18 items found for your search. If no results were found please broaden your search.
(10/25/18 9:56am)
Hala Kassem ’19 began her introduction of André Aciman by thanking Tim Berners-Lee, the man who invented the World Wide Web.
Her gratitude is perhaps also owed to her own habit of procrastination. Late one night as she avoided homework, Kassem, a Film & Media Culture major, took to the Internet for distraction, researching films and other things she found interesting. On this particular night, she was researching the 2017 film “Call Me By Your Name” based on the 2007 novel of the same name by André Aciman.
As she researched Aciman’s life and career, Kassem discovered a personal connection with the writer: both have roots in Alexandria, Egypt.
“I too am ‘out of Egypt’ in a sense,” Kassem said in her introduction, “as Alexandria is the city my mum first flew to from China; it is the city where she met my dad, the city where their journey as partners began and subsequently mine, the city that generated the love that brought my two favorite people together and gave me the opportunity to be here doing what I love doing.”
Kassem emailed Aciman to thank him for his work and was surprised to find he had replied to her inquiry the next morning. What is more, he even offered to come to Middlebury so they could speak in person.
Kassem’s determination to see his promise through was the driving force behind his visit which Professor of English and American Literatures Robert Cohen called “hard to come by and expensive.”
Aciman was born in Alexandria in 1951. A few years later, Israeli, French and United Kingdom forces invaded Egypt during the Suez Crisis of 1956 in order to regain control of the Suez Canal.
Shortly thereafter, Aciman explained, “life changed radically for anybody who was not an Egyptian in Egypt. Essentially anyone who was French, English and ultimately Jewish was immediately expelled from Egypt.”
Being themselves Jewish, Aciman and his family were forced from the country in 1965, when he was only 14.
This exile was neither the beginning nor the end of Aciman’s struggle with his identity. He admitted he was surprised to discover his family was Turkish after so many years of hearing the country ridiculed. His father eventually disclaimed his Turkish citizenship, making himself and his family stateless. Later, his father bought an Italian passport and thereby became “a fake Italian.” Finally, Aciman immigrated to the U.S. and gained citizenship here despite not feeling like an American at all, considering the citizenship to be removed from any sense of identity with the country.
The struggles and confusion surrounding his identity reflect his attraction to the ambiguous.
“If I don’t find ambiguity,” he said, “I’m not interested.”
During much of his talk, Aciman described his attraction to and views on romance and the romantic in the modern sense of the word. For him, the most powerful part of attraction lay not in sexual or marital acts but in the build-up, in the dancing around the issues, in the moments when two people are talking about something without ever saying what they truly mean.
His 2007 novel, “Call Me By Your Name,” made famous by the 2017 film, greatly concerns itself with this idea of romance. Set in 1980’s Italy, “Call Me By Your Name” follows Elio, an introverted and intelligent teenager, and his attraction to Oliver, a graduate student working with Elio’s father over the summer.
Aciman read from the novel the scene when Elio attempts to verbalize his desires to Oliver, a scene that epitomizes Aciman’s quiet and equivocal romantic style.
Although he is most famous for this novel, Aciman’s first book was a memoir about his life and subsequent exile from his home country, “Out of Egypt.” Kassem described the work in her introduction as “a story about memory lost and regained.”
Her summary is an apt one for the memoir as well as for Aciman’s talk as a whole. He emphasized his view that writing is a way to resurrect, alter and remember the past with the purpose of understanding who we are and where we come from.
“I liked what [Aciman] said … about not settling on any one self-definition,” Cohen said in an email. “Keeping things mobile and in-play and unresolved (or rather acknowledging that they already are, and not falsifying that complexity): among other things it allows the writer to surprise him/herself, stay light on his/her feet.”
For Kassem, Aciman’s talk and body of work reflect this ambiguity she sees surrounding her own self-conception.
“I was born to a Chinese mum and an Egyptian dad and so the theme of identity was a constant in my life,” she wrote in an email. “As a little kid, I did not know what my identity was because my parents integrated me equally in both cultures, which is something I thank them for everyday.
“However, it brought me a sort of confusion about where I belong and whom I belong to,” she continued. “I always thought that I had to pick one side or to pick one identity and so I always found it challenging to answer the question ‘where are you from?’ My response to this question changed many times over the years. … This was my least favorite question and for the longest time I dreaded answering this question mainly because I did not know the answer myself.
It took me a while to accept that this aspect of my life would always be part of me and that it is what makes me myself. … It has offered me so many blessings that I would not want to have it any other way.”
Her connection with Aciman’s work and life inspired her to send a simple thank-you, a choice that culminated in Aciman’s visit to the college.
“Hala’s initiative [in bringing Aciman to the college] was instrumental in making this happen, and a very welcome and all too rare phenomenon for an undergraduate,” Cohen said. “It’s crucial, I think, to bring in working writers for the students to see up close and interact with, to get a sense of them as a particular sensibility with a particular set of aesthetic prejudices and preoccupations — not perfect or finished creatures but just bluffers like everyone else, trying to give voice to things that we’re not all accustomed to giving voice to.”
I asked him how he would advise other students who wish to bring writers or other artists to campus.
“I’d advise them to do it the same way Hala did,” he said, “boldly, thoughtfully, seize-the-day-ishly.”
(09/13/18 9:57am)
In the middle of February in my senior year of high school, my twin sister and I met for an interview with a Middlebury alumna in a Starbucks crowded with tourists in ski gear. When she asked us what drew us to Middlebury, I did what any overworked 18-year-old would do and I racked my brain for anything that sounded vaguely informed and intelligent.
