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News from the Department

AA/EOE/ADAI UC 69263.5052 8.13

THE UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN MISSISSIPPI

Department of Theatre

Welcome to the

Dear Friends,

This season the Department of Theatre will celebrate the masterworks of uniquely American drama,and we are thrilled to present three Pulitzer Prize winning works by our nation’s finest writers.

Of special mention is Clybourne Park (Pulitzer 2011), by Bruce Norris, an uproarious and challenging work that examines our national progress along themes of personal civility and civil rights. Darkly satirical and provocative, this play follows the demographic life of a single house in Chicago as it passes from the civil rights era to present day. Many of our patrons may already know the smash rock musical RENT (Pulitzer 1996), by Jonathan Larson, which will open our season with an exhilarating rush. This upbeat musical perfectly captures the New York urban culture of the 1990s at its most precarious, and in doing so it introduced the genre of rock musical to a new generation of avid fans.

William Inge’s Picnic, winner of the Pulitzer in 1953, draws audiences to a simpler and smaller American community in the Midwest. Here we visit with neighboring families whose quiet peace is shaken when a young and confident stranger appears on the eve of the town picnic. Rounding out our celebration of American writers will be Tony Kushner’s A Bright Room Called Day, a boldly political examination of the banality of Weimar era Berlin and the rise of fascism in the 1930s. Kushner (who later won the Pulitzer for Angels in America) exposes his early talent here with incisive political theatre.

Southern Miss Theatre is proud to extend our celebration of masterworks in presenting Shakespeare’s The Tempest and Nicolai Gogol’s The Government Inspector. Gogol, among the finest Russian writers of the early 19th century, almost single-handedly ushered in a new style of distinctly modern satire with The Government Inspector, a play with insight, wit and no shortage of physical comedy. Our season closes with Shakespeare’s late gem, The Tempest, whose plot twists and magical enchantments give way to touching romance and tearful family reconciliations. While the play is known for its theatricality and magic, its real allure is found in Shakespeare’s insight into the human spirit and his breathtaking poetical language.

We hope that you’ll take advantage of the full offering of plays this season, which showcases some of the country’s — and even the world’s — finest dramatic works.

Welcome to the new season, and we’ll see you soon at the theatre!

With All Best Wishes,

John Warrick Chair, Department of theatre

With generous support from the college and university, Associate Professor Sean Boyd (Performance) has been accepted to the Classical Theatre for the Professional Theatre program at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts (LAMDA), where he will spend the entirety of his sabbatical year.

Associate Professor Robin Carr (Performance) traveled to Sydney to present a series of training workshops for Australia’s flagship university for theatre studies, the prestigious National Institute of Dramatic Art. Robin also took the opportunity to travel to the Philippines to work with the Theatre Art Guild there.

Assistant Professor Murell Horton (Design and Technology) was nominated for a Helen Hayes award for his costume design in Nicolai Gogol’s The Government Inspector at the Shakespeare Theatre Company. Professor Horton’s work appeared during the season in which the Shakespeare Theatre Company won the Tony Award for Regional Theatre.

The Department of Theatre is the recipient of an NEA grant under the Arts Engagement in American Communities project. Associate Professor John Warrick (Theatre History) will serve as project director and dramaturg in a year-long; multi-disciplinary collaboration with the Department of Dance. Work will be undertaken with the additional, generous support of Southern Miss' Office of Research.

2013-14 Theatre Season Celebrating Masterworks of American Drama

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A Shipwreck. An Enchanted Island. A Dangerous Reconciliation.

Main Stage Project, Tatum Theatre April 17, 18, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26 at 7:30 p.m. | April 27* at 2 p.m. RESERVED SEATS: $14 public; $10 faculty, staff, seniors and military; $8 students *PRESHOW TALK AT 1 P.M.

Shakespeare’s late masterpiece combines intrigue, danger and romance in a world brimming with magic and enchantment. Variously termed a romance play and a tragicomedy, The Tempest reflects the maturity of a seasoned playwright at the peak of his skills. Often taken by endeared audiences as the culminating work of the best-known playwright of the English language, The Tempest promotes a vision of forgiveness and family reconciliation through poetic sentiment.

