Goodman Youth Arts Council and God of Carnage!

By Teresa Rende, Education and Community Engagement Associate

The Goodman Youth Arts Council (GYAC), our newest program for teens, has been in high gear this spring! GYAC members serve as the Goodman’s teenage ambassadors. Donating their time, work and brain power, GYAC members not only aid the Goodman with special events, but strive to create theatergoers among others their age. Whether it is through their mission statement, videos or outreach work, they find innovative ways to seek out new teens who have not experienced live theater, and spread the message that theater deserves the attention we already give to movies, TV, video games and popular music!

As we closed God of Carnage earlier this month, the council saw a great opportunity to bring in other teens from their schools. Their goal was to bring teens they didn’t know, and teens that weren’t already involved in drama at school. In conjunction with our 10Tix program, the council offered fellow students tickets at a discounted rate, and on Saturday, nearly 50 fresh faces rolled into Goodman to see God of Carnage. Many from this group had never seen a live theater performance in their life!

To welcome these newcomers, the council threw an after party. They arranged a prize raffle, and one lucky student won the opportunity to see Matthew Morrison perform live at the Goodman Gala in May! If that weren’t enough, the newcomers were welcomed by God of Carnage stars Keith Kupferer and Mary Beth Fisher themselves, who talked about the behind-the-scenes action on God of Carnage as well as their careers and lives; they even stayed to draw the raffle prizes and award winners!

All in all, GYAC throws a pretty great party.

Top: GYAC members (l to r) Brandon Rivera, Vicky Giannini and Lauren Escobar. Bottom: God of Carnage stars Keith Kupferer and Mary Beth Fisher and the GYAC. Photos by Teresa Rende.

New and Familiar Faces

By Jenny Seidelman, Campaign Manager

Sarah Ruhl’s new play, Stage Kiss, is in tech rehearsals right now and will begin previews this Saturday. This world premiere brought a batch of brilliant new faces to the Goodman along with it—among them two hilarious young actors, Jeffrey Carlson and Sarah Tolan-Mee, who are both making their Goodman debuts in the comedy.

But if you are a long-time Goodman patron—or even if you’ve joined us every once in awhile— it’s likely that you’ve seen some familiar faces grace our stages over the years. Brian Dennehy, Mary Beth Fisher and Karen Aldridge, among others, make frequent appearances on our stages. Among the Stage Kiss cast, audiences may remember Erica Elam from her appearance in The Trip to Bountiful in the Horton Foote Festival; Ross Lehman from Waiting for Godot, Wings and The Rover (among others); Mark L. Montgomery from A Christmas Carol; Scott Jaeck from this season’s The Seagull and Mary; and Jenny Bacon—who returns to Goodman Theatre as “She” (the actress with no name) in Stage Kiss.

Behind the somewhat anonymous character that Ms. Bacon plays in Stage Kiss is an actress who has made frequent appearances on Goodman stages over the years. Among them are performances in Eugene O’Neill’s A Touch of the Poet (1995/1996) with Brian Dennehy (directed by Robert Falls) and Anton Chekhov’s Three Sisters (1994/1995; pictured above), also directed by Falls. She was also in Paula Vogel’s The Baltimore Waltz (1992/1993) for which she received a Jeff Award nomination for Best Actress in a Principal Role in a Play.

Here’s an article from a 2000 edition of the Chicago Reader in which Ms. Bacon talks about her journey from wallflower to leading lady.

Top: Jeffrey Carlson and Sarah Tolan-Mee in rehearsal for Stage Kiss. Photo by Liz Lauren. Middle: Jenny Bacon and Mark L. Montgomery in Stage Kiss rehearsal. Photo by Liz Lauren. Bottom: pictured in Robert Falls' 1995 production of Three Sisters by Anton Chekhov are Susan Bruce (Olga), Jenny Bacon (Masha) and Calista Flockhart (Irina). Photo by Eric Y. Exit.

Planting the Nogalar in the Owen Stage

By Erin C. Gaynor, Development Intern

Upon entering the Owen Theatre to see El Nogalar, the most striking feature on the set are the trees. Long and lean (and maybe a little gangly), these trees are beautiful and real.