“The School of Bread Loaf,” I’d said.
When I was accepted to Middlebury, I did a better job of researching the options open to English majors at the college. The Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference really did end up drawing me to the school, as I always knew I wanted to write and the conference looked fun and valuable — not to mention the cost of attendance is waived for a select few Middlebury students. I can remember talking with my mom as a first-year and telling her my plans to apply as a junior and hopefully attend in the summer before senior year.
My acceptance two years later felt like things were falling into place and reminded me that, while Middlebury has had its ups and downs, this college was definitely the best choice for me.
My first day at the conference was hot and anxious as I sat in my room in the Inn waiting for my mystery roommate to appear. I knew what to expect because I had worked with Jason Lamb and Noreen Cargill (coordinator and administrative director, respectively): readings, dinners, classes, workshops, but I did not know how I, a quiet and reserved sort of person, could handle ten days of noise and events.
Evidently, I had forgotten that most writers are also quiet and reserved and in some ways being around such like-minded people brought out in all of us an eagerness to introduce ourselves to strangers, chat about college in the Barn and inquire about each other’s lives and work.
Really, attending Bread Loaf is a lot like experiencing a collective fever. Rarely do we get the opportunity to isolate ourselves on a mountain with 200 people who also desire above all to spend their time writing in the hopes that someone will read their words someday.
There is a joke amongst Bread Loafers that Robert Frost’s ghost haunts the writers’ conference. I am inclined to believe it, if only because of our habit of discussing him as if he were there made it seem like he really was inescapable. Frost, whose legacy (and Ripton home) are closely tied to the conference, attended Bread Loaf 29 times — so in some ways he haunted it when he was alive, too. Other writers to earn fellowships or faculty positions have ranged in genre and style from Toni Morrison to George R.R. Martin, John Irving to Eudora Welty.
It is a place that doesn’t really let you forget those who have come before you, not simply because we all want to stand in awe of these writers, but because, sitting in the little theater where our literary heroes have also sat, we can more easily imagine ourselves writing something great (maybe even something good).
“It was really enthralling being part of a tradition and history of quality writers,” Steve Chung ’21 said. “If you’re a poet like me, for example, mingling with fiction writers or nonfiction writers was a really wonderful experience. There were so many experiences that people brought to the table.”
I imagine there are as many answers to the question, “What was the best part of Bread Loaf?” as there are attendees, but I am sure that many people would agree with me in saying that it felt like both a relief and an inspiration to be surrounded by so many writers. Maybe we aren’t so crazy or deluded. Or at least, we are not alone in our craziness and delusions.
For the most part, Bread Loaf was simply fun. From the dances to the readings, the workshops to the hayride (apparently the only accurate part of “The Simpsons” episode parodying Bread Loaf), the Conference participants delighted in the warm weather, new friendships and joy of writing.
“Definitely apply,” Chung said when I asked him what he would say to anyone interested in the conference. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Nowhere else do you get to meet so many writers in one place. Even if you don’t necessarily think you’re going to go into writing professionally, you should apply.”
What I experienced at Bread Loaf represents the most valuable time I have had at Middlebury and I imagine many years from now when I look back on the time I spent in college, I will remember the August skies of Ripton and fields of goldenrod as vividly as I will recall the flurries of snow and late nights in the library.
(03/08/18 2:51am)
When I arrive, it is tea time.
“It’s mango black tea,” Carolyn Kuebler ’90 says. She offers me local honey before leading me back to her office. The surprisingly sunny day lends the office a brighter mood than one might imagine of a literary magazine. Her desk is strewn with papers, notes and the most recent issue of the quarterly. The cover is a black-and-white sketch-like piece of artwork; a rhinoceros and birds, scribbles like words and a metronome.
Carolyn Kuebler has been with the New England Review (NER) since 2004. She worked as managing editor until 2014 when she became editor after Stephen Donadio returned to full-time teaching at Middlebury College. Her job includes reading submissions, handling the budget of the magazine and organizing events.
“I do a lot of reading,” Kuebler said when I ask her to describe her job. “And looking for great new content. Sometimes we pursue writers. When we want to do international sections, we’ll track down writers of different nationalities, who speak different languages. We have to find some kind of literary ambassador for those sections because we don’t tend to get a lot of submissions from people from say, China or South Africa or Germany. When we want to have more international content, we have to track that down.”
She is obliquely referring to the final issue of 2017, which featured South African writers.
In her editor’s note of the volume, Kuebler writes, “No one author--or even a dozen authors, as you’ll find here--can represent the voice of any nation. In South Africa, though, the idea of a national literature is particularly fraught, as the laws of apartheid, established to keep people ‘apart’ … created radically inequitable nations within nations.”
NER’s focus on South Africa came about by a series of happenstances, know-somebody-who-knows-somebodys and inquiries into the literature of the nation. Kuebler had hoped especially to publish translations of pieces written in languages other than English, considering South Africa is home to eleven official tongues.
That turned out, however, to be a challenge.
“So many writers in South Africa write in English even if they speak other languages,” she said. “It ended up being a real lesson for me.”
Due to a smorgasbord of political, socioeconomic, institutional and educational reasons, most of the work submitted had originally been written in English. So, unlike other issues the magazine has published, the South African issue is not translation-focused.
This lack of translation, however, does not detract from the poetry and prose of the South African writers who deal with themes of place, power and language. Even the cover art, “Magic Flute Book: Newspaper,” was done by a South African artist, William Kentridge.
