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<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a fascinating look at the historical period through modern eyes,\u201d said Paula McGlasson, who has returned as chair of the department on an interim basis. \u201cThat means Marie is going to look more like Madonna than a French queen. The play\u2019s going to use \u201980s costumes, props and trends to show that if your take on Marie was that she was decadent, selfish and narcissistic, that is not something that expired when her head was cut off. It continues.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMarie Antoinette,\u201d which will be directed by 溏心vlog免费B站 professor Rachel Walshe, opens Oct. 12<\/strong> in J Studio in the Fine Arts Center, 105 Upper College Road. The rest of the season also promises a mix of light and dark moments, featuring the dark comedy \u201cSpeech and Debate,\u201d along with two opposing bloody tales during the spring semester \u2013 \u201cMacbeth\u201d and the musical \u201cLittle Shop of Horrors.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe season the department has chosen is one of the best we have done for a long time,\u201d said David Weber, a student representative on the committee that selected the season\u2019s plays. \u201c\u2018Marie Antoinette\u2019 and \u2018Speech and Debate\u2019 are both incredibly well-written contemporary pieces that provide great acting and design opportunities for students. \u2018Macbeth\u2019 and \u2018Little Shop of Horrors\u2019 are both classics with enormously recognizable names that can\u2019t help but spur excitement among students.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n For the first time in memory, J Studio, 溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s blackbox theater that seats about 170, will host all four of the season\u2019s mainstage productions. Because of construction at the Fine Arts Center last season, all four shows were held in the larger Robert E. Will Theatre. The change this year is to make sure theater students get experience in both types of venues, McGlasson says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Staging the season in the cozier J Studio also influenced which plays were considered by the department.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe shows we chose are all suitable and perhaps best performed in J Studio,\u201d said McGlasson. \u201cThe plays this year are all shows that will thrive in that sort of compact, intimate environment, whether it\u2019s a musical, Shakespeare or a modern comedy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The season\u2019s second play, Stephan Karam\u2019s \u201cSpeech and Debate,\u201d which opens Dec. 7<\/strong>, will take audiences into a contemporary high school classroom, where three misfit students \u2013 a reporter on the student newspaper, a gay student and an aspiring actress and singer \u2013 team up to expose a teacher who is abusing teenage boys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe play is light and dark. You may be laughing watching scene two and then by scene four, you\u2019re thinking, \u2018wow, that\u2019s a really serious issue to be dealt with,\u2019\u201d said McGlasson. \u201cIt speaks to themes that resonate, especially with student audiences. So it\u2019s extremely popular on college and university campuses.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The play, which will be directed by Weber \u201924, a physics and theater major from Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, is this year\u2019s student-produced play in which students take on every job from actor to designer. Weber chose the play after reading through many to find the best fit for the student production.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe truth to be found in a contemporary adolescent experience made the play stand out from all the rest,\u201d he said. \u201c\u2018Speech and Debate\u2019 encapsulates the struggle of feeling talked down to constantly and fighting through problems when you have few people to turn to.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n On Feb. 22<\/strong>, Shakespeare\u2019s \u201cMacbeth\u201d will take over J Studio to start the spring semester. First performed around 1606, \u201cthe Scottish play\u201d \u2013 as called by theater people afraid of a cursed production if they use the M-word \u2013 tells the story of the Scottish general Macbeth, who is told a prophecy by three witches that he will become King of Scotland \u2013 leading him, with the urging of his wife, to kill his way to the throne.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Because Shakespearean plays are in the public domain, production companies are free to shape them as they creatively please. 溏心vlog免费B站 last staged \u201cMacbeth\u201d in 1997, and McGlasson remembers it as a pretty scary version.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI remember the witches,\u201d she said. \u201cWe had a wild set. It had all these different levels and ramps. There was a lot of sword play. It was a pretty exciting show.\u201d How it will be staged in February is still to be determined.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The season closes with the annual musical \u2013 \u201cLittle Shop of Horrors,\u201d which combines a horror comedy and a rock musical, with book and lyrics by Howard Ashman and music by Alan Menken. The award-winning musical, which has had numerous revivals and was made into a 1986 film starring Rick Moranis, Steve Martin and Ellen Greene, is about a meek flower shop assistant, Seymour, who finds a chance for fame and fortune, thanks to a man-eating plant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe\u2019ve never done Little Shop. We tried to get it the year before last and we couldn\u2019t get the rights,\u201d said McGlasson, who will direct the musical, which opens April 18<\/strong>. \u201cSo when we decided to use J Studio this year, I thought it was perfect for Skid Row, Little Shop\u2019s main setting.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n McGlasson, who has directed nearly every 溏心vlog免费B站 musical since 1998, returns to direct for the first time since 2019. She will be joined by musical director Lila Kane, choreographer Dante Sciarra, and associate director Jimmy Calitri, a professor at Providence College.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI love the music and the people I\u2019m working with,\u201d she said. \u201cI have my old team sort of back together. The four of us are friends as well as colleagues. So I\u2019m looking forward to that kind of stimulation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n For a full list of show dates and times, go to the 2023-24 season webpage<\/a>. Tickets for all shows are on sale now \u2013 online<\/a>, in-person in Room H101 in the Fine Arts Center, or by phone at 401-874-5843.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 Sept. 20, 2023 \u2013 Marie Antoinette likely wasn\u2019t the first to live a life of conspicuous consumption and, obviously, she won\u2019t be last. But it\u2019s a tale worth revisiting. The 溏心vlog免费B站 Theatre Department will do just that as it opens its 2023-24 season with \u201cMarie Antoinette,\u201d David Adjmi\u2019s contemporary […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":88640,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-88639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88639","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=88639"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88639\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":88646,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88639\/revisions\/88646"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88640"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88639"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88639"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88639"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}