Introducing the Production, By August Roy

Over the next few months, this production blog will be illustrating the process of building a devised piece based on Edgar Allen Poe's infamous works called "The Shadows of Edgar Allen Poe." (If you are looking for information about the show, such as ticket prices and show times, check out the previous posts by scrolling down the page.) A large number of new theatre students are participating in the project, as well as a few actors and musicians from other productions at LLCC.  As part of illustrating this process, this blog will include pictures and interviews, and maybe even music and video clips!

Below are some of the pictures from rehearsal over the last few weeks.

Devon and Anne work in a movement exercise exploring love lost.

Judy explores with fabric and movement and what it means to be a spirit experiencing a storm.

The team solving staging problems as director Mark Hardiman shares his thoughts with Assistant Director Shannon  and Stage Manager A. J. listen in.

Will and Coral explore heartbreak in a movement exercise.

Approaching Poe: A Note From the Director On Collaborating With a Creative Team and Famous Text

I have long had an idea of dealing with Poe in performance in some way. That plan started with an idea of adapting works to tour high schools many years ago. It evolved in my thinking to an evening of Poe and then to a devised piece based upon the works of Poe, which was my intent with this project here.

We began just over two weeks ago after casting with a fair number of texts from people’s favorites list of poe short stories and poems. I used the ensemble, people I spoke to and my recollections of works I had read to form the foundation. These were copied and assembled. We broke our cast into two working teams, each team worked on a short list of texts. Our process began with reading the text then experimenting with ways to cast light--to open up and illuminate meanings within the text--with staging. In some cases text was broken up with a variety of speakers, in some cases there was a narrator of sorts and the text was performed. We worked on solving difficult problems with staging using huge pieces of fabric and actors.

After two weeks of rehearsal and intense discussions nightly (sometimes going until past 11PM) with the directorial team to clarify and solidify findings, we felt it was time that the directorial team assemble over two days and hone a general working text for the piece. It became clear that due to the quality of Poe’s writing, that the nature of the final text will be more dependant on the actual text of Poe than we at first may have considered. We had originally thought we might be creating some of our own verbally-expressed text. But, on examination and through some experimentation, it proved unnecessary when we looked at the bounty of writing Poe already provided.

The question then was, what was to be the form of the text? We had worked with and rough-staged various stories and poems and considered, what was their metaphoric structure? What was the tone and subject matter? Picking common forms, themes and ideas helped us derive a overall structure and sense of mood for a rough draft of a working script. This helped us reduce the amount of text we would use. I have always felt that the texts had a mystical aspect that was their central pull and had toyed with a ritual structure to the piece, however, we wanted a form that was in some way familiar but allowed a kind of metaphoric dissonance that would be both compelling and disturbing--similar to the way that Poe writes. Then, examining all the pieces in aggregate, we landed on an artistic and textual form that served the pieces: a mass (here meaning a service or ritual ceremony.)

As we head into tonight’s rehearsal we will be experimenting with a flow in mind, molding and shaping our staging while further winnowing down the text by focusing on what can be done and not spoken….

   LLCCNEWS

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                                           Oct. 6, 2014

Contact: Lynn Whalen, lynn.whalen@llcc.edu; 786.2219

 

LLCC Theatre presents world premiere of “The Shadows of Edgar Allan Poe” Dec. 5-7 at the Hoogland Center for the Arts

 

SPRINGFIELD – Lincoln Land Community College (LLCC) Theatre presents a world premiere Dec. 5-7 of “The Shadows of Edgar Allan Poe” directed by Mark Hardiman, professor of theatre. Performances will be Dec. 5 and 6 at 8 p.m. and Dec. 7 at 2 p.m. in the Hoogland Center for the Arts, Theatre III.

 

Tickets, at $18 ($16 for seniors and $10 for students with ID), may be purchased beginning Oct. 31 at the Hoogland Center, 420 South 6th St., by calling 217-523-2787 or online at www.hcfta.org.

 

Because of the nature of the writings of Poe, parental discretion is recommended.

 

Audiences are invited to enter the swirling reverie of Edgar Allan Poe in this alchemical mixture of prose and posey. “The Shadows of Edgar Allan Poe” is designed to conjure Poe’s most celebrated reflections on life and love, through creative staging of masterpieces such as “Annabel Lee,” “The Raven,” “The Tell-Tale Heart,” “The Pit and The Pendulum” and others. The entire event is told through juxtaposition of light and shadow, music and mesmerizing movement.

 

“The Shadows of Edgar Allan Poe” is a devised piece of theatre, according to Professor Hardiman. “Devised theatre can include song, movement, poetry, improvisation, pieces of actual text, striking visual images and reflections on the piece that are highlighted in a new context. Through a collaborative process, the ensemble of actors, director and assistants are developing the performance. We are working to open up ideas and connections between the pieces that readers may not have experienced. The process is to explore background and symbolism while keeping the pieces accessible and performance-worthy.” 

 

The performance is designed to be an immersive event of approximately 90 minutes and will feature original musical compositions by Dylan Smith and Jefferson Gentry, who have worked with Hardiman previously on LLCC projects.

 

LLCC Theatre is engaging in an effort to expand the accessibility of its performances through this staging at the Hoogland Center. “This helps increase the exposure of the program to the Springfield audience while enhancing the experience and exposure of those working on the project both backstage and on-stage,” says Hardiman. 

 

LLCC’s theatre program includes 32 courses in multiple disciplines within theatre including acting, directing, stage management, costuming, stage combat and others. More information is available at www.llcc.edu.