While broad, the scope of the publication does not overlook its current home: Middlebury College. The college has published the magazine, and therefore been responsible for its budget and employees, for over 30 years.
“Unfortunately, I think NER goes largely unnoticed by most of the students at Middlebury,” said Robert Erickson ’18, one of two summer 2017 interns. “Most of us wouldn’t expect that we have one of the nation’s most well-respected literary magazines in our own backyard.”
Even with its seeming remoteness, however, the publication enjoys a bond between the college that publishes it as well as the town it finds itself in.
“Literary magazines add to the culture in ways that are beyond just the journal,” Kuebler said.
In recent years, NER has collaborated with the Mahaney Center for the Arts and Oratory Now to produce “NER Out Loud,” during which students read selections from the magazine. NER also hosts events that bring together local and student writers at places like Carol’s and the Marquis Theater for readings.
Hearing the poems and stories aloud, which granted the writings different, sometimes surprising reinterpretations, has inspired NER to continue the practice in the form of a podcast, which is currently in the works.
“We have some of our J-term interns and some Oratory Now students putting together readings,” she said. “Hopefully they’ll release that by the end of the semester.”
Another connection between the College and NER is their hiring of interns like Erickson during the regular fall and spring semesters as well as over the summer and J-term.
Erickson interned with Victoria Pipas ’18 this past summer, where they read submissions, worked on online content, conducted interviews and started some long-term projects for the publication.
“I think I came away with a new appreciation for just how difficult it really is to write good literature,” Erickson said. “As a literary studies and classics major at Middlebury, 99 percent of my reading consists of books that are generally acknowledged to be of high caliber and have ‘withstood the test of time,’ so to speak. But spending as much time as I did reading and discussing fiction submissions from writers with a range of talent levels helped me to develop the vocabulary necessary to explain why one piece might have succeeded where another failed, or what separated the ‘great’ stories from the simply ‘good’ ones.”
“In my view, one of the most impressive things about NER is their commitment to finding and publishing new talent,” he said. “Many literary magazines of NER’s caliber rely heavily on work acquired through a contract or an agent to fill their pages, but NER is committed to publishing fresh, new, exciting voices alongside more well-established ones. The Poetry Editor, Rick Barot, makes it a point to include one issue each year that exclusively features poets whom the magazine hasn’t published before. For NER, the work on the page is what earns a spot in the magazine; nothing else.”
This year, NER turns 40, and Kuebler said they have special events planned for the anniversary.
“We’re going to release different pieces from the archive that are not currently up on our website with introductions from the editors over the past decades,” she said. “For instance, the first managing editor has written a little piece about an essay that came out in 1980. It’s a way for people to meet all the people who have edited here in the past and to see some material New England Review published way back when.”
(09/14/17 4:01am)
This fall, the Mahaney Center for the Arts will celebrate its 25 anniversary in style, bringing to the College an exciting schedule of events showcasing a variety of artistic disciplines. The scheduled performances, exhibits, talks, and film showings are emblematic of the MCA’s vibrant history at the College and its role in connecting students to art from both within and beyond the Middlebury area.
The festivities will commence this weekend with performances from the vertical dance company BANDALOOP, which will be returning to the College after a jaw-dropping show in 2004. The company will also offer free vertical dance workshops at Virtue Field House, as well as a dance technique master class and alumni talk with artistic associate Mark Stuver ’97.5. BANDALOOP’s performance is the first of many must-see events that the MCA is sponsoring this season.
The Campus spoke to Liza Sacheli, director at the MCA, about her experience with and plans for the center.
Middlebury Campus: In your time here, what are some of the most memorable moments or performances that you’ve been able to see in the MCA?
Liza Sacheli: I’ve been at the Mahaney Center for the Arts for 20 years now, so I’ve seen my fair share of memorable moments. Some of the highlights for me have been Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra; amazing string quartets like the Emerson, Tokyo, and Takács; world-class pianists Emanuel Ax, Peter Serkin, Krystian Zimerman, and Paul Lewis; theatre companies like Anne Bogart’s SITI Co and the Abbey Theatre of Ireland; and more recently the Nile Project (an amazing East-Central African music/dance/environmental cooperative).
MC: In the aftermath of national and local rifts, what role do you think the MCA can play in healing in our community? What role do you think the artist can play in our society today?
LS: The arts have always been reflective of culture and society. Our programming often explores issues that are on our campus community’s minds. Take last year’s play “Rodney King,” for example. The performer, Roger Guenveur Smith, has made a career out of portraying important figures in African American history. Rodney King came to our national consciousness as a victim of police brutality over 25 years ago, but the issue of race relations and policing is unfortunately still an issue today. The show provided a platform for conversation and exploration — many students took part — and Pulitzer winner Junot Diaz came to moderate a discussion about the show with student, faculty, and community members.
At the same time, we offer plenty of arts experiences that are a “balm” of sorts — an enjoyable, engaging performance can do so much to reduce our stress, offer us a sense of peace or pleasure, and increase our sense of connection to others in the audience and on stage.
MC: How does the MCA interact with the art scene in town? In the state of Vermont? What larger partnerships does the MCA maintain?
LS: We communicate quite a bit with the other cultural organizations in town, like Town Hall Theater, the Sheldon Museum, the Vermont Folk Life Center, and others. We have collaborated closely on events with Town Hall Theater, the Middlebury New Filmmakers Festival, and the Vermont Symphony Orchestra, among many others. Middlebury has a very lively cultural scene. It’s all we can do to not program big events on top of one another.
