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Theatre South Carolina: New season features classic comedy, drama, and comedy-drama
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A fine mix of old and new, comedy and drama defines the 2006-07 season for Theatre South Carolina.
The season opens in September with The Real Thing, a Tony Award-winning drama by British playwright Tom Stoppard. In what has become a tradition at USC, the season will wrap up with a work by William Shakespeare--the comedy As You Like It. In between will be a fable by Bertolt Brecht and a comedy-drama by Martin McDonagh.
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| Tom Stoppard |
Stoppard's The Real Thing is about two cunning, game-playing couples searching for love. The play was originally produced in London in 1982. It came to Broadway in 1984 in a production starring Glenn Close and Jeremy Irons and it won numerous Tony Awards. Stoppard also wrote the play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead and the screenplay for the movie Shakespeare in Love, which won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1998. The Real Thing at USC will be directed by Karla Koskinen.
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| Bertolt Brecht |
Brecht's The Good Woman of Setzuan is an oriental folk tale about an impoverished woman who is chosen by the gods to receive money because she is the only good person in town. German poet and playwright Brecht (1898-1956) attempted to develop a new approach to the theater: to persuade his audiences to see the stage as a stage, and actors as actors, and not to see the traditional make-believe of the theater. His plays reflected a Marxist interpretation of society and when Adolf Hitler gained power in 1933, Brecht was forced to flee from Germany. He arrived in the U.S. in 1941 and, after settling in Hollywood, helped write the film Hangmen Also Die. He was later called before the House of Un-American Activities Committee, was blacklisted in the Hollywood community, and soon after moved to East Germany. USC's production of The Good Woman of Setzuan will be directed by Beatrice Rancea, a visiting artist from the National Theatre in Constanta, Romania.
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| Martin McDonagh |
McDonagh's The Pillowman is a 2004 comedy-drama about an unpublished horror writer whose stories about bad things happening to good children begin to come true. The play was awarded the Laurence Olivier Award for best new play in 2004. Some of McDonagh's other plays include The Beauty Queen of Leenane and The Lieutenant of Inishmore. McDonagh, who was born in England to Irish parents, won an Oscar for his first film, Six Shooter, a live-action short. Jim O'Connor, theatre faculty at USC, will direct.
Shakespeare's As You Like It, takes place in the enchanted Forest of Arden, where the line separating reality and fantasy is blurred. Duke Senior, his daughter Rosalind, and his niece Celia flee the court for refuge in the forest and are pursued by assassins. Rosalind must disguise herself as a man in order to survive. Rosalind falls for Orlando, Phebe falls for Rosalind…and it all ends in marriage and laughter. The director of this production is to be announced.
For more information about the upcoming Theatre South Carolina season, go to the USC Department of Theatre and Dance Web site at www.cas.sc.edu/thea/index1.html.
7/06
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Mark your calendar
--The Real Thing, by Tom Stoppard, Sept. 29-Oct. 15, Drayton Hall
--The Good Woman of Setzuan, by Bertolt Brecht, Nov. 3-19, Longstreet Theater
--The Pillowman, by Martin McDonagh, Feb. 23-March 4, 2007, Drayton Hall
--As You Like It, by William Shakespeare, April 20-29, 2007, Drayton Hall
Tickets for these productions are $14 general public; $12 senior citizens, military, and USC faculty and staff; $10 students.
Season tickets--which will be available in mid-September--can be purchased by calling 7-2551.
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