuring a hilariously talented cast, Never the Bridesmaid is a sweet, funny, life-affirming comedy by Chicago playwright Bill Jepsen. The script was featured and developed in our 2011 Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays. It will run February 26th through April 7th. The stellar cast includes Kristin Danko, Daria Harper, Catherine Hermes, Nick Lake. Lindsey Pearlman, Brian Plocharczyk and Steve Pringle.

And for something completely different, Polarity’s new assistant to the artistic director Julia Farrell is putting together He Knows … Really Good Christmas Stories! For the first time ever, you and your children can join Polarity for a night of hot cocoa, pajamas and some good old fashioned bedtime Christmas stories! Read to us by our jolly narrator and his helpful carolers, we will snuggle up and listen to Twas the Night before Christmas, Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph and many other holiday classics! General admission is $5, and children under the age of 2 get to enjoy the evening for free. And don’t forget to bring the camera, Mom and Dad. Santa might show up to help us celebrate the happiest season of all! Saturday, December 8, 7pm. Click here for tickets.

And speaking of new work, our old friend Mason Hill (Polarity’s Iago, Hamlet, Stanley Kowalski and Korin Goda) is working toward producing a new motion picture called Metal of Victory. He’s got a very amusing Kickstarter page to check out about the movie.

Mason, along with his New York based film company are producing their first full length feature film intended for a wide national release.   Medal of Victory is a farcical action comedy about two soldiers who go AWOL after accidentally shipping nuclear bomb components to Malawi instead of food rations.  While on the run they are mistaken for war heroes and thrust into a heated small town election.  Mason will also be playing one of the lead roles in the movie.  The film starts principal photography late this spring and is intended for a wide national release.  The Midwest born Production Company is nearing the end of a crucial Kickstarter campaign to supplement investment in the film. Check it out and see if you can give them a hand.

On Friday and Saturday November 16^th and 17^th, 2012, at 7:30 PM, Polarity Ensemble Theatre of Chicago proudly presents two special performances of Beautiful Women in Terrible Trouble.  This two-hour experience is a ‘best of’ from a much longer work that has been buzzing around Chicago these past few months.

Writer/Director Darren Callahan reveals his inspiration for the event, discusses the development process, and, of course, teases you with sex and violence, in this broadcast from the field.

Beautiful Women in Terrible Trouble is the ‘umbrella’ title for three separate, full-length plays – “Sources,” “Desperate Dolls,” and “Witness to an Accident.”  They’re not sequels, they don’t share characters, but together they’re intended to create a bonded narrative – a “world” – that has thematic similarities and stylistic cohesion.  If you see all three plays, it forms a whole much greater than the sum of the parts.

According to Darren: “Beautiful Women in Terrible Trouble is, if nothing else, very ambitious.  I like to think there’s not much like it happening in theatre today – either locally or nationally.  Some of the content is very taboo, but moreso, it’s a large commitment in these lean times – both for audiences and for theatres.  It requires three separate companies to commit to produce the plays concurrently or consecutively.  One theatre company can’t do it alone.  It was meant to be a ‘cross-town classic’ – a partnership between different ensembles, different casts, different directors, and different locations (even experimental spaces.)  Patrons could buy a ticket to one show, but it is best under a festival pass where they can see all three plays for a bundled price.  Despite the challenge of getting such a big commitment, I firmly believe in the pieces’ artistic value and box office possibilities.

“Polarity’s always been a great champion of new work – particularly risky work.  Their annual Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays includes a rigorous judging process, leading to months of script collaboration and summative performances in front of packed houses.  Through this, they’ve brought about several new works for theatre that have gone on to production at Polarity and elsewhere.  I like their approach (having developed my own play The White Airplane in 2007 for its 2009 production, and also directing G. Riley Mills’ Death & Devils for the company in 2010.)  When (Polarity’s Artistic Director) Richard Engling spoke about Beautiful Women in Terrible Trouble, I was pleased that he wanted to get it on its feet, see what happens.

“The vision for an eventual production is to have three simultaneous productions over a four or six week run, with a singular marketing campaign.  At the very least, it would be noticed for its ambition.  My other hope is that it would be noticed for its quality.  The commercial potential of film/stage hybrids could be greatly realized, particularly in Chicago, where kitchen sink realism is still the common type of drama in this town.  Someone might see just one of the plays and like it.  But by seeing another and another, it leads to a cumulative, and more rewarding understanding.

“It’s crazy!  Three producing companies getting along, sharing lists, sharing theatre?  Nuts.  Bonkers.  And as one of them told me, ‘Never gonna happen.’  A few companies have approached me with doing just one, but that’s not my position (as of today.)  It’s best at a long length, as an experience.  I’m stickin’ to my guns.

“Here’s what led me to be so bold…

“A few years ago, I saw my first Dario Argento movie.  I was late to the party, as he has been around since 1970.  For those unfamiliar with his work, he is an Italian director of thrillers and horror stories who has made about thirty films, including Deep Red, Suspiria, Opera, Tenebre, and The Bird with The Crystal Plumage.

