Shows: Past Productions
[ Coming Soon ] + Past Productions +
STADIUM DEVILDARE
a new play by Ruth Margraff
directed by Shawn Sides
composed by Graham Reynolds
created by Rude Mechs
| "...[the actors] unleash torrents of text, fevered
arias fueled by Margraff's astonishing sense of language, words spilling
forth at mach speed, sentences in overdrive, their evocative images and
provocative meanings barely glimpsed as they rocket toward the horizon...
Sides' canny direction, supplemented by Graham Reynolds' thundering, adrenaline-rush
score, keeps the work focused and compelling." -- Robert Faires, The Austin Chronicle. (click here to read the entire review) Ladies and Gentlemen: Four contestants have been transported to an actual U.S. battle zone in order to entertain the troops and take care of the Enemy. Every square inch of action and desire is surveiled in order that it might be edited later for maximum entertainment. Inspired by survival-style reality programming, the inimitable playwright Ruth Margraff pits a quartet of gifted patriots against each other to win the honor of wearing Evel Knievel’s magical outfit and take a shot at the world’s most destructive forces: Godzilla-like adversaries seeking to corrupt the supreme American global freedoms and industrial Democracies that we enjoy today. A paranoid frenzy of gory hallucinations, obstacle courses, and competitive consumption which turns into an intimate, simple and sincere attempt to address ourselves to “real” reality and sacrifice. Features an original orchestral score composed by Graham Reynolds inspired by Shostakovich, Blue Oyster Cult and Chinese percussion. WHEN: April 22 - May 22, 2004 WHERE: The Off Center TICKETS: $15 general admission Call 476-RUDE (7833) OTHER USEFUL INFO: * Be Warned! This performance contains Adult Language and Themes, smoking, loud music and sound, and flashing lights. * There will be an audience talkback following each Thursday performance. * The ensemble cast includes many of Austin’s most talented and acclaimed performers: Jason Liebrecht, Lana Lesley, Robert S. Fisher, Joey Hood and Shawn Sides. The design team includes Brian Scott (Lighting), Leslie Bonnell (Costumes), Robert S. Fisher (Sound). and Stephen Pruitt (Scenic). * This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts, which believes that a great nation deserves great art. ABOUT THE ARTISTS: RUTH MARGRAFF (playwright) Ruth is a HARP artist-in-residence and a founding member of HERE Arts Center’s “Opera Project” where she has written The Electra Fugues, Night Vision, Judges 19, and Cry Pitch Carrolls. Her work also includes composer Fred Ho’s Voice of the Dragon … A Martial Arts Ballet (to tour in 2003 to 40 cities and slated for the Apollo Theater in 2004), Wallpaper Psalm, Back to the Dollar Latin, Centaur Battle of San Jacinto, and Locket Arias. Her works have been developed and produced by Brooklyn Academy of Music, Lincoln Center, Public, Kitchen, NYTW, Guggenheim Museum, Gale Gates Company, and Mabou Mines, Walker Art Center (Minneapolis), Seattle Repertory, Undermain (Dallas), Audrey Skirball-Kenis (Los Angeles), Iowa Playwrights’ Workshop and several Austin-based companies including Yacov Sarir’s Danceworks and Deborah Hay Dance Company. Internationally, Margraff has been produced in New Zealand, Turkey, Serbia, Yugoslavia, Russia, and is slated for an upcoming project at Tokyo’s Theatre Nohgaku and has received a special invitation to the 2003 Rembetika Conference (Isle of Hydra, Greece). Ruth’s work has been published in NuMuse Anthology, Epoch, Patterson Literary Review, Smith and Kraus, and American Theater. Ruth has received a Jerome Fellowship, McKnight Advancement Grant, Bellagio artist residency, and three Rockefeller Foundation commissions in new opera. Ruth has taught literature, creative writing and socio-political theory at St. Joseph’s College and Long Island University, and currently teaches playwriting at Brown and Yale universities, and is on leave from the University of Texas at Austin Michener Center for Writers. She is a member of the New Dramatists. SHAWN SIDES (director) Shawn Sides has been a performer, director and producer in Austin and New York for the past 16 years. Directing credits for Rude Mechanicals include curst & Shrewd: The Taming of the Shrew Unhinged (’97); Crucks, Part II of Kirk Lynn’s Faminly Trilogy (’98 -Austin Critics’ Table Award- “Outstanding Movement”); Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the 20th Century (Austin - ’99, ’00; “Best Comedy”, “Outstanding Director” Austin Critics’ Table; “Outstanding Director of a Comedy” B. Iden Payne Awards), Ohio Theatre/Foundry Theatre, New York (‘01), Walker Arts Center, Minneapolis (’01), The Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus (’01), On the Boards, Seattle (’02), UCLA (’02), Sommer-Szene Festival, Salzburg, Austria (’03); Requiem for Tesla (’01 - “Outstanding Director of a Drama”, “Best Overall Environment” Austin Critics’ Table, ‘03); El Paraiso (’02 - “Best Musical” Austin Critics’ Table). The Austin Chronicle named Shawn as “Best Director” in 2002 and 2003. Additionally, Shawn was recognized as one of “Austin’s Most Valuable Players on the Stage” by Austin Chronicle critics in 2002. One of the founding members of Rude Mechanicals, Shawn has served as Co-Producing Artistic Director since the company’s inception in 1995. Shawn holds an M.A. in Theatre from New York University. GRAHAM REYNOLDS (composer) Graham Reynolds has worked
professionally as a composer, performer, and bandleader for the past
15 years. His works include three major orchestral works (two symphonies
and a violin concerto), seventeen one-movement string quartets and countless
other chamber music pieces, and scores for feature length films, experimental
film shorts, animation, dance, and theater. His band, The Golden Arm
Trio, has two full-length CD releases and tours nationally on a regular
basis. Graham composed the original score and performed live for Ruth
Margraff’s The Cry Pitch Carrolls, produced by Salvage Vanguard
Theatre, Austin, in 1999. He also composed the original score and performed
live for Ruth’s Wallpaper Psalm, 2001 which won “Outstanding
Musical Direction” from the Austin Critics’ Table Awards.
Other projects have included American Demons, a collaborative work with
Deborah Hay, Jason Neulander, and Andrea Moon, 2000, and scores for
new dance works by artists including Andrea Ariel and Yakov Sharir.
With Rude Mechs, Graham has arranged and performed music for In the
House of the Moles, by Terry Galloway, 1999, and composed and performed
original music for Requiem for Tesla, conceived and directed by Shawn
Sides, written by Kirk Lynn, 2001. Most recently with Rude Mechs, Graham
composed a new score and performed live music for their re-invention
of Requiem for Tesla 2003, and co-composed and performed live music
for El Paraiso for which won “Outstanding Original Score”
from the Austin Critic’s Table. Fall 2002 saw the premiere of
Graham's first opera, Motherbone, written with librettist Karen Hartman
(winner of the Lowe Award for Music Theater) and produced by Salvage
Vanguard Theatre in Austin and in a recent workshop production in New
York. Graham is currently a composer-in-residence at Salvage Vanguard
Theatre. |
|
Photos by Bret Brookshire
|
For tickets or information please call 512-476-RUDE
or visit our tickets page. Copyright © 2005 Rude Mechanicals. All rights reserved.
|
||