The MCA also works with national organizations like the Association of Performing Arts Professionals and Americans for the Arts, the International Society of Performing Arts, and regional organizations like the New England Foundation for the Arts. Those relationships help keep us connected to the broader arts scene, and to best practices in our field.
MC: How does the MCA go about attracting talent to rural Vermont? What does the selection process for artists look like?
LS: The Mahaney Center for the Arts staff has developed strong working relationships with a network of artists, agents, and other arts centers throughout the region, nationally, and even internationally. So we hear about what artists are touring, and when. We go out and see hundreds of performances every year. There are some artists we keep an eye on for years, until the time is right to bring them to Middlebury. The Performing Arts Series has a very impressive track record at catching artists while their stars are on the rise — take Yo-Yo Ma, for example. We take lots of suggestions from faculty, students, and staff in the arts departments, and we work with them to complement their own work with the best professional artists we can “import” to campus. And once they perform at Middlebury, their experience at the MCA and with our audience is so good that they’re usually happy to come back.
MC: What does the future hold for the MCA? Do you have a vision for where you’d like the MCA to be in another 25 years? Are there any upcoming programs or initiatives that you’d like to preview.
LS: We have two long term goals: First, we’d love for our Performing Arts Series to continue its nearly century-long tradition of presenting the best in classical and chamber music, but also to broaden its programming to embrace all the incredible and diverse artists the world has to offer. We would love for the diversity of our curriculum and community to be even better represented on our stages. I bet that would make the Arts at Middlebury even more attractive to students, too.
Second, access to the arts is important to us. The Mahaney Center for the Arts team continually works at breaking down the barriers of participation in the arts. We’ve made significant strides in physical accessibility — the MCA is one of the most physically accessible public spaces in the state of Vermont, and we offer assistive listening devices, large-print programs, and priority seating and parking. The MCA has also committed to price accessibility; fully half of the arts events we support are free, and for those that are ticketed, we keep our prices at or below that of other local/regional cultural organizations. We have held the line on $6 top ticket prices for Middlebury students, and we offer several free and discounted ticket programs for them too. But we still have work to do in terms of ensuring equal cultural access to all audiences. That may include rebalancing our program offerings to meet the community’s needs and interests, removing the barriers of formality that often play out in arts events, and/or finding new ways to communicate with and welcome new audiences.
As for upcoming performances, everyone should come to the MCA’s 25th anniversary kickoff with BANDALOOP, the first week of classes! This incredible company combines rock climbing technique with contemporary dance to create spectacular, perspective-bending dances. They’ll perform on the side of the Mahaney Center for the Arts — suspended from the roof on ropes — on Friday September 15. The performances will coincide with the fall all-campus picnic, to be held on the MCA back lawn, and WRMC’s SOSFest, featuring Noname, immediately following on the front lawn. It’ll be a night to remember! All free for Midd kids. Students can also sign up to dance on the wall with BANDALOOP at go/bandaloop.
Visit the MCA’s website to learn more about the upcoming events of the 2017–18 season.
(03/02/17 9:18pm)
At 4:30 p.m. on a Wednesday, Proctor Lounge is not exactly a raucous venue. I was sitting in my usual manner — quiet repose and decided neutrality — as I waited to speak with Shannon Gibbs ’18. When she arrived, joined by Greg Swartz ’17.5, the atmosphere of the room shifted. A few minutes later, Peter Lindholm ’17.5 hurried in, and soon their animated and eager voices filled the lounge as they told me about Middlebury Discount Comedy’s (MDC) upcoming show — ZooDystopia — which ran with free admission in the Hepburn Zoo from Feb. 23-24.
I began, after admitting my near-ignorance of the show, by asking them how MDC got started.
“I started [MDC] because I saw a need,” Gibbs, the founder and current president of the troupe, said. “There were only improv groups on campus. [The nature of sketch comedy] brings a lot of intentionality to the work. We know what we’re saying when we say it, rather than improv groups who come up with it on the spot.”
“Every member of the group serves as a writer, actor, director, collaborator,” Gibbs went on, alluding to the fact that everyone in the fifteen-person troupe dabbles in at least one or two areas of the production.
“One thing we pride ourselves on,” Gibbs said, “is shedding a light on … and projecting the Middlebury community back at itself so that we can all laugh at it. We also have political sketches, feminist sketches, lots of social commentary [and] religious satire.”
Having heard and read a little bit about the troupe (I said I was near-ignorant), I knew MDC often toyed with in the audiences’ comfort-levels during their shows — both in their visual and verbal statements.
“We like to make people feel uncomfortable sometimes,” Gibbs told me.
“Very much,” Swartz jumped in.
“On some level, the whole goal of a comedy show is to get laughs,” Lindholm added. “But the method by which you go about getting laughs is not always the same. Laughter can be an expression of discomfort as well as [an expression of] finding something funny.”
“We like to push boundaries,” Swartz said. “But it can be tough. There are different crowds on campus. People have very different ideas of what is okay and what’s not. People have very different boundaries. You have more [politically correct] culture, and you have people who are against that.”
“One thing we’re trying to do is fuse those two cultures,” Gibbs said, “by talking about big issues in a way that is accessible to the masses … I think this need to feel safe when you want to feel safe is an important new development, but there is a lot to be gained by not feeling comfortable and not feeling safe every once in a while.”
She was probably referring to last spring’s show, “Much Love in this Air,” which was met with some confusion and displeasure due to a number of violent and offensive sketches.
“One thing that we’ve really committed ourselves to [since the Mar. 2016 show] is making sure that it is the best writing that it can be, making sure that the ending of the sketch isn’t unnecessary, isn’t coming from left field, isn’t cheap or easy. [We are] continuing to push the envelope but in ways that exhibit good writing.”
