Upcoming: An Ordinary String by Hannah Bisewski, staged reading at the Blue Theatre, May 9

The Blue Theatre new plays series

presents

 

. . . . 'An Ordinary String'

...a new play by Hannah Bisewski

ONE NIGHT ONLY - Wednesday, May 9th at 8 pm

Blue Theatre, 916 Springdale

Blue Theatre hosts UT MFA playwriting graduate
Hannah Bisewski to present her newest play:
'An Ordinary String'

A mind-bending play within-a-play-within-a-play, in which stories encompass wandering theatre troupes, a steampunk turn-of-the-century magician, and an Old World cabaret. Bisewski originally developed and premiered 'An Ordinary String', co-directed by Melanie Scruggs and Hannah Bisewski, last fall during its earliest stages as part of the Plan II-affiliated Broccoli Project' at the University of Texas. Bisewski is a recent graduate of the University of Texas MFA Playwrighting Program and attends Columbia this Fall.

Blue Theatre Resident Director and Company of Actors are pleased to present a formal public staged reading of 'An Ordinary String', as part of our New Plays Series. Our Resident Artists support, develop, host and produce new works of multi-disciplinary art, performance and theatre. The New Plays Series/Writer Development Program is designed to give emerging playwrights an opportunity to develop these new works for the stage through open public staged readings held throughout the season. We encourage you to attend talk-backs with playwright, actors and director following each performance as feedback and open discussion play a fundamental part in the writer's creative process.

'An Ordinary String' will be presented at Blue Theatre, 916 Springdale, Austin, Texas 78702 on Wednesday, May 9th at 8 p.m.

Staged Reading FREE to attend. Any and all donations are greatly appreciated and support ongoing new plays development at the Blue Theatre. Reception to Follow.

Conversations While Dining Alone by Ken Johnson, Dougherty Arts Center, January 13 - 29

by Hannah Bisewski

An evening at the Dougherty Arts Center for Ken Johnson’s Conversations While Dining Alone is a voyage into the brooding, lonely thoughts of the saddest people we know. Or maybe into those of just about everyone we know. These original monologues capture some of the ideas we have when we’re alone, the frustrations and the very ugliest thoughts that haunt our quieter moments.

Chuck Merlo enters and seats himself at a desk, places a McDonalds breakfast before him and begins an irritable rant into the cell phone pressed against his head. His steady monologue suggests there isn’t much of a conversation taking place. Merlo gestures at the wooden human figures around him, painted in all shades and fixed in all sorts of poses, referring to them as the “great unwashed,” the unshowered masses, homeless people whom he must serve in some capacity. He complains of their stupidity, their laziness, their sordid attempts at taking advantage of the welfare system. Only toward the end of his monologue do we understand that he might envy them in some sense, that maybe his character craves some level of acceptance and compassion from their community.

And so begins the parade of intimacy, texts fashioned entirely by Ken Johnson. Kayo Productions’ cast of eleven actors presents a total of twenty-four characters. Each provides a brief introduction and context and then expounds upon the most painful trope of the character’s existence. They range from sexually deprived wives to lonely custodians and murderous husbands -- the abusive and the abused. The light dims gently after each monologue and the company rearranges the featureless wooden figures. Sometimes the characters speak to the silhouettes, trying to bridge some communication gap and to make themselves understood. Of course, they fail. Sometimes the figures simply serve as a faceless crowd, a reminder that much of the interaction in which we engage every day ends up anonymous and unheard.

The bottom of the stage is lined with a cityscape in silhouette, suggesting that these characters are people we can find anywhere, in this city as much as in the next. And, sure enough, many of the issues the monologues confront are believable, even familiar, so much so that a few of the characters feel a bit archetypical or clichéd. Many of the performances hint at self-parody, though rarely with conviction or entirely enough to be understood as such (Sally Hultgren’s “A League of her Own”, performed at the end of the first act, is an exception: the story of a wealthy homemaker addicted to crack cocaine). Many of the performances are designed to make us uncomfortable at times, so that the audience isn’t sure whether to laugh or to keep a somber silence.

Conversations While Dining Alone is an exercise in humanity, in stepping into the shoes of another person, probably someone less fortunate than yourself, and trying on that plight for size. What you’ll find is a trove of compassion you might not have tapped in quite a while. Some of the issues are stark and much of the language is strong and raw (and rightly so), so children aren’t likely to enjoy the performance.

Conversations While Dining Alone plays at 7:30 p.m. and tickets are $12.50. Student discounts are available.

Upcoming: An Ordinary String by Hannah Bisewski, Broccoli Project, University of Texas, November 11 - 20

Received directly:

The Broccoli Project

at the University of Texas

presents

An Ordinary String

by Hannah Bisewski

Co-directed by Hannah Bisewski and Melanie Scruggs

November 11 - 13 and 18 - 20, 7:30 p.m.

