UC Davis gets creative to save long-planned theater show
The coronavirus pandemic has turned the performing arts world upside down. Directors have had to abruptly pull the curtain on live performances, forced to wait the pandemic out or find another way to share their work.
For two University of California Davis professors, it was a crushing end to the planned May 14 opening of a modern day interpretation of the Sophocles’ “Antigone,” two years in the making.
Then, like a lightning bolt from stage left, associate professor Margaret Laurena Kemp came up with an alternative. “I was moved to consider how we would allow this moment in history to positively impact our learning community and our intended production,” Kemp said.
The result? An online multimedia remake titled “Antigone NOW” which the public can view for one day only, Saturday, May 23, after registering for the link on the university website.
The 20-minute production was co-directed by award-winning Irish director Sinéad Rushe, an artist in residence, and acted by UC Davis theater and arts students.
It is a deeper look at the emotional struggles of Antigone, the sister of two brothers who fought opposite sides in the Thebes’ civil war. In the classical version, Antigone faces the anguish of her two brothers’ death, killed fighting each other on the civil war battlefield. The new King allows one brother Eteocles to be buried with war hero status. He orders that the remains of her other brother Polyneices, who fought on the opposite side, to be left lying on the ground where he was killed. Antigone defies the King and buries Polyneices anyway. The King sentences her to death for her deed. Instead, she hangs herself, not knowing the King was going to relent. Antigone NOW hones in on her trauma.
“We’ve stripped the play back,” said Rushe, “… the all-female cast each play Antigone in a kind of polyphony, a chorus. The piece is a collage of filmed responses to Antigone’s grief and hones in on her decision to bury her brother illegally.”
The NOW part in the title reflects the revamped project done in the current COVID period. It is also acknowledges the eerie similarity of the classic tragedy to a wrenching pandemic situational challenge a loved one faces today – whether to host a proper funeral for their deceased and violate the public health order to not gather in crowds. The theme, then and now, is about the deeply felt necessity of physical human connection.
It has a specially composed musical score and sound design by Lex Kosanke, based in London, with additional contributions by graduate student Jennifer Grace in Davis and Owen Marshall, who obtained a doctorate from Davis in 2019 and currently works out of New York.
Part of the process involved exploring verse and spoken word performance with Dahlak Brathwaite, another alumnus, also in New York. Everyone worked across time zones to pull the production together.
“We ran daily rehearsals synchronously online, doing ensemble work,” said Rushe, “and then sending the actors off to film sections of the script wherever they were – on their phones, or using laptops, iPads or video cameras. Every day they were given direction and notes to reshoot in person in rehearsal on line or on email.”
For UC Davis undergraduate student actors Alyia Hunter, Margarita Olmos and doctoral student Regina Gutierrez Bermudez it was an intense but rewarding experience. “It became a positive learning for us,” said Gutierrez. “Like Antigone, we need to learn different ways to do things and find a way to be truthful and caring.” The professors became students of the new process too.
“We didn’t know if we could do it,” said Rushe, noting the team worked collectively from four different parts of the world – the United States, United Kingdom, Japan and Singapore. “We invented the methodology as we went along. But what seemed impossible to do – as isolated and secluded as we were – we were able to do and create a real sense of ensemble.”
“We learned one can create meaningful presence between people through virtual media,” said Kemp. However, when life returns to normal, the love of live theater – possibly with more use of digital elements – should be even more special.
“I feel there will be a higher appreciation (of) the spirit of creativity in the flesh and an appreciation of it with fresh eyes,” Rushe said. In the meantime the ensemble production AntigoneNOW should as Kemp says in promoting the production, “answer the call.”
If you go
Register now to view AntigoneNOW by going to www.arts.ucdavis.edu/theatre-and-dance. A link will be emailed to registrants 24 hours in advance of the production.