“We’ve found our comedic voice much more in [ZooDystopia],” Lindholm said.
I posed the question of how — or if — MDC knows when their message has successfully been received by their audiences.
“People are laughing,” Lindholm said simply.
“People talk about the shows for a long time after,” Gibbs replied. “That’s something I really like and I think it’s something specific to sketch comedy. I’ve heard football players … discussing the orgasm gap [after our shows].”
“It’s going to hit people in different ways,” Swartz said. “If people are laughing, having a good time, it’s a good environment — then we feel that we’ve done a good job. We’re comfortable with the show so if people like it, talk about it, engage with the material, then that’s positive for us.”
The conversation left me keen to see what they had in store, and I worked to keep an open mind going into the Feb. 24 show in the Hepburn Zoo.
However, many others were also eager to see the show. By the time I got there well before the doors closed, more than a handful of people were already being turned away because the Zoo was at capacity.
After waiting in much anticipation, the audience was greeted by Gibbs herself. She gave a series of trigger warnings for sexual content, nudity, references to male sexual underperformance and “turtle dick” — something I and probably most audience members did not think warranted a trigger warning until we were finally forced to see it.
Shortly after, Roger Dai ’20 performed a short stand-up segment on growing up in China “without any talents” and finally realizing his penchant for comedy and joining MDC.
Then began the sketches — 24 bits lasting as long as five minutes or as briefly as a few seconds and covering topics from binge drinking to sexual frustration, from party culture to academic culture.
Last year, MDC garnered attention for their risqué, violent and — to some — unnecessarily disturbing or offensive content. ZooDystopia — while remaining unquestionably out there — took on a goofier tone.
A sketch titled “Up” introduced the audience to one of the most prevalent themes of the show: female sexual dissatisfaction. While Gibbs’s character clearly portrayed her frustration with her partner’s lack of knowledge of female anatomy (at one point she pulls out a large diagram), the show went on to cover the same idea again and again.
In “Les Midds, Part 2: ‘On My Own,’” Liana Barron ’18 sings a parody of a song from “Les Misérables.” After her apparent hook-up leaves for more partying, Barron’s character sings about her vibrator.
By the third sketch covering the theme, “BYOV,” the joke felt overdone, but its bizarreness still drew laughs and looks of demure shock from the audience.
Most of the sketches lampooned Middlebury and its students. “Spring Break in Iraq” cleverly commented on the way Middlebury students tend to spend breaks in hot, sandy locales — only this time, four friends find themselves in a war zone. “Discount Daily,” poked fun at students in the form of a news broadcast, covering topics such as academic stress, the milieu of socio-economic disparity, “biddy” culture and more.
A great deal of the jokes relied on shock-value — something for which MDC is known. In “Les Midds, Part 1: ‘Who Am I,’” Sebastian LaPointe’s ’18 character wakes up and vomits. The unsuspecting audience members sitting in the front, however, were shortly met with a spray of puke when he slapped his hand into the puddle.
“Naked Club” similarly utilized the cast members’ willingness to push the envelope (if only for the sake of pushing the envelope) when they took the stage fully nude — yes, fully.
The final sketch of the night proved to be the most mystifying. While discussing the ‘team’ dynamic of a recently finished threesome, the characters suddenly change tone and subject. The scene darkens and becomes a parody of the Netflix show Stranger Things.
It, and pretty much every other sketch of the night, left audiences laughing and shifting uncomfortably — but mostly it left us wondering if stranger things had happened on the stage of the Hepburn Zoo.
(02/16/17 9:14pm)
One need not look far for snowscapes and subzero temperatures when living in Vermont, but the atmospheric world of a new novel by alumna Katherine Arden ’11 offers some consolation: there are colder places to be. Arden’s novel, “The Bear and the Nightingale” hit shelves early January, and this entertaining and absorbing fantasy tale has already garnered attention and praise.
The story of “The Bear” unfolds in the forests and villages of medieval Rus’ in what is modern-day Russia. From the outset, a sense of otherworldliness and fantasy encroaches on the plot like frost on a window. In the opening chapter, a humble family gathers around a massive stove to hear the fairytales and stories of the spirits of the house and of nature. At first, they seem merely stories. As the story progresses, however, the spirits and demons of Russian folklore come to life and reveal themselves to Vasilisa Petronova, the story’s heroine.
Vasya — bold, unusual and brave — pushes against her lot in life, which is to either become a wife and mother or to become a nun. She prefers to wander the forests, honor her household spirits, learn to ride horses, all while rejecting her strictly delineated role in the household and society.
When her widowed father marries a devoutly Christian and severe woman who forbids Vasya from making offerings to appease the household spirits, the whimsical plot begins to take on a disquieting and creepy tone. As Vasya sees the beginnings of tragedy and terror, she must take actions to resist her stepmother and a menacing priest from Moscow bent on instilling fear and piety in the small village. As she fights for what she believes is right, Vasya discovers abilities very few possess and eventually must decide how to save her freezing village.
“The Bear” is Arden’s first novel, but she writes with a vivacity and honesty beyond her years. Arden, who majored in Russian and also specialized in French Literature at the College, had not planned to become a writer after college. In order to escape the frigid climates of Vermont and Russia, Arden moved to Hawaii after graduation. She undertook numerous odd-jobs, and worked every job from a horse-tour guide to a Macadamia nut picker. To stave off boredom, Arden decided to try something she had never done before: write a story. She began writing what she knew, namely Russian fairytales. Vasilisa, the young daughter of a Ukrainian family also working on the farm, inspired Arden and became the heroine of her story.