“When I was indoctrinated with Trauma, I didn’t like it.  Too Italian.  Not enough sense in the plot.  Way too violent.  At the very least, I had to admire his technique, and was compelled to see another (Suspiria.)  That one I liked better.  So I saw another (Deep Red, his best).  I enjoyed it even more.  Then on to …Crystal Plumage, Four Flies on Gray Velvet, Cat o’ Nine Tails, Inferno, Phenomena, etc.  I was hooked.

“All of Argento’s films follow familiar patterns – a killer wearing gloves, operatic violence, and beautiful women. They are all part-thriller, part-horror, with excellent music, stylized performances, and acrobatic camerawork.  Argento makes films that are all from the same world, with his own rules applied and a unique perspective on Good and Evil.

“I decided that the plots I had been writing needed a similar uniformity.  I had already completed Sources, a play about the 1970s Hollywood exploitation film circuit, and had started on two companion pieces, Desperate Dolls and Witness to an Accident.  As they came together, I realized the whole – all three stories – were much more powerful and interesting if combined, set against each other as reflections.  These are not Argento rip-offs, but he had been the germ.

“There is also the added lurid appeal of the subject matter.  The plays are very sexy – purely so. They’re not porn, but they are definitely hot.  They’re the stories of strong women characters fighting almost natural elements – forces of evil as persistent and unpredictable as a raging storm or fatal diagnosis.  To sustain an atmosphere for six hours could be an amazing triumph and great, collaborative opportunity to work with interesting people in this town.  It’s nothing if not great networking.  Hopefully, it will be something even more memorable.

“For these performances at Polarity, I decided to direct a selection of scenes from the three plays.  There’s enough meat there to know the plot, understand the characters, enjoy the show as it stands, but it’s meant to be a first step.  We want to hear the plays aloud, sense what works and what doesn’t, but most importantly get people to understand what we’re trying to do.

“I got lucky on the cast – all my first choices.  Talented, beautiful women (Alyssa Thordarson, Ellen Girvin, Stephanie Leigh Rose, Michelle Courvais) and tough, intensive men (Charley Jordan, Brian Alan Hill, and Zach Uttich) will bring their all to a show where they will be saddled with script in hand, only a little blocking, and just a few rehearsals.  But don’t let that frighten you.  This is the A-team.

“And it’s a chance to get in on the ground floor.  Say you were there first.  Spread the world.  Have a drink with the actors.  It’s a cheap date and one expected to show many returns, so I hope everyone can make it out.  This show will truly live up to its title.”

Darren Callahan has written drama for the BBC, SyFy Channel, National Public Radio, and Radio Pacifica New York.  As the author of several successful stage plays, including The White Airplane and Horror Academy, both published by Polarity Books, he is highly involved in theatre as a writer and a director.  Novels include The Audrey Green Chronicles and City of Human Remains.  Screenplays include Documentia, Nerves and Summer of Ghosts.  He is writer, director, and composer of the films Under the Table and Children of the Invisible Man.  He is also a musician and has released many records, including film soundtracks, on various labels.  His website is darrencallahan.com

Beautiful Women in Terrible Trouble, directed by Darren Callahan and starring Alyssa Thordarson, Stephanie Leigh Rose, Ellen Girvin, Michelle Courvais, Charley Jordan, Zach Uttich, and Brian Alan Hill.

SOURCES

1970s L.A.  The Lymans are a happy family living in Hollywood. When the middle daughter, Sienna, a budding starlet, performs a strange magic trick at a family party, their lives are turned around.  A few days later, Sienna vanishes, her father dies, her older sister has a miscarriage, and her mother loses her memory.  Knowing a curse has befallen the Lymans, Katherine, the mother, goes searching for her missing Sienna, leading the family deeper and deeper into a haunted past and a nest of violence.  This horror-noir features a mostly female cast, some stage combat, mature themes, and brief nudity.

DESPERATE DOLLS

1960s L.A.  After auditioning for a low-budget film producer, three beautiful young actresses become tangled in a nightmare of hypnosis, killing, and apparitions.  Sunny Jack Fennigan has the best intentions – to make female-led independent feature films that make a quick buck at the box office.  A powerful agent known only as “Captain” calls with a proposition that may turn his life around.  His three best prospects – girls with handpicked nicknames – seem ripe for stardom.  But then Hollywood becomes a dark parade of seedy motels and murders that threaten to wipe out all three of the girls and Sunny Jack, too.   This horror-noir features a mostly female cast, blood and media effects, mature themes, and brief nudity.

WITNESS TO AN ACCIDENT

1950s L.A.  Agatha Moll is a rising young actress who suddenly finds herself locked in “The Hotel” – an all-female sanitarium.  But, she’s not crazy.  What secrets does she know that trapped her in this fate? Could it be something about Ray Pendarsky, a film executive, whose daughter was committed to The Hotel one year before?  Or is it regarding Dean Foster, her director, whom she’s entangled with in a torrid affair? At the mercy of a sadistic orderly and a failed ingénue named Lillian, will she ever find her way out of The Hotel?  This horror-noir features a mostly female cast, blood and violence effects, mature themes, and brief nudity.