As readers of my previous post about clafouti know, my favorite part of theater is how so many aspects of it are imitated to fit the stage. When I found out all of the trees on stage for El Nogalar were actual trees, I talked with Assistant Production Manager, Matt Chandler, to find out how the El Nogalar trees came to live in the Goodman.

According to Matt, a friend of Director Cecilie Keenan’s brother knew of a gentleman in Frankfort, Illinois, who was looking to clear some trees off of his property. A few members of the properties team went down to Frankfort to help the gentleman clear the trees and put them on a flatbed truck. The trees were then brought to the Goodman’s scene shop.

The trees on stage are anchored similar to how Christmas trees are every year, but on a much larger scale. Specially cut holes were carved into the deck of the Owen stage. The trees were then placed in those holes, putting the trunks four feet under the stage. Similar to a Christmas tree, the El Nogalar trees are slowly dying (a far more depressing outlook than most of us take around the holidays); their branches have “begun to droop and we are constantly trimming them during the run,” Matt told me.

So why use real trees? Primarily cost. “It’s far easier to cut down a tree versus build, carve and paint a fake tree—the time, labor and materials add up,” said Matt. The last production to use real trees was Ruined, which had palm trees shipped from Florida.

When looking to use real versus false trees, structure and use on stage typically dictates which will be picked. For instance, the tree in The Trinity River Plays needed to be fake due to Iris (Karen Aldridge) and Rose (Penny Johnson Jerald) sitting and interacting with the tree. Real trees begin to decompose after a while and would have been dangerous for the actors.



The El Nogalar set, designed by Brian Sidney Bembridge, is gorgeous.I appreciate that real trees are on stage. For me, the trees limbo between life and death, present yet decomposing, is reminiscent of the memory Maité clings to of the pecan ochard. If you haven’t yet, go see El Nogalar before it closes on Sunday—both the set and the acting are beautiful.

Top: Yunuen Pardo and Carlo Lorenzo Garcia in El Nogalar; photo by Brian Sidney Bembridge. Middle: The set of El Nogalar; photo by Brian Sidney Bembridge. Bottom: Penny Johnson Jerald in The Trinity River Plays; photo by Brandon Thibodeaux.

Reel vs. Real: Iconic Kisses on the Silver Screen

Stage Kiss is in full-on rehearsal mode, and the dialogue around the Goodman’s administrative offices (and in rehearsal, and in photo shoots) these last few weeks has become increasingly kiss-oriented. In the current issue of OnStage, Associate Producer Steve Scott explores some of the most legendary kisses of the silver screen; you can read the full text of his article here; then, if we forgot your favorite film kiss, let us know in the comments!

By Steve Scott
Whether it signifies the beginning of a romance, the consummation of an illicit affair or a death sentence pronounced by a Mafia Don, the kiss is one of the most common and most intimate human interactions found in popular entertainment, providing audiences with some of their favorite memories—and sometimes, as in Sarah Ruhl’s play Stage Kiss, leading to unanticipated results off camera as well. Here is a look back at some of the most memorable stage and screen kisses of the recent past.



THE SCANDALOUS KISS:
The Kiss (1896)
The first kiss recorded on film originated on the Broadway stage in a musical comedy entitled The Widow Jones. In the second act of the play, the show’s stars, May Irwin and John C. Rice, engaged in a lingering smooch that caught the attention of Thomas Edison’s company, which had recently purchased the rights to a motion picture projector known as the Vitaphone. To showcase his new product, Edison filmed Irwin and Rice’s kiss in his New Jersey studio. Although it lasted a scant 20 seconds, the sequence (above) caused an immediate sensation, with critics and civic leaders expressing outrage. Critic Herbert Stone wrote, “Neither participant is physically attractive and the spectacle of their prolonged pasturing on each other’s lips was hard to beat when only life size. Magnified to gargantuan proportions…it is absolutely disgusting!” Perhaps inevitably, The Kiss became the Edison Company’s most popular release of the year.



THE ICONIC KISS:
From Here to Eternity (1953)
The adulterous affair between an army sergeant and a captain’s wife culminated in perhaps the best-known screen kiss of all time: Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr locked in a fervent seaside embrace with the ocean’s waves washing over them (above). Although torturous to film, the scene was one of the most erotically charged couplings yet seen in an American film, and helped make the movie one of the blockbusters of its time. It also may have led to an offscreen romance between the two stars: although Kerr denied the rumors, Lancaster eventually confirmed the affair.

[Continued here.]

Clafouti and Carnage

By Erin C. Gaynor, Development Intern

When I think of theater, I think of its innate “whiz-bang” properties. It’s an art form that has subsisted on making the most with the least amount of money. At least in the not-for-profit world, but we won’t dwell on certain productions of certain superheroes that may or may not be the laughing-stock of Broadway. So when I found out that the clafouti that appears on the Goodman stage in God of Carnage wasn’t gelatin and some food coloring but the actual French dish, I had to investigate.

First of all, Goodman Theatre not only houses two amazing performance spaces, but also has a working kitchen. According to Stephen Kolack, the properties head at the Goodman, real food made in the Goodman kitchen is prepared all the time. In the 2010/2011 Season alone, both The Trinity River Plays and God of Carnage had real food onstage, including pie dough, pie filling, a decorated birthday cake, and of course, clafouti.

It should be known that the Goodman kitchen is not elaborate. It’s tucked into a corner of the props room, like a corner of a classroom that accidentally has an oven in it. Upon entering the props room, there are containers full of fresh tulips (if you’ve seen the show, you know their fate). Stephen, the preparer of all this food, does not believe himself to be a cook. I disagree—as I watched him make the clafouti, he made it with such swift ease, it was like watching a chef on television.

Clafouti is a bit on an unusual dish. It’s made with eggs, flour, vanilla and fruit. It tastes like a custard and can be served warm from the oven or at room temperature. Michael and Veronica discuss the odd qualities of clafouti in God of Carnage:

MICHAEL

So, clafouti, is it a cake or a tart? Serious question. I was just thinking in the kitchen, Linzertorte, for example, is that a tart? Come on, come on, you can’t leave that one little slice.

VERONICA

Clafouti is a cake. The pastry’s not rolled out, it’s mixed in with the fruit.

ALAN

You really are a cook.

VERONICA

I love it. The thing about cooking is you have to love it. In my opinion, it’s only the classic tart, that’s to say on a pastry base, that deserves to be called a tart.

As an avid baker, I was the only person who busted out laughing in the entire theater after this line. Stephen told me the actors in God of Carnage have been great about eating the clafouti every night, especially since the clafouti served onstage is adapted to fit their dietary needs. Here is the recipe for Goodman Theatre’s God of Carnage clafouti:

Clafouti
Serves 4, lasts 3 performances

One 9” – 10” ceramic tart pan
3/4 cup egg whites, from approx. 5 – 6 eggs
1 cup flour
½ cup sugar
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 ½ cup soy milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 apples, peeled, cored, and thinly sliced
(Note: the mechanism used to do all three of these tasks at once—an early version of which is pictured below—is Stephen’s favorite part of making the dish. Also, the God of Carnage script calls for a clafouti with apples and pears and gingerbread crumbs. Just the apples and cinnamon do the visual trick. Remember the “whiz-bang?”)

1)Preheat the oven at 350 degrees fahrenheit.
2)Mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, and cinnamon in a medium-sized bowl. Set aside.
3)Whisk together the egg whites, soy milk, and vanilla in a large-sized bowl. Add the dry ingredients and whisk until just combined.
4)Quickly spray the tart pan with a non-stick spray. Lay in half the apple slices in the pan, then pour half the egg mixture.
5)Place the tart pan in the oven and bake for 15 minutes. The apples should have risen to the top of the egg mixture. Pour the remainder of the egg mixture on top of the partially baked mixture, then layer the remaining apple slices. Bake for approximately 30 – 40 minutes, until the clafouti has risen and bounces back when pushed gently.
6)Let cool slightly. Serve with coffee and be forewarned: a heated discussion may ensue.