Arden worked for six months on her manuscript, researching extensively and getting help and advice from friends and family. Eventually, she wondered if she could publish the work that had begun as a distraction.
She eventually found a literary agent and an editor eager to take her on. Not only did Arden sell her first book, but she also signed on to write two more novels. “The Bear” is to be the first novel of a trilogy following Vasilisa and her adventures in medieval Russia.
The novel itself captures the feeling and the spirit of an icy Russian winter: the setting seems to seep off the page, frigid and foreboding. Further, the themes are as chilling as the Russian January: a sense of distrust and fear combined with the eerie magic. As the pagan clashes with the Christian, conflicts between characters as well as eras arise in a frightening and exciting fashion.
Arden, who was chosen for the spring 2017 Barnes and Noble Great New Writers selection, has written a beautiful and daring tale that benefits from her careful research and clear affection for Russian culture and history. “The Bear and the Nightingale” is the kind of engrossing, ethereal novel that pulls readers in and chills them to the bone — in the best way possible.
(01/26/17 9:13pm)
Chronic Blush, a play written by and starring Cole Merrill ’19, will be running in the Hepburn Zoo on Jan. 28 – 30. It will be directed by Eliza Renner ’18 and also stars Victoria Isquith ’19, Sam Martin ’19, Madeleine Russell ’19, as well as a handful of voice actors. The crew includes Stephen Chen ’19.5, Sarah Gratz ’19 and Joseph Haggerty ’19.
Finne Murphy (FM): Would you be able to give me a synopsis of the play in a sentence.
Cole Merrill (CM): I had to write one for the box office. You ready for this? “Set in the near future, two siblings attempt to navigate an electric, media-saturated world in the wake of a spectacular explosion.”
FM: What was your inspiration for the play?
CM: I think the simplest answer I could give is that about a year ago I got weirdly obsessed with the Challenger Launch. I looked up footage and information about it. The fact that it happened intrigued me. I had heard about it, but it took on a new resonance. It stuck with me.
I also wanted to write a play for Sam and Madeleine to do, and this idea of a space shuttle explosion kept coming back to me. That was probably the kernel that then became this play. There’re a lot of other things that went into it too, but that’s probably the most interesting one.
FM: What do Sam and Madeleine have to do with this?
CM: The actors or the characters?
FM: Oh, the actors…. Is that their names? They kept their first names?
CM: I did that. They don’t like it, but…. yeah. They approached me earlier this year, and they were talking about doing a play together, but it just didn’t really seem like it was going anywhere. I wanted to write a play because I wasn’t involved in any theater classes because I got to campus late, and so I was just in all these weird classes. I wanted to do something creative. I approached them about it, and we talked a lot about what they were interested in and ideas that were interesting to them.
We discussed concerns they had about the future because the play is set in the future. All of that congealed into what the play is. So if people don’t like it, it is equally as much their fault.
FM: Have you ever written a play that you actually put to stage?
CM: No. Last year I took Playwriting I with Dana Yeaton — who is amazing and kindhearted and brilliant and a beautiful person. I did a reading of the final play I wrote for that class in the Gamut room but that was a 30-minute play and this is a full-length play. And this play involves quite a lot of tech.
FM: Can you go into the tech aspect of it? Without giving anything away.
CM: Yeah. So the play is set 20-30 years in the future — we’re purposefully vague by not giving the exact year — but it’s set in the future. Artificial intelligence plays a huge part in the show. One of the main characters is an AI. We’ve staged certain scenes around technological themes.
We used a lot of technology in terms of media. That was the dumbest way to say that. There’s a lot of media in the show. There are constantly headlines being read and sensationalized. I would hope that the way that I’ve written the headlines and blurbs and sounds gives people… I hope there’s something politically resonant about it.
FM: I was going to ask if you use media as commentary.
CM: I always hope there’s some kind of commentary. I would say there is some pretty offensive stuff in the show, and I would say that it is stuff I wouldn’t have felt comfortable putting in a play to be performed if I didn’t think it had a purpose — a satirical motivation.
FM: Is playwriting something you want to continue doing?
CM: I don’t know. It’s really hard. And I don’t think I’m really good at it. I think I feel a lot more confident in my short story writing and essay writing than I do in my playwriting.
Plays are so dependent on plot and dramatic action, and if you don’t have a really good sense of those things in every scene, it can get really boring.
I think this play turned out pretty good because I used a lot of gimmicks.
FM: You’re also an actor. How do you use that experience to write the play?
CM: Hmm…
FM: Are you acting in it?
CM: Yeah. I’m in it for totally selfish reasons. When I started writing it, I knew it was going to be involved. I didn’t want to be there for just part of the process. I didn’t want to be gone for rehearsal. Initially, the character that I wrote for myself was really small and had a scene at the beginning, one in the middle and one in the end. Madeleine makes fun of me because I’m more or less the main character now.
I don’t really consider myself an actor. It’s kind of fun, but when I get in a room with Madeleine, Sam and Toria, they’re really acting. I have to work a lot harder to get to the same place that they can.
FM: How long have you been acting?
CM: Just since I came to Middlebury. I don’t really act. But for this, I really wanted to be a part of it.
FM: I understand.
CM: You’re going to have a lot of trouble spinning this into a positive article that makes people want to see it.
FM: I’ll figure it out. Is there anything else you want to say?
CM: When we started out, we wanted to just to give a lot of people the opportunity to express themselves through theater outside of a class. As we’ve gone on, we’ve had a ton of people help us out in a lot of ways.