Performances will take place at the Polarity Ensemble Theatre in the Josephinum Academy, 1500 N. Bell, Chicago, IL (Wicker Park, Western & North).

Two performances only. Friday, November 16^th and Saturday, November 17^th.  Showtimes are Friday and Saturday at 7:30 pm.

$5 general admission.  Tickets can be purchased in advance by clicking Brown Paper Tickets or by calling 1-800-838-3006.  Press tickets available by emailing boxoffice@petheatre.com.

by Richard Engling

Polarity Ensemble Theatre’s Dionysos Cup Festival of New Plays has apparently reached the proper vintage to bear multiple fruit. This summer two scripts developed in the Dionysos Cup series will see their world premieres playing simultaneously, the series itself adds video thanks to an award from the Saints, another Dionysos Cup play has gone on to further development with the Goodman Theatre, and Polarity will award this year’s Cup to a worthy and entertaining new script.

Winning the 2012 Dionysos Cup is Land Where My Fathers Died by Ron Hirsen, a funny, poignant play about the collision of indigenous rights with contemporary property rights. In it, a middle aged school teacher returns from work to find a traditional Native American tepee on the front lawn of her Rogers Park home. Grander, a quirky old man from the Potawatomi reservation in Wisconsin, emerges and informs her that he has come to spend his final days on the land promised by the ancestors. Whose land is it? Will Grander die there on the lawn? Will anyone want to taste his squirrel jerky?

Polarity is producing the world premiere of Adrift in association with Azusa Productions, directed by Maggie Speer, July 26 – August 26, 2012 at the Greenhouse Theater Center, 2257 N. Lincoln Avenue in Chicago. Adrift, a play by David Alex, was presented and developed in the 2008 Dionysos Cup. Isaac Abbas, a devoted and loving son, wanders in search of an answer, “How can I forgive myself for the choice I made?” The memory of his father, Jack, a Naval Officer who suffered from post-traumatic stress, continues to haunt him. As a high school teacher, Isaac attempts to help his student, Tom, reconcile with his father who also serves as Isaac’s principal. Fathers and sons grow and learn from each other as they confront and make decisions concerning definitions of truth, loyalty, honor and accountability. The production features James Eldrenkamp, Colin Fewell, Gary Murphy and Eric Swanson. David Alex has received three Grant Awards from the Illinois Arts Council in Recognition in Playwriting (including Adrift) and a Grant from the Pilgrim Foundation. He is a member of the Dramatists Guild and former Secretary of the Chicago Alliance for Playwrights and the Illinois Theatre Association.

Savage Land (formerly entitled Liars of Us All) was featured and developed in the 2012 Dionysos Cup. Its world premiere is being produced by Nothing Special Productions at The Den Theatre, 1333 N Milwaukee Ave, Chicago, August 3 – September 2, 2012. Savage Land was written by Chicago playwright Josh Nordmark and will be directed by NSP Artistic Director Mikey Laird. Set in the cultural collision of late-18th century colonialism, a lover’s triangle sparks a fury of destruction as Verse, (Celeste Burns) whose curiosity and daring are too often overshadowed by her beauty, follows her lover Henry (Matt Drake) into the depths of the jungle to study the strange and uncivilized natives of the foreign land. The lovers are followed close on the heels by the famed artist Fauntleroy (Scott Danielson), whose lustful desire drives him to claim artistic immortality at any cost and return to society with Verse as a trophy on his arm. It’s a story of conquest and adventure, love and loss.

These two world premieres playing simultaneously will mark the fifth and sixth plays developed in the Dionysos Cup series to reach full production. To date, Polarity has produced five Dionysos Cup Festivals, each featuring four or five new plays in development. Other Dionysos Cup plays not yet produced are also sparking interest. Pound of Flesh by Katie Watson, featured in the 2011 festival, was given another staged reading by the Goodman Theatre in May of this year.

The Dionysos Cup Festival itself was honored in 2012 with an award from The Saints, the nonprofit volunteer organization that supports Chicago theatres with volunteer services and grants. The award from The Saints allowed Polarity to purchase a professional-grade digital video camera film the workshop readings to give further aid to the playwrights. Josh Nordmark, author of Savage Land said, “The DVD is a great tool in connecting the playwright to a full production at another theater. It’s one more option for a producer to see the work previously done on this project.”

Polarity artistic director Richard Engling created the Dionysos Cup Festival early in the company’s history. With each festival, its popularity with local playwrights and with audiences has increased. “I believe it is one of the finest new play development series anywhere,” Engling said. “The workshop readings are produced at a fairly sophisticated level to bring out the qualities of the scripts. However the readings are just one element in a six month long development process. We are there to help these playwrights. We work only with local playwrights so that we can work together in the rehearsal room. We believe Chicago is the best theatre town in the world, and we are doing our best to help develop and produce the local product. We love to see Chicago playwrights working with Chicago actors and directors. We take the plays all the way, when we can. We are about to produce our fifth full production of a Dionysos Cup script so far. It’s a very important part of what we do.”

The Dionysos Cup Festival is in keeping with Polarity’s mission to develop new work. The ‘Polarity’ in its name refers to the poles of the classic and the brand new. Polarity develops new homegrown scripts and brings them to the stage. Another “Polarity” is in bringing works to both the stage and the page. Polarity has published two volumes of plays to date.

Polarity Ensemble Theatre is a professionally diverse group of artists who strive to advance the state of Chicago theater for both local and international audiences by developing new works and bringing new life to the classics through live performance, workshops, and publishing.

Ron Hirsen, author of the 2012 Dionysos Cup-winning Land Where My Fathers Died is a Resident Playwright at Chicago Dramatists. He has worked professionally in Chicago as both director and actor, appearing in productions at Wisdom Bridge, Court Theatre, and Northlight Theatre. His early plays had readings at Wisdom Bridge and the Goodman Theatre. Elegy was read at the Jewish Repertory Theatre in New York, before receiving its premiere production at the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia in 2002. The Frugal Repast, developed at the National Playwrights Conference at the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center in 2004, received its premiere production at the Abingdon Theatre in New York in 2007 and has been published by Samuel French. As part of its annual O’Neill celebration, The O’Neill presented a reading in 2005 of Mr. Hirsen’s Gene, a one-act play intended as a companion piece to Eugene O’Neill’s Hughie. Land Where My Fathers Died received the John Gassner Memorial Playwriting Award for 2008 and was heard in readings at Chicago Dramatists and at the New England Theatre Conference prior to its inclusion in the 2012 Dionysos Cup Festival at Polarity Ensemble Theatre in Chicago. The Well-Tempered Clavier had staged readings at Chicago Dramatists and at Abingdon Theatre in New York. Twelve, originally developed at Chicago Dramatists, received a staged reading there in 2009. Other plays include The Incurable Insomnia of Joey Kinderman, Murder at Widow Bull’s, and The Interpretation of Dreams. Mr. Hirsen is a member of The Dramatists Guild and a former member of Actors’ Equity and is represented by Elaine Devlin Literary in New York.

by Darren Callahan, photos by Emily Granata

Would you trade places with Tom Jones? On paper, he seems to lead a charmed life. But look a little closer. “The common answer might be ‘yes,’ but I wouldn’t trade places with him,” says actor Marcus Davis. Davis plays the title character in Polarity Ensemble Theatre’s 2012 stage production of Tom Jones. “Tom may have women throwing themselves at him, but every time he gets involved with one, someone seems to be looking to stab him or beat him to a pulp.”

Despite that, the treatment Davis has had in the press has been anything but cruel. In a three-star review, the Chicago Tribune said: “Davis’ choirboy features make for a wholly believable Tom.” The Chicago Reader raved: “Marcus Davis and Alex Fisher are fresh-faced and likable.” In a four-star review, Chicago Stage Style said: “Marcus Davis embodies the more-sinned-against-than-sinning Jones (reminding me of the naively sexy Hugh Grant at his best).” Read reviews.

So how does one uniquely portray a rake, a roustabout, a Man About Town – particularly one known to centuries of readers via Henry Fielding’s classic novel (adapted for Polarity by playwright David Hammond)?

Davis has learned that when someone watches a play, they register what happens as though it were real life. Having the audience come along for the ride, with sympathy for Mr. Jones and all his travails is at the forefront of Davis’ and director Maggie Speer’s minds.

“Every character I do is also an opportunity to learn about myself. The thing that I’ve loved about working on Tom is discovering his pure altruism. His brother treats him like a second class citizen, and still Tom’s sympathies for him are genuine and remain so until the end of the story. There’s so much cynicism in the world today; I enjoy the relief of creating a world where the few who are honest win out in the end.”

But, really – Tom is a bit of a bastard, isn’t he?

Davis may not agree, but he gets to the heart of it when he acknowledges his fellow actors. “First, I’d be remiss not to give a nod to the women who have to put up me and throw themselves at me. They’ve all been good sports. Second, all the people that have fights with me in the show have been fantastic. Stage combat is a big thing for me, and it’s especially when you’re working with good partners, which everyone has been.”

Speaking of ACTION! SEX! DRAMA!…

For a detailed and involving show, with a large cast and ambitious staging, it’s important to keep one’s energy up. “I think everyone underestimates how much energy they have,” says Davis. “Any runner can tell you that they stop feeling tired at a certain point. Not to say my task is as grueling as a marathon, but shutting off the brain and letting the body just do what it knows how to do is the same in both activities. Besides, an audience is a more potent source of energy than any caffeine or B vitamin I’ve had.”

Tom Jones provides Davis a strong vehicle to flex his comic and dramatic muscle, but when asked about any concern of comparisons with past Tom Joneses, particularly the iconic film performance by Albert Finney in the 1963 Tony Richardson version, he replies, “To make a truthful character, actors have to be truthful to themselves. That actually takes care of most of the job when it comes to setting their interpretation apart. I have a unique experience that I bring to the table. If I’m true to myself, then the very things that set me apart as a person will hopefully also be the very thing that makes my performance unique.”