Black Box Theatre, Student Activities Center, Room 2.304, 2201 Speedway (click for map)

The Plan II-affiliated Broccoli Project's production this fall An Ordinary String is an original production written by Plan II senior Hannah Bisewski. Co-directed by Melanie Scruggs and Hannah Bisewski, An Ordinary String is a mind-bending play within-a-play-within-a-play, in which stories encompass wandering theatre troupes, a steampunk turn-of-the-century magician, and an Old World cabaret. Prepare yourself for a space-altering radical take on the theatre experience. Performances will be held in the SAC black box theatre, November 11-13 and 18-20 at 7:30. Tickets are $5 for students, $10 for non-students, and can be purchased at the door prior to performance.

Audience members enter this theatrical realm faced with a choice: the seat chosen around this four-sided set constructed of four equilateral stages determines one of four possible realities to be experienced. Three sides of the story remain a mystery, that is unless you choose to see the play more than once.

Night of the Living Dead, Weird City Theatre Company at Doughety Arts Center, October 13 - 29

by Hannah Bisewski

A note to the nervous: Weird City Theatre’s Night of the Living Dead will have you clenching the edge of your seats, squinting into the darkness to see if a zombie is lumbering in your direction. Director John Carroll’s arrangement of the performance space at the Dougherty Arts Center manipulates spectators to facilitate that sense of terror. A runway extends from the traditional proscenium, separating the audience down the middle and leading to a smaller stage behind them. More than once an actor rose from the dark and terrified someone in the back row with unexpected contact.

George Romero’s 1968 black-and-white zombie film provides the story. Almost all of the dialogue in the Weird City’s staging comes directly from the film, so fans will appreciate familiar lines with expressions idiosyncratic of the era.

From the first moment the atmosphere is that of a bone-chilling, midnight graveyard, swirling in fog, glowing under black lights and alive with heart-stoppingly eerie ambient sounds. An obviously human form sits in a downstage chair, covered by a blood-stained blanket. This ransacked interior will soon become the hideout of the surviving characters.

The action is as fast-paced as the film, and before long zombies are clawing at the Laffy Taffy innards of characters we meet only briefly.

The chills go down a bit after the intermission, as the focus shifts to the stressful entanglements of the refugees and the conflicting messages of ill-fated newscasters. Missed cues and dropped lines lowered the energy of the Saturday night performance, but gradually the tension rose once again. Zombies ambled comically in the background of the living room, staring down the remaining survivors. The nervous, creepy atmosphere of the opening builds to violent, overwhelming horror as zombies overwhelm the final few survivors.

Weird City Theatre Company will keep you transfixed to the very end of this Night of the Living Dead, even if you’re familiar with the classic film. This dedicated cast brings live dramatic irony to celluloid fantasies. You’ll feel tremendous relief to see the last of that hoard of zombies mosey out of the theatre.

EXTRA

Click to read ALT review of WCTC's first production of Night of the Living Dead, November, 2008

Reviews from Elsewhere: Chaoses, The Broccoli Project, UT, reviewed by The Daily Texan

Found on-line:

Plan II players engage complex plot

By Gerald Rich
Daily Texan Staff
Thursday, November 19, 2009


Photo: Jordy Wagoner/The Daily Texan
In the picture Kyle Evora plays the character Felipe in The Broccoli Project’s latest production, “Chaoses,” written and directed by Plan II Honors student Hannah Bisewski
[click photo to view larger version]

As audience members slowly trickled into the Burdine auditorium early Saturday night and chatted before the show, suddenly, and without any change in stage lighting, a planted cast member jumped up from the audience and began prefacing the play.

The audience is left to wonder where reality stops and the fiction begins in “Chaoses,” the latest play by Plan II student organization The Broccoli Project.

“Not only is it a play within a play, it’s like a play within a play within a play. There are plots crossing over, bending and interweaving,” said writer/director and Plan II junior Hannah Bisewski. “It speaks to how immutable that line is between reality and fiction. The characters in pieces of fiction, whether it’s a conscious effort or not, are always trying to transcend the limits of their own fiction.”

The play begins with a present-day journalist wishing to move away from the stark realism of news reporting. He sets out to write a slightly fictionalized yet reality-based memoir. The journalist then visits an elderly couple and begins to listen to the husband’s hilariously risque ramblings about his princess falling in love with a pirate. Although these ramblings initially seem like pure fantasy, the audience slowly learns that the stories actually lie somewhere in between fiction and reality.

Read more at the Daily Texan Online. . . .