For instance, we have a ton of voice acting. We spent hours and hours in the recording studio. We’ve been getting people involved to do video for the show. All sorts of people are involved incostume design, set design, etc. That’s one thing we wanted to do. To give a lot of people a chance for artistic expression… Not artistic expression, that’s stupid. Change that.
One thing that was great was that it allowed many different people who do many different things to come together and create something. It took me forever to get that quote.
FM: Is that all?
CM: Come see Chronic Blush. It is one part The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, two parts Interstellar, two parts Adam Sandler’s Click, three parts Don DeLillo’s White Noise and two parts the New Testament. If that doesn’t sell tickets, I don’t know what will.
(12/08/16 9:09pm)
Just before the doors of the Hepburn Zoo closed, a well-dressed and jovial man strode onto the stage to greet the audience. The man — Matt Friedman, played by August Rosenthal ’17 — pointed out the exits and informed us that the show would run for precisely 97 minutes. He went on to introduce us to the scene: a boathouse sitting on the shore of a glistening river, set against the background of twinkling starlight. When a few stragglers joined the audience, he decided to run through his entire monologue again for their benefit — this time at breakneck speed — before he was interrupted by an off-stage shout.
So began Talley’s Folly. The Pulitzer-prize winning play by Lanford Wilson ran from Dec. 1-3 in the Hepburn Zoo. The play, directed by Katie Mayopoulos ’18, served as the senior thesis work of Lana Meyer ’17, who produced the show and portrayed the titular Sally Talley.
The show takes place on the Fourth of July in 1944 Lebanon, Missouri, and chronicles in real time a conversation between Sally Talley, the liberal-minded daughter of a wealthy factory owner, and Matt Friedman, an accountant working in St. Louis. It quickly becomes apparent that Matt has come to ask Sally to marry him, but all of his attempts to express his intentions are met with Sally’s closed and protective dismissals. Over the course of the 97 minutes, however, the audience becomes privy to the secrets guarded by both characters and the undeniable love they share for each other.
With only two characters, one act and zero set changes, Talley’s Folly runs the risk of being too confined — but it is anything but. It is a decidedly tender story about family, war, nationality, differences, understanding, secrets and — ultimately and most importantly — love. Matt and Sally’s conversation is dynamic, entertaining and endearing as the pair divulges their tragic pasts and looming fears about their futures.
“A lot of student theater work in recent years has been drawn towards edgier subject matter, which I have always admired but is just not in my wheelhouse as a performer,” Meyer said. “While Talley’s Folly is not necessarily a traditional romance, it does have a marked ‘feel-good’ quality, the value of which I was hoping to bring into the canon of student work at Middlebury. In that context, this somewhat old-fashioned play feels, in a way, very new to me.”
The untraditional aspect to which she is referring comes not only in the unconventionality of the two lovers’ relationship, but also in the way they suppress the feelings they have for each other. Matt and Sally often comment on the unlikeliness of their attraction: Matt, a “probable” (as he put it) Lithuanian Jewish immigrant, is eleven years older than Sally, who grew up in a wealthy and conservative Protestant household.
Their differences, however, cannot outstrip the love they harbor for each other, and they ultimately find hope and acceptance in their relationship.
“Sally and Matt are not just unprepared for love,” Meyer wrote in her producer’s note, “they are afflicted with a loneliness they had come to believe would never end.”
But the loneliness does end. Both characters share a wit, lucidity and likeability that makes the show enticing and affecting. It was their vulnerability and honest portrayal by Meyer and Rosenthal that made the story and its message of hope and love so memorable.
(10/27/16 8:03pm)
It is rare to find a story so relevant that it feels like it takes place on your college campus. It is rarer to find a story so relevant that makes you realize it does.
One such story is found in Wrecked, the latest novel by Maria Padian ’83. Padian, who lives in Brunswick, Maine, is also the author of Out of Nowhere (2013), Jersey Tomatoes are the Best (2011) and Brett McCarthy: Work in Progress (2008).
The story, which chronicles sexual assault on college campuses, shifts between the perspectives of Haley and Richard, two college students who see their worlds change after a fateful night of partying.
One night, Haley’s roommate, Jenny, returns from a party as a different girl, shaken and wounded. Richard’s friend, Jordan, returns from the same party telling a story about a drunken hookup with a freshman. When Jenny accuses Jordan of rape, the worlds of these four people collide and change forever.
It is a story often told in young adult literature. Wrecked, however, is different. Its story is not told by the victim but by two outsiders without all the details. Their perspectives mirror our own as readers, as we are never quite sure what really happened. Haley and Richard come together as they struggle to sort out truth from lie and memory from imagination. They are confronted with the rape culture and victim-blaming that too often affect the lives of women and men who face the realities of sexual assault.
Because the story isn’t told from the victim or the accused, the task of weeding through the many details to find the truth becomes even more complex. It underscores for the readers the toll sexual assault exacts on peoples’ lives, highlights the unhealthy relationship some college students have with the words ‘yes’ and ‘no,’ and demonstrates how easy it is for doubt to creep in.
The story takes place at MacCallum College, a fictitious but eerily familiar small private school. The characters party, concern themselves with sports and grades, engage in casual sex and even occasionally recline in an Adirondack chair on the green.
Padian said that “[t]he setting is very much influenced by living in a small college town,” but she maintained that it was not actually based on Middlebury or Bowdoin College.