Stephen is an incredibly nice and kind individual and I was impressed by his knowledge of clafouti prior to our meeting. Since Stephen is a little camera-shy, the above photo is a picture of clafouti that I made, with blueberries and raspberries.

Top: My clafouti; photo by me. Above: An apple peeler similar to Stephen's. Photo by David Carroll.

Adapting to Adaptation

By Clayton Smith, Audience Development Coordinator

By now, the dutiful Goodman blog reader is undoubtedly aware that El Nogalar, the play currently running in our Owen Theatre, is an adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard. The art of adaptation is certainly nothing new. Everywhere we look there are movies based on books, plays based on movies and movies based on musicals.

Broadway, of course, is no stranger to the art of adaptation. One of the most famous Broadway adaptations is West Side Story, the Leonard Bernstein musical famously based on William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. But did you know that these smash hits are also adaptations?

Cats: Here’s one you don’t hear every day—a Broadway musical based on classic American poetry. Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cats is adapted from Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, a book of poems by T. S. Eliot, one of the most important English-language poets of the twentieth century. One of the musical’s characters, Jellylorum, is even named after T. S. Eliot’s own cat.

Miss Saigon: This war-time tale of woe is based on the great Puccini opera Madama Butterfly, which was itself based on the short story “Madame Butterfly,” written by John Luther Long in 1898. That means Miss Saigon is an adaptation of an adaptation. Did that just blow your mind? Fun Fact: Puccini’s Madama Butterfly was also the inspiration for the play M. Butterfly, written by David Henry Hwang, whose world premiere production of Chinglish opens at the Goodman this summer!

Cabaret: This Kander and Ebb success, which takes place in Nazi Germany, is another mind-bending adaptation of an adaptation. The musical is based on the 1951 play I Am a Camera by John Van Druten, who based his script on the novel Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood. Fun Fact #2: Isherwood also wrote the novel A Single Man, which was adapted into an Academy Award-nominated film starring Colin Firth in 2009.

La Cage aux Folles: This long-running Broadway hit by Harvey Fierstein and Jerry Herman is based on a 1973 French play (in case the name didn’t give away its origins) by Jean Poiret. For the less Broadway-savvy out there who may not recognize the title La Cage aux Folles, you might be more familiar with the movie The Birdcage, starring Robin Williams and Nathan Lane, which is based on the same original Poiret play.

Romeo and Juliet: If you haven’t taken the time to “Brush up Your Shakespeare,” you may not be aware of the fact that “Shakespeare basically stole everything he ever wrote” (potential Fun Fact #3: name that play). The great, tragic Romeo and Juliet is no exception. The Bard based this play off of Ovid’s Pyramus and Thisbe, a tale of ill-fated lovers that stems from Roman mythology.

Top: T.S. Eliot, the original inspiration behind Cats? Illustration by Simon Fieldhouse. Above: Romeo and Juliet; engraving by James Heath, painting by James Northcote.

Compelling Chekhov

By Jenny Seidelman, Campaign Manager

In our current edition of OnStage, playwright Tanya Saracho talks about her personal connection to the work of Anton Chekhov and how she came to reconceive The Cherry Orchard as El Nogalar.

Many other artists at the Goodman seem to have found this masterwork quite compelling—we’ve produced The Cherry Orchard four times in our history (during the 1956/1957, 1970/1971, 1974/1975 and 1984/1985 seasons). That doesn’t include Regina Taylor’s adaption Magnolia (2009), which set Chekhov’s tale in Atlanta, Georgia, amidst the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

Some theatergoers might remember our 1985 production of The Cherry Orchard—several of the artists involved with the show are now theatrical and film powerhouses. The production, which was adapted by David Mamet (whose work will return to the Goodman stage next January with Race), featured William H. Macy, beloved Chicago icon Mike Nussbaum and Peter Riegert (aka “Boon” from Animal House)!

Above: Pictured (l to r) in the Goodman's 1985 production of Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard, adapted by David Mamet, are Peter Riegert, Lindsay Crouse and Colin Stinton. Photo by Brigitte Lacombe.