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Show u N I V E R 5 I T CEDAR CITY, UTAH• MONDAY, JULY 29, 1996 Plays-in-Progress readings set for next month here he Utah Shakespearean Festival will present its annual staged readings of New Playsin-Progress during the month of August. The four plays will be presented August 1-2, 8-9, 15-16, 22-23, and 26-29. The reading will begin at 10:30 a.m in Thorley Hall, located in Southern Utah Unive rsity's Music Building. Admission to the readings is complimentary, and no seats are reserved. However contributions are encouraged to help support the continuation and development of this important and exciting new Festival program. The four plays being read this year are Ballad Hunter by Jenny Laird (August 1-2 and 28), Sacrament of Meatballs by Mark Steven Jensen (August 8-9 and 29), Gadianton by Eric Samuelson (August 15-1 6 and 29), and Sacrileg e by Edward Mast (Augu st 22-23 and 26). The 1996 New Plays-in-Progress Readings are made possible, in part, through a grant from the Utah Statehood Centennial Co mmission, and all of the plays have some connection to Utah And its pioneer heritage. "The New Plays-in-Progress Reading have become a very popular part of the Festival's offerings," said Wendy Bowers, Festival marketing and public relations director. "It is a chance for us to introduce our audiences to some of the country's best new playwrights and their work. We are very proud of it." Ballad Hunter is set on an isolated mountain during the spring of 1936, just as FDR's New Deal reaches an arm into its mysterious and seemingly forsaken land. It is an eerie tale of a family of three generations of women who come to their day of reckoning when the appearance of a stranger on the mountain forces them to deal with their silent neighbor, each other, and the impending nature of change. It is a play about the unleashing of secrets, the defeat of fear, and the awakening ~f innocence. T Tobin Atkinson WIii direct ·sacrament of Meatballs· Bryan Humphrey wlll direct . ·Sacrilege· George Judy wlll direct ·Gadlanton· and ·Ballad Hunter I In Sacrament of Meatballs, Bachelor Orin, alone on the Hulverson farm, must hire help to assist with cooking, housework, and chores, including care of a strange, mutant calf kept in the basement. Into his life come two teenage missionary girls (sisters) from a religious belief which demands charismatic devotion. The girls are intent upon converting Orin to the faith, when one sister's intentions become more personal. There follows a series of conflicts and events both comic and oddly romantic as all three encounter new realities and new insights both maturing and surprising. Gadianton mingles Mormon myth and scripture with a contemporary story of corporate greed and governmental callousness. Layoffs at a computer software company and nuclear testing in southern Utah a re the basis for an exploration of the tensions between institutional imperatives and individual conscience. The spirit of the Mormon scriptural character, the "robber" Gadianton, hovers over the contemporary characters who must make choices between their personal ethical standards and modern corporate realities. Sacrilege is based on a story from the history of the Hopi Indians, the People of Peace, who live on the table-rocks near the Four Corners area of Arizona, Colorado, Utah, and New Mexico. To their wo rld come the Spanish with metal helmets, not to enslave, but to convert the People of Peace to the religion of Jehovah. With the Spanish come drought, which means starvation for these farming people and requires the year-round cycle of ceremonial dances. Conversions to Christianity and the Spanish way threaten the deterioration of the people's ceremonies and creates serious conflicts between the baptized and the anti Jehovah villagers. The results are tragic and predict the future "death" of the People of Peace. A young Utah/Nevada playwright, Jenny Lai rd writes with a special interest in older characters. She has written a plethora of plays solely for senior actors. The new collection of short plays, Way Out West of Broadway includes her plays George and Sass and Paper Walls. She is also the editor of a new book of original mono logues for senior acto rs to be published this autumn by Dramatic Publishing. She received her M~:tll¥iAting at the . 5Bpersity of Nevada-Las Vegas, studying with Julie Jensen, Davey Marlin-Jones, and Jerry Crawford, Festival Litera ry Seminar Director. Mark Steven Jensen became a Western Playwright afte r moving to Las Vegas from Kensington, Minnesota (population 294). He had threeplays produced in l.:as Vegas: Burning Tar, Garden of the Mind, and Cannibals Are Cooking. He soon moved to Cal ifornia where the San Jose City Lights Theatre produced his Hoghouse and Grave. A trial production of Sacrament of Meatballs was presented at the Onstage Theatre of Pleasant Hill , and the Gena Bua Theatre in Los Angeles recently staged a production of his play Egg. When not writing plays, he is a scriptwriter for Accolade Software in San Jose where he is preparing a new CDROM game , "Deadlock: Planetary Conquest." Eric Samuelson is a Utah native, but spent early yea rs in Bloomington, Indiana. His father was an opera singer and on the faculty of the distinguished Indiana University School of Music. Samuelson completed a mission in Norway for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, a B.A. Degree in Theatre from Brigham Young University, and a Ph.D. From Indiana University where he studied playwriting with Orson Scott Card, Sam Smiley, and Tim Slover. He has written 14 plays, including the libretto to Murray Bo ren's opera, Emma. His plays have been produced in California, Indiana, New York, and Utah. He is {continued on page ZJ |