MacCallum College is probably based on all small private schools. It’s easy to see the similarities between its setting and characters and any liberal arts college or university in America. The very fact that the setting can take on so many real locations is why the story feels so possible and so visceral. If something like this could happen at MacCallum, it could happen at Middlebury. And it certainly does.
Padian’s characters come beautifully to life in this enthralling and powerful novel. They allow us to step into their shoes and wonder how we would act, what side we would choose and if right and wrong can be defined as sharply as the world wants them to be.
(10/13/16 7:59pm)
I would consider myself a pretty punctual person, but when I arrived at the Robinson Concert Hall for the fourth annual Cocoon, the seats were already brimming to capacity. Only after climbing to the balcony did I manage to find a place to hear the six stories that would enchant and move me that night.
Three students, two Middlebury community members, a Middlebury alumna and a faculty member took the stage on Friday, Oct. 7 to share stories of love, loss, journeys and hijinks in front of a 400-person audience.
As Co-host and Co-producer August Hutchinson ’16.5 described, “Cocoon is meant to be a pleasant and thought-provoking way for individuals to communally spend an evening, and an experience through which they can better understand the minds and lives of others.”
The annual Cocoon event is a quasi-spinoff of the monthly Middlebury Moth-Up events. More formal and with a two- or three-fold increase of attendees, Cocoon invites members of the community, faculty, alumni and students to tell their stories.
Before the show began, a palpable hum of anticipation filled the concert hall. Like many others in the crowd, I had been to the Middlebury Moth-Up before and knew that something wonderful was about to unfold. The Moth events are not usually so well-lit, but they are always just as packed.
We waited patiently for a few minutes before the two co-hosts, Celia Watson ’17 and August Hutchinson ’16.5, strode into the spotlight. Their brief introduction detailed the concept of the Cocoon and the Middlebury Moth-Up: each speaker has ten minutes to tell a story completely from memory. They promised a riveting show, both with their words and the zeal behind them.
And then Watson and Hutchinson, who also served as co-producers along with Tabitha Mueller ’18, welcomed the first speaker.
Rachel Liddell ‘15 detailed her post-graduate job/soul search with the confidence and style of a seasoned speaker – in part due to her previous position as the Middlebury Moth-Up co-leader during her time at the College.
Her journey across the country and back again dredged up her fears about never finding a job she loved. A chance job offer in an industry she had no experience with, however, gave her the opportunity to do what she loves best: tell stories.
Eric Mortensen, the second speaker, introduced himself as “the kid from the Bronx who married the farmer’s daughter.” A Middlebury community member, he presented the story of his own marriage, beginning with a bold phone call that would be answered by his future wife.
For the first time in Moth history, a duo told the next story in tandem. Brother and sister Olivia Wiggins ’18.5 and Kai Wiggins ’16.5 opened their tale with the possibility that they may have the same heart condition that took their father’s life. Together, with wrenching honesty and beautiful strength, they brought the audience back to the unimaginable day they lost their father.
After a brief intermission, community member Elizabeth Christensen recounted her dynamic career as a lighting technician for stage plays. Her run-ins with forty-foot ladders and the CIA painted for us a picture of a woman devoted to her craft and endlessly interested in expanding her horizons. She now works for the College as a coordinator for the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Second to last was the charismatic and eloquent Dominick Tanoh ’18. His deep voice and professional cadence gave way to a remarkably silly romp about friendship, Chicago, the end of summer, the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum and White Fire OG Kush.
Finally, Associate Professor Psychology Kim Cronise detailed the journey she made with a painting, an heirloom that brought with it the wisdom and love of the woman who gave it to her – her mother. Mired in the tumult of her life, the painting carried her through relationship turmoil, cross-country moves and job changes by representing the strength and love of her mother.
The beauty of the Cocoon and the stories that unfold on the stage come from the mutual understanding of vulnerability and trust between the audience and the speaker. They trust us with some of the most personal stories of their lives and we trust them to be honest. What we witnessed last Friday was an emotional and powerful journey through the terrains of diverse yet relatable human experiences, with each story centered on the theme of revelation.
“Revelation to me is a realization,” Watson explained, “a moment of reflection that points to something of greater significance or understanding. I also think of it as a moment that sheds new light on a particular situation and ultimately causes a turning point in one’s life.”
These moments ranged from gaining a better understanding of friends from afar to realizing the transcendent ways our family enriches our lives, from landing a dream job to finding the people we want to spend our lives with.
As speaker Tanoh put it, “Those moments [of revelation] are so rare but when I have them, when I have my revelations, it seems like I can finally see one small part of the patterns in an aggressively chaotic universe... What a revelation is to me: finding some moment of vision despite the constant turmoil that constantly catches us off guard.”
(09/15/16 7:58pm)
It’s an understatement to say that the Paul Ward ’25 Memorial Prize merely recognizes extraordinary writing talent among the first-years of Middlebury College — it seems instead to be a premonition of the success to come for its recipients.
This is certainly the case for Emma Cline ’10 who won the Paul Ward Prize in 2007 for outstanding young writers while a sophomore at Middlebury. Her short story, entitled “What is Lost,” took top spot. Fewer than ten years later her first novel, The Girls, sent ripples across the literary world.
The book, which came as the first of a three-book deal with Penguin Random House, recounts the summer of 1969 that Evie Boyd spends entangled in a cult bearing an uncanny resemblance to the Manson Family.
Evie Boyd, the story’s narrator, recalls the summer when she turned fourteen and stumbled upon an unsettlingly pretty girl rummaging through the dumpster. Evie, driven by her desire to be liked, eventually joins a cultlike commune lead by a charismatic leader.
Yