Celebrating the Year of the Female Playwright in B-N in 2014

There has been a lot of controversy about the lack of representation for female playwrights on American stages. I don't know if it was on purpose or just a happy accident, but Bloomington-Normal knocked it out of the park when it came to showcasing the work of female playwrights in 2014. From The Diary of Anne Frank back in January to Falling by Deanna Jent, which closed just before Thanksgiving, from stories told in ten minutes to one acts and full-length plays, we had a chance to see -- right here in Bloomington-Normal -- 21 different plays written by women, two plays co-written by women, and three musicals with music, lyrics or books written or co-written by women.

Last spring, Illinois State University gave us Diana Son's Stop Kiss, directed by Leah Cassella for Westhoff Theatre, followed by Exonerated, a "true crime" documentary piece written by Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen and directed by Cyndee Brown, and Mrs. Packard, a look at a particularly dark moment in women's history written by Emily Mann and directed by Vanessa Stalling for ISU's Center for the Performing Arts.

This fall, ISU came back with In the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play) by Sarah Ruhl, directed by David Ian Lee for the CPA, with an amazing set design by Jen Kazmierczak; Water by the Spoonful, Quiara Alegria Hudes's 2012 Pulitzer Prize winner, directed by Cassella in Westhoff; and By the Way, Meet Vera Stark, from Lynn Nottage, another Pulitzer winner, directed by Don LaCasse for the CPA.

Over at Heartland, the April play was Iron, by Scottish playwright Rona Munro, a searing look at a daughter trying to reconnect with the mother she can't remember, a mother who is in prison for killing Dad fifteen years ago. Claire BonEnfant, Nancy Halper and Brigitte Viellieu-Davis won slots in Heartland's 10-Minute Play Festival, while Lori Matthews and Pamela Devon Lovell wrote winning one-acts produced as New Plays from the Heartland. And this fall, Heartland staged Julia Cho's The Language Archive, directed by Kathleen Kirk, and Deanna Jent's Falling, directed by Lori Adams, who had also directed the play in its St. Louis premiere and its off-Broadway transfer. Jent's intensely personal play was a shot right to the heart of playgoers.

New Route Theatre continued its mission to showcase underrepresented voices by bringing back The Mountaintop, Katori Hall's play about the last night in the life of Martin Luther King, and then offering Johnna Adams' mother/teacher showdown Gidion's Knot; Full Bloom, a reunion play by Leola Bellamy, Erica Thurman's Flashbacks; and Walking with My Ancestors, a journey into the past told in song, dance and the spoken word, written by ISU professor Ama Oforiwaa Aduonu.

Community Players brought us The Diary of Anne Frank, an adaptation of Anne's own words for the stage originally written by Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett and updated by Wendy Kesselman; the musical 9 to 5, with music and lyrics by Dolly Parton and book by Patricia Resnick, and Shrek: The Musical, with music by Jeanine Tesori and lyrics and book by David Lindsay-Abaire.

Illinois Wesleyan University offered 12 Ophelias by Caridad Svich and The Drowsy Chaperone, a delightful 1920s musical spoof with music and lyrics co-written by Lisa Lambert and Greg Morrison.

The newest theatrical venture in town, the bar plays called Sticky in the Sticks, also featured work by women, in the tradition of Sticky founder Libby Emmons. The Normal version of Sticky gave us pieces by Emmons herself as well as Jeanine Jones in its December show.

All in all, it was a very good year.  More than two dozen different women with very different voices, all represented on stages in our home town.

The work isn't done, of course. It seems unlikely this will happen two years in a row, let alone three or four. But for now, for Bloomington-Normal in 2014, we can congratulate ourselves on quietly, happily getting it done. Here's to moe of the same in 2015!

Auditions January 27-29 at Community Players for 9 TO 5 THE MUSICAL

Sing it with me... Working nine to five, what a way to make a living...

If you know that song by heart, if you are a big Dolly Parton fan, you'll want to know about auditions for Community Players' production of the musical 9 to 5, coming up at 7 pm on January 27, 28 and 29.

The idea of women fighting back and taking over the workplace was a big deal in 1980, those days of power suits and ties (or floppy bows, to offer a girly version of ties). That's when Patricia Resnick and Colin Higgins put together Nine to Five the movie, with Lily Tomlin as a no-nonsense office administrator unhappy doing all the work and getting none of the credit, Dolly Parton as a curvy secretary sick of being judged by her curves, and Jane Fonda as a newbie in the office steno pool, just trying to figure out what's what. Dabney Coleman did a memorable turn as their sexist pig of a boss, the one they plot against.

Since Dolly Parton wrote the title song, complete with percussion from her fingernails, it might've seemed like a no-brainer to get her to write a whole score and turn it into a musical. That did happen, but not till 2008, which is kind of a strange time to resurrect this very 80s -- or even late 70s -- view of the battle of the sexes, or at least the battle of the sexes in the work arena.

But resurrected it was, hitting Broadway in 2009 with a complete Parton score and book by the same Patricia Resnick who cowrote the screenplay for the 1980 movie. Dolly herself was too old to play Doralee by that point, so Megan Hilty took the role, alongside Allison Janney as Violet, the Tomlin role, and Stephanie J. Block as Judy, the woman Fonda played.

Brett Cottone will direct this 9 to 5 for Players, with support from producer John Lieder, assistant director Austin Travis, vocal director Eugene Phillips Jr., choreographer Chris Terven, costume designer Alan Wilson, lighting designer Dan Virtue and sound designer Rich Plotkin.

 

Cottone is looking for a big cast, approximately 20 people ages 18 to 60, to fill out the workforce at Consolidated Industries, including several women who are overworked and unappreciated and a big boss who is a "sexist egotistical lying hypocritical bigot." Here's how Cottone breaks down the roles he needs to fill:

VIOLET – 40s to early 50s. Attractive, strong, ambitious woman. Stands up for what she believes in. Head secretary and Mr. Hart’s administrative assistant. She is also a single mother of a teenager.

DORALEE – late 20s to late 30s. Sexy in a wholesome country singer way. Character should “suggest” Dolly Parton-like character but not an impersonator. Needs to sing country.

JUDY – late 20s to late 30s. Attractive, insecure, at first afraid of being on her own but later becomes empowered and strong. She is the “new” girl. Husband just left her for his secretary.

ROZ KEITH – late 30s to 40s. The office kiss-up and second to the boss, a gossip, has an unrequited love for her boss and will do anything to win his approval.

FRANKLIN HART – 40s to 50s. Arrogant, self-absorbed, male chauvinist corporate 70s boss. Is capable of a surface, smarmy charm.

MISSY – 40s to 50s. Hart’s wife. Fluttery and ditzy.

JOE – 20s to 30s. The cute, young, office accountant. He’s smitten with VIOLET.

DICK – 30s to 40s. Judy’s soon-to-be ex-husband. Average middle-aged guy, sporting a little less hair and a little more paunch than he did ten years ago.

DWAYNE – 20s to early 30s. Doralee’s husband, very supportive of Doralee.

JOSH – 18 to early 20's (must look young) Violet’s teenage son.

MARGARET – any age. Secretary. The office lush.

ENSEMBLE (singers / dancers) – 18 to 60s

For more information, check Community Players' 9 to 5 webpage or Facebook page. Performances are scheduled to begin March 21.

IWU's 9 TO 5: THE MUSICAL Opens Tuesday at McPherson Theatre

Working nine to five
What a way to make a living
Barely getting by
It's all taking and no giving
They just use your mind
And they never give you credit
It's enough to make you crazy if you let it!

Dolly Parton won two Grammy Awards and was nominated for an Oscar for the music and lyrics of that breezy, catchy little song, set to the beat of a typewriter and written for the movie Nine to Five. Parton also starred in the movie, playing Doralee, a smart, good-hearted secretary who bands together with two friends, played by Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin, when they aren't treated right at work. Fed up by their sexist pig of a boss who never gives them credit, the three comically turn the tables, trapping him in his own house and running the company by themselves.

The film was turned into a stage musical called, conveniently enough, 9 to 5: the Musical, almost 30 years after the movie, with lots of new songs supplied by Parton and a book written by Patricia Resnick, the same person credited for the screenplay for the original Nine to Five along with its director, Colin Higgins.

This time out, 9 to 5 starred Allison Janney (The West Wing) as Violet, the Lily Tomlin role, Stephanie J. Block (The Pirate Queen) taking over as Judy, the character Jane Fonda played on screen, and newcomer Megan Hilty as Doralee, Parton's role. Like Block, Hilty was best known at that point as a replacement for one of the leads in Wicked. After 9 to 5, she broke out on TV's Smash, the weird musical drama with all kinds of problems, not the least of which is pretending that Hilty doesn't overshadow the competition.

The stage musical is bright and bouncy, with three good roles for women and one -- the dastardly boss -- for a man. On Broadway, Marc Kudisch took that role, earning a Tony nomination along with Janney, choreographer Andy Blankenbuehler, and Dolly Parton's score. All three actresses were nominated for Drama Desk Awards, with Janney taking it home.

All of that means that there should be plenty of opportunities for Illinois Wesleyan's cast and crew to shine as they present 9 to 5: The Musical at McPherson Theatre starting Tuesday night at 8 pm. Assistant Professor Scott Susong, whose work on shows like Hello Again and Once Upon a Mattress has been terrific in the past, directs this 9 to 5 with a cast of 27, which includes Christine Polich, Lizzie Rainville and Kate Rozycki as Judy, Doralee and Violet, respectively. Josh Levinson plays creepy Franklin M. Hart, Jr. (Or, you know, the Big Bad Boss.)

For this Illinois Wesleyan School of Theatre Arts production, Jean MacFarland Kerr choreographs, while Saul Nache acts as musical director and Saundra DeAthos-Meers conducts.

9 to 5: The Musical opens Tuesday, November 13, and continues through the 18th, with performances at 8 pm Tuesday through Saturday and a 2 pm matinee on Sunday. For ticket information, click here to see the IWU Theatre box office page.

Lots of Theatre Coming Up in 2012-13 at IWU School of Theatre Arts

So far this Spring, we've talked about what ISU and Community Players are doing in 2012-13, as well as a few Chicago theater companies. Now we turn our attention to Illinois Wesleyan University and their 2012-2013 School of Theatre Arts season.

IWU's School of Theatre Arts always manages to surprise me. After going for provocative, darker musicals like Stephen Sondheim's "Passion" and Michael John LaChiusa's "Hello Again," IWU is taking a more cheerful, straight-down-the-middle-of-the-plate approach to its big musical, plus offering a Shakespeare comedy and two well-regarded "sister" plays that seem just right for the college theater setting. And then there's the last choice, a three-playwright collaboration reflecting on the New Orleans hurricane and devastation. It's fairly new (2008) and completely new to me. As I said, IWU continues to surprise!

They will open their season in McPherson Theatre with "A Shayna Maidel," Barbara Lebow's 1985 play about two Polish Jewish sisters torn apart by the Holocaust. Rose White and her father have been safe in New York since she was a toddler, but her sister was left behind. Rose (original name: Reyzel Weiss) has been acclimated and assimilated, but it's all new to her sister Lusia, just now able to come to America after surviving the concentration camps. "A Shayna Maidel" means "a pretty girl" in Yiddish. As it happens, one of my grandmother's sisters was named Shayna but called Sophie in the U.S; until we found her birth records on the family tree, the only "Shayna" I knew was in the title of this play. The 1992 TV movie version of the play was titled "Miss Rose White," looking to the American side of the character rather than the Yiddish one. Professor Nancy Loitz will direct "A Shayna Maidel" for IWU.

The fall musical will be the bright and breezy "9 to 5," directed by Assistant Professor Scott Susong in McPherson Theatre. The original "9 to 5" was a Dolly Parton/Lily Tomlin/Jane Fonda chick flick, with Dolly writing the hit title song. Parton wrote a bunch more songs to turn it into "9 to 5: The Musical." Allison Janney took on the Lily Tomlin role, while Megan Hilty (now a smash on "Smash") created the role of Doralee, who is very much like Ms. Parton, for the stage, with American Idol's Diana Degarmo taking Doralee on the national tour. "9 to 5" is about three women toiling at a large company in the early 80s, trying very hard to keep their wits about them even when treated terribly by a creepy sexist boss. When their problems with the boss escalate, they undertake a crazy scheme to keep him tied up and hanging from the ceiling of his own home, and then they run the company (beautifully) in his absence. Patricia Resnick co-wrote the screenplay and wrote the book for "9 to 5: The Musical," which was nominated for 4 Tony Awards and 15 Drama Desk Awards in 2009. And here's the "9 to 5" story in under ten minutes, if you'd like to see what Janney and Hilty looked like in the roles.

Also in McPherson, Assistant Professor Thomas Quinn will direct Shakespeare's "As You Like It," the romantic comedy with the lovely Rosalind on the lam in the forest of Arden, dressed as a boy and supposedly teaching Orlando, the boy she has a bit of a crush on, how to woo like a man. There are accompanying rustics, Rosalind's jester Touchstone, a gloomy philosopher named Jacques who gives the famous "Seven Ages of Man" speech, and a couple of Dukes, one who usurped the other's position. "As You Like It" will also be part of this summer's Illinois Shakespeare Festival, if you would like to see both and compare/contrast.

The annual Faculty Choreographed Dance Concert rounds out the McPherson schedule, this one directed by Associate Professor Jean McFarland Kerr, who recently did such fine work on "Promenade."

Over in the E. Melba Kirkpatrick Laboratory Theatre, you'll see Shelagh Stevenson's "The Memory of Water," directed by undergrad Kristyn Kuzinar. "The Memory of Water" looks at three sisters gathering for their mother's funeral. The title's "memory" comes into play both because their mother suffered from Alzheimer's and because they each remember the events of their childhood differently, as siblings often do. Memory is a hazy, unreliable issue for each of them. There is another play I often confuse with this one, demonstrating my own unreliable memory. But, no, this is not Lee Blessing's "A Body of Water," which is also about people who struggle with what they do and do not remember.

The other play they've scheduled for the Lab Theatre is "The Breach," a 2008 play by Catherine Filloux, Tarell McCraney and Joe Sutton. The three playwrights wrote three different intertwined stories to tell what happened to New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. It's not just about devastation on the human level, but about heroism, politics and water. There is a lot of water in "The Breach." This play will be directed by Raven Stubbs, also an undergrad in IWU's Theater program.

That leaves one or two titles still to be announced for the Kirkpatrick Lab Theatre. I'll report back as soon as I hear. In the meantime, you can read up on these shows and get ready for what you'll see in the fall.