# # #

Tom Jones performs at 1500 N. Bell Street in Wicker Park through April 29. Tickets are $19. Senior discount tickets (age 65 and older) are $15, and student discount tickets are $10 with valid ID. Showtimes are Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm, and Sundays at 3pm. Seating is general admission. Click here to purchase tickets online or call the box office at 800-838-3006.

by Darren Callahan

Star Wars. Drupelets. And a little show with the clever title of FupDuck. These are just a few of the dozen recent shows that Lene Hardy has stage managed. If you didn’t know, being a stage manager is like being a bass player – you’re always gigging. Stage Management is a special talent. It requires attention to detail, responsibility, ability to influence and please a great number of various personalities, and it requires most of all a love of theatre. Lene Hardy has those qualities in spades.

With Polarity Ensemble Theatre of Chicago’s spring 2012 production of Tom Jones, adapted from the Henry Fielding novel by playwright David Hammond and directed by Maggie Speer, stage manager Lene Hardy brings her best game, including her skills at prop design. So let’s learn more about this fascinating contributor.

Oh, and Captain Neat-o Man. We mustn’t forget him.

If you don’t know how all the roles of theatre fit together as a perfect working machine, perhaps we should start with what a stage manager does. This often unheralded role is actually one of the most critical to a smooth-running production. Often the director can’t be there at every show, so a dependable stage manager is hired. This person is the liaison between the director and the backstage crew, which includes the actors. Present at every performance, the stage manager (or SM for short) keeps the schedule, the logistics, and most of the director’s entire vision intact for every performance. It’s a demanding job for something with little spotlight. Starting in the 17th century, the role was defined and has been leveraged at countless performances over hundreds of years – the SM is a tradition that goes as deep as roles in costuming, design, or stage combat.

Chicago theatre is always clambering for talented SMs. “I came to be SM after the position was advertised on BackstageJobs.com,” says Ms. Hardy. “The posting had a link to the theatre’s website, which helped me get a feel for the theatre as well as the play. I’m new to Chicago and eager to contribute to the theatre scene, so I e-mailed over my resume and met the director for an interview within the week.”

Like finding a bass player who can also sing, Lene was quite the discovery for this production of Tom Jones. She is also the properties master, or the person who designs, acquires, and keeps track of all the necessary objects used within the production. Hardy explains: “When I took on the stage management position, a props master still hadn’t been found. I volunteered since I think the mechanics of props should be worked out early in the rehearsal process instead of coming as a surprise later. By this token, I’ve assembled props for a lot of the shows I’ve stage managed. I’ve worked with productions in the past that get started with just a director, the cast, and me, with the expectation that designers will be found later. In these cases, most of the designers found are also me. Sometimes even having a props master, the rehearsal props I bring in end up being in the final performance. The task can be daunting at times, but I do enjoy the creative aspects of construction, as well as the knowledge that I alone shoulder the responsibility, and if a prop is not finished I have no one to blame but myself.”

For Polarity’s production, Hardy is certainly not alone. To realize Fielding’s immense novel, there is a large cast of 17 actors, who represent even more characters.

“Communication can be difficult,” she admits. “No matter how articulately a statement is worded, the more people hear it, the more chance there is that it will be misunderstood. A lot of my job involves relaying information, which sometimes means asking five or six people the same question and getting answers that seem almost deliberately contradictory.” Hardy compares it to the class game of ‘telephone’ – where a phrase or idea is round-robin’d to determine what’s lost in translation. Hardy is the operator. How to handle this challenge?

“I try to break down the actors into various lists: who needs rehearsal clothes, identify schedule conflicts, even who has to be at what rehearsal. Despite the number of scenes with crowds or large groups, there is a great deal of rehearsal time devoted to principle characters, and it’s a bit tricky coordinating when people will be needed and when their time is going to waste.”

This enormous effort by Hardy is doubled with her props role. The process of prop construction is ongoing. This is particularly true of the props used in stage combat: a cane, a stick, two swords, and three rifles. Here, Hardy is helped immensely by the fight choreographer, a talented costume designer, and the actors themselves. Often, actors are left awkwardly grabbing or getting rid of a prop that hinders more than helps, but this will be cleared up when the blocking is solidified and the set is complete. “Our chief media is paper, a material I enjoy. Each article must contribute to the landscape while remaining functional, with attention to practicality and, more importantly, actor safety.”

Hardy is beholden to the wishes of director Maggie Speer. When handling a specific vision, Hardy’s job is to support all that happens around her, and drop as few (if any) balls of the hundreds in the air at any given time.

As the production moves headlong towards its opening night, the excitement and suspense is something that requires superhero nerves to control. Maybe someone like Captain Neat-o Man! I hate to leave the reader on the hook, but I tell you this – go see Tom Jones, appreciate the fun, the passion, and the craft of the production, brought to you by a great Chicago ensemble. Then, after the performance, sneak backstage and shout, “Ms. Hardy!” The woman who answers will know the identity of Captain Neat-o Man. Guaranteed.

“A week has not gone by without a member of the company making a brilliant point that never would have occurred to me,” laughs Hardy. “And just when it looks like approaching disaster, I am surprised by the generosity and enthusiasm that makes this a truly engaging ensemble.”

Tom Jones performs at 1500 N. Bell Street in Wicker Park through April 29, 2012. Tickets are $19. Senior discount tickets (age 65 and older) are $15, and student discount tickets are $10 with valid ID. Showtimes are Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm, and Sundays at 3pm. Seating is general admission. Click here to purchase tickets online or call the box office at 800-838-3006.

by Darren Callahan

Playwright David Hammond has waited patiently for twenty-five years to realize his perfected adaptation of Henry Fielding’s classic novel Tom Jones. “I wrote the first version in a great hurry, as a last-minute replacement in the repertory of the now-defunct Valley Shakespeare Festival in California. I arrived to direct a production that had been canceled due to rights issues, so we brainstormed about what to do, and I agreed to adapt Tom Jones.”

Luckily for Hammond, Fielding’s 18th century novel, The History of Tom Jones, A Founding, was one he knew very well. Mr. Jones’ navigation through high- and low-society, with its exploitative streak of bawdiness, was a defining novel of English literature for centuries after publication. Along with War & Peace, it is a story Hammond has read and re-read more than any other work.

In three days, Hammond had written enough pages to begin rehearsals. The speed of the writing, while exhilarating, had also left Hammond feeling the material deserved a more measured approach. “The show was a hit and we did a successful tour, but I knew that some of that first adaptation was smoke-and-mirrors. There were places where I’d patched things together or glided over inconsistencies and missing circumstances, but the arc of the thing, and its spirit, somehow captured Fielding. All that summer, I kept telling myself that I would get back to the script and push it through to real completion.” Little did he know it would be decades before he could again find time for Mr. Jones.

With its spring 2012 production of Tom Jones, Polarity Ensemble Theatre of Chicago continues its mission of producing new works (such as Ghost Watch, The White Airplane, or Kabulitis) alongside classics (A Streetcar Named Desire, Hamlet, and recent 2011 DCA Storefront hit production of Peer Gynt.) Hammond recalls, “The old script sat in my files until a year ago when, out of the blue, two different theatres called asking about the rights. One of the theatres was Polarity, where Maggie Speer, who was my student at the American Conservatory Theatre thirty years ago, is Managing Director. Maggie called my agent in New York asking about the play. She didn’t know at the time that I was the playwright, because I had written that first version, as I wrote everything I did in those days, under a pen-name. Similarly, although Maggie’s name rang a distant bell in my mind, I couldn’t figure out how I knew her. It was quite a moment when we finally met up by email and identified each other!”

Polarity has a solid reputation for respectful insights on rewriting, as evidenced by their annual festival The Dionysos Cup, where new plays receive a high-quality showcase. Hammond leveraged the new interest in Tom Jones to finish his initial vision. “I asked if they could give me a month to rework the script one final time before sending it. They happily agreed, and I pulled out the script and Fielding’s novel. It felt like going home. I had a deliriously happy month working on it. The original structure still held, but I was able to solve things I had avoided the first time around, clear up some loose ends that didn’t really match, further define characters, follow through on details of circumstances, and make an altogether more organic and cohesive work out of it.”

Hammond also brought into the play more of Fielding’s wry humor. The third-person narration of the novel being a challenge, Hammond spent considerable time on retaining the original version’s energy while sharpening the dialog and tightening elements of plot. The novel is over three-hundred thousand words (longer than the last Harry Potter novel!), so to create a tighter, stronger, and funnier version than first existed was a call to arms for the experienced playwright.

“I think the trick was to capture the multiple levels of conflict in the story,” adds Hammond. “There are so many elements: the personal nature of Tom’s and Sophia’s journeys, the different but equally colorful worlds of town and country, the contrasts of wealth and poverty, decadent sophistication versus youthful innocence and idealism, society versus the outsider. And there are also levels of morality: are we answerable to some hierarchical code, not only here on earth but in the eyes of heaven? Are human beings basically good or basically evil? Are weaknesses of the flesh forgiven if the heart is basically well-intentioned? Does God view us with a twinkle in his eye if He knows we try our best? And how do we find a way to live productively and not torture ourselves if we take a wrong step? I think Fielding thinks there’s good in everything if we take things with an occasional grain of salt.”

David Hammond has written adaptations of works by Euripides, Moliere, Beaumarchais, Chekhov, Ostrovsky, Gay, Wedekind, and E.T.A. Hoffmann, as well as several original plays. Hammond has taught on the faculties of the Juilliard School, the Yale School of Drama, and the American Conservatory Theatre Advanced Training Program and is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Dramatic Art at UNC-Chapel Hill. He currently teaches for the American Repertory Theater/Moscow Art Theater School Institute for Advanced Theatre Training at Harvard and is Professor of Theatre Studies and Arts Division Chair at Guilford College.