Winner of the 1953 Pulitzer Prize in Drama

Studio Project, Hartwig Theatre March 28, 29 and April 3, 4, 5 at 7:30 p.m. | March 30 at 2 p.m. GENERAL ADMISSION: $8

Set in a small town in Kansas, Picnic details the lives of "ordinary" Americans from hopeful widows and embittered spinsters to idealistic teenagers and restless wanderers. Picnic picks up with the Owens family and their neighbors and an unlikely encounter with a mysterious and alluring stranger at the annual community picnic. A master at depicting families rooted in the American Heartland, Inge is often hailed as the voice of his generation and is particularly known as the “Playwright of the Midwest.”

Winner of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize in Drama

Main Stage Project, Tatum Theatre Feb. 20, 21, 22, 26*, 27, 28 and March 1 at 7:30 p.m. | Feb. 23 at 2 p.m. RESERVED SEATS: $14 public; $10 faculty, staff, seniors and military; $8 students *PRESHOW TALK AT 6:30 P.M. | INCLUDES ADULT THEMES AND EXPLICIT LANGUAGE

Pulitzer Prize Winner and Tony Award Winner for Best Play, Clybourne Park takes us on a wickedly funny and disturbingly real encounter with racism and real estate. The same Chicago neighborhood is seen through black and white as time changes from 1959 to 2009. Brilliantly written, this searing satire picks up where Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun left off, then takes a sharp plot turn into the 21st century. How much has really changed? This piece is courageously honest and contains adult language, humor and themes.

The Powerful Account of the Fall of Weimar Berlin

Studio Project, Hartwig Theatre Oct. 31 and Nov. 1, 2, 5*, 6 at 7:30 p.m. | Nov. 3 at 2 p.m. GENERAL ADMISSION: $8 | *PRESHOW TALK AT 6:30 P.M. | INCLUDES ADULT THEMES

This thought-provoking and boldly political effort by Tony Kushner (Pulitzer prize winning playwright for Angels in America) recounts the rise of Weimar Berlin’s art culture, just at the moment when an obscure and poorly educated Hitler began appealing to populist movements in Germany. More than a simple treatment of a tragic moment in history, the play investigates how common Berliners were unable to act against a rising fascist threat, or chose not to.

THE TONY AWARD WINNING SMASH ROCK MUSICAL!

Main Stage Project, Tatum Theatre Oct. 3, 4, 9, 10, 11, 12 at 7:30 p.m. | Oct. 6 and 13 at 2 p.m. RESERVED SEATS: $14 public; $10 faculty, staff, seniors and military; $8 students INCLUDES ADULT THEMES

Loosely based on Puccini’s classic opera, La Bohème, RENT earned both the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and a Tony Award for best play in 1996. With song favorites such as the catchy “Seasons of Love” and “No Day But Today,” Jonathan Larson succeeded in "bring[ing] musical theatre to the MTV generation." The piece achieves much more, however, in humanely depicting the fragility and hope of urban youth in New York City during the gritty 1990s.

RENT by JONATHAN LARSON Clybourne Park by BRUCE NORRIS

Picnic by WILLIAM INGE

The Tempest by WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

A Bright Room Called Day by TONY KUSHNER

The Government Inspector by NICOLAI GOGOL Adaptation by Peter Raby, Based on a Translation by Leonid Ignatieff

If your face is lopsided, Don’t blame the mirror. — A Proverb

Main Stage Project, Tatum Theatre Nov. 14, 15, 20, 21, 22 at 7:30 p.m. | Nov. 17* and 24 at 2 p.m. RESERVED SEATS: $14 public; $10 faculty, staff, seniors and military; $8 students | *PRESHOW TALK AT 1 P.M.

Gogol’s hilarious satire is often considered the funniest and most biting Russian play of the 19th century. When a provincial Russian town mistakes the wrong man as an inspector from the central government, bribery overflows; but the smiles turn to stunned disbelief as the action builds to oneof the most famous endings in theatre. We are pleased to present an adaptation produced at the Guthrie Theatre in 1973.