Tom Jones performs at 1500 N. Bell Street in Wicker Park. Previews begin March 20th, with press opening on Thursday, March 22nd and a Gala Premiere Night Friday, March 23rd. Tickets are $10 for previews, $19 for regular run, and $35 for Gala Premiere Night which includes a post-show reception. Senior discount tickets (age 65 and older) are $15, and student discount tickets are $10 with valid ID. Showtimes are Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm, and Sundays at 3pm. Seating is general admission. Click here to purchase tickets online or call the box office at 800-838-3006.

David Alex’s play, Adrift, has been selected by Albuquerque’s Fusion Theatre for its 2012 “New Works 4 New Mexico” staged reading series. Adrift was included in Polarity’s 2008 Dionysos Cup Festival. Alex praises the Dionysos Festival’s “creative dual reading and talk back format as an integral part of new play development” and thanks Polarity Ensemble for its continued support of new work by local writers.

by Darren Callahan

Clay Sanderson makes his Polarity debut with Peer Gynt. Recent credits include Jeff in Brigadoon with Light Opera Works, Officer Lockstock in Urinetown at Circle Theatre, and Frederick in Noises Off at Theatre at the Center. He has also appeared in productions with Oak Park Festival Theatre, City Lit, Bailiwick Repertory, Festival 56, and Wagon Wheel. He can next be seen in The Light in the Piazza at Theo Ubique. He holds an MFA in Acting from The Theatre School at DePaul University.

But – this is the real question – has he ever played a frickin’ troll?

“Well, I’m always looking for my next show, and I saw the audition notice on the League of Chicago Theatres website. I had heard of the play and knew it was a classic, and Polarity is a good company so I signed up for a slot. I got called back for The Troll King and managed to not screw it up, and here I am!” he declares.

I had to ask if, when he was a small child, did he ever dream of playing a troll?

“Can’t say I did,” he replies. “However, I did play ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’ at a piano recital once.”

Ah, dreams, so easily fretted away. So how did he build a character based on mythology – did he focus on the troll or the human characteristics?

“I was originally under the impression that the trolls were going to be green creature-type things, but at the first read-through (director) Jeremy Wechsler told us we were to be ‘humanoid’ — not human, but like, perhaps mutant humans. An inbred mining community.”

I asked if he had ever seen C.H.U.D. He had not.

“At first I wasn’t sure what to do, because for months I had been thinking I was going to be playing more of a monster — a kingly monster — and was going to use the same voice I had come up with for the callback. So I had to revamp my entire approach. But with the help of Jeremy’s direction and an idea brought up by Meg Elliott, who plays my daughter, to use Southern accents (since we’re making the setting America by way of Norway), I was able to come up with what I hope is a pretty interesting character.”

So, now I’m super excited to see this troll costume – I picture fangs, maybe a crazy nose, something to make Rick Baker proud – you know, the works.

“Our special effects are our acting!”

Crap.

Well, I’m sure it’ll still rock it. I don’t think there’s been a troll on stage in Chicago in at least, what, three seasons? I’m not counting critics. Wait, did I say that? So, Clay, any particular thoughts about the effect this wacky Ibsen will have on an audience?

“I think that anyone who is familiar with Peer Gynt will agree that it is a challenging play. It is epic in its scope and theatricality, and is like a big Thanksgiving feast with many different courses. Some sections of the feast might be hard to swallow, but I think we can guarantee that you will leave the theater feeling full and satisfied.”

Let’s eat!

Production Details

Peer Gynt ran at the DCA Theater’s Storefront Theater, 66 E. Randolph St., in the heart of Chicago’s downtown theater district, from November 15 through December 18, 2011.

by Darren Callahan

Paul Gilvary, composer and musical director for Polarity Ensemble Theatre’s production of Peer Gynt, had a significant challenge – how best to realize Director Jeremy Wechsler’s vision for the Americana influences while staying true to the Norwegian mythology of Ibsen’s rarely done classic. The solution: folk music.

Folk music, a 19th century English phrase, has been characterized by the late 20th century Woody Guthries and Bob Dylans, and parodied in films such as Christopher Guest’s A Mighty Wind. But, at its core, folk music is about the roots of a culture, the smaller experiences of common men and women in the context of nothing but their own lives and fortunes. This fits perfectly with the aesthetic of Peer Gynt, a play based on various blends of Norwegian style, story, and absurdism. “I was playing this type of music when I was a teenager in the 70s,” remarks Gilvary.

Aided by two stellar musicians, Christopher Gagnon on violin and Teddy Stuebi on guitar and banjo, Gilvary, on bass, blends acoustic instruments, percussion, and leads the cast in several rousing numbers. Some of the music is traditional, while other songs are original compositions by Gilvary. “The songs, original and otherwise, pass through the director’s filter,” says Gilvary. “Jeremy also selected the song we play going into intermission.” Don’t That Road is a traditional song that closes the first act in rousing chorus of the full cast and effectively passes the baton from Bryson Englelen’s “Young Peer Gynt” to Richard Engling’s second act “Old Peer Gynt.”

Regarding the director’s influence on the music of the production, Gagnon adds, “Paul received some input from Jeremy. But from my perspective, as is often the case in theatre, the director has an idea for what he wants, but it’s up to the musical director to try to interpret that and translate it into something that makes musical sense. Artistic directors don’t always speak the same language as musicians — and vice-versa — it’s one of the things that makes doing music in theatre both challenging and rewarding: coming to understand how the music and the artistic vision for the play can meet in the middle and result in something that lifts the production without drawing focus from it.”

Two other indelible numbers are placed within the production. Sung by Erica Bittner playing “Young Solveig” is an original composition that sweetly moves the story forward while highlighting the band and Bittner’s striking voice. And, towards a lamentable rough spot of Peer’s life, a promenade of singers belt out a Gospel song, Glory to Thee, while moving across twenty-foot-high risers above the audience.

Regarding the band’s history, Gilvary tells it like this: “Chris and I played together for a production at Strawdog Theater. Teddy and I worked for a show for Silent Theater. With Chris, we played in a band for the play Old Town. Teddy and I were part of a jazz trio for The Set Up where we performed original music. I hand-picked both of these guys because they have talent and are both pleasant to work with.”

With 40 minutes of pre-show music, the three musicians have the opportunity to connect as a band playing a set, and not exclusively as the background for the dramatic action of the play. Before needed at cast rehearsals, the band had opportunities to work out stuff in Gilvary’s studio. “Once we joined the cast, the time to rehearse is scarce. This is always the case when you make music for plays.”

“I’m very happy with how it gelled,” adds Gagnon. “We had good chemistry right from the first rehearsal, and our various talents seem to complement one other nicely.” In fact, the band’s considering continuing to play together even after the close of Peer Gynt. But, strike while the iron (and the band) are hot and see Polarity Ensemble Theatre’s production of Peer Gynt.

Production Details

Peer Gynt ran at the DCA Theater’s Storefront Theater, 66 E. Randolph St., in the heart of Chicago’s downtown theater district, from November 15 through December 18, 2011.

by Darren Callahan

Okay. You got me. I’m obsessed. I love trolls. There, I said it. Polarity Ensemble Theatre’s production of Peer Gynt has trolls. Gots ‘em in spades. I’m thinking: I need more trolls. Troll Hunter kept me going for a little bit in my post-Peer buzz. Then came Troll – the Michael Moriarty schlockfest from the mid-1980s. So I moved on to Troll 2, which I heard was bad, knew was bad, and delivered in bad, bad, bad spades. Alas, the joke is on me….Though called Troll 2, they’re actually Goblins. Son of a…

But.

How to redeem oneself after watching Troll 2? I mean jeepers. That’s a bad movie.

By watching “Best Worst Movie,” of course!

BWM is an excellent 2009 documentary following up with the cast and crew of 1990’s Troll 2. For many years, Troll 2 held the lowest rating in the IMDB database – zero stars. But slowly, over the last decade, it has eeked out a more respectable 2.3 stars (out of 10), based solely on the rediscovery by fans as one of the most satisfying terrible movies ever made.

Directed by Michael Stephenson, who played the little boy “Joshua” in Troll 2, BWM starts out as lighthearted self-effacement, but evolves into an affecting portrait of Hollywood dreams destroyed.

The focus is on George Hardy, who played the strapping hero in Troll 2. In many ways, he’s the real-life doppleganger of Eugene Levy’s fictional dentist-turned-actor from Waiting for Guffman (Christopher Guest’s funny mockumentary about small-town stagecraft from 1996.) Safe and respected as a dentist, the filming of the documentary brings out Hardy’s hubris – big time. At first amused by the cult stardom, then bragging about it, Hardy soon becomes addicted to, and ultimately disillusioned by his limited fame.

A star of a bad movie is still a star and, at first, the film’s fans greet Hardy with overwhelming respect. As he moves across country from horrorfest to horrorfest, the invited guest at fan screenings of Troll 2, he repeats his character’s signature lines ad nauseum.

It’s interesting to see the story of a man with only one success. The director, some of the other stars – they moved on, either to TV or plays or bit parts in movies, or they’ve moved on to greener pastures and look back on the filming of Troll 2 as a strange confluence in their lives. But Hardy, clearly a good man and probably an excellent dentist, seems to have a hole in his life that remains unfilled.

It’s easy for a documentary to pick a story, follow it, perhaps groom it. Was Hardy ripe for this and Stephenson saw a narrative opportunity, stoking the fire? Or are some trips down memory lane a bad idea? You judge for yourself.

At least I got my fill of Trolls for the week. Won’t last, though. I can tell. I’ve got a fever, and the only cure is more troll. If you’ve got the same itch, definitely check out Peer Gynt!

For more on “Best Worse Movie,” visit:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1144539/

P.S. As I write this, I’m also watching 1977’s “The Car,” a movie that was given a Golden Rasberry for one of the worst, yet entertaining movies ever made. And, guess what’s playin’ the soundtrack? A song from the opera of Peer Gynt. See, everything is connected. I feel very Zen about this troll thing.

Production Details

Peer Gynt ran at the DCA Theater’s Storefront Theater, 66 E. Randolph St., in the heart of Chicago’s downtown theater district, from November 15 through December 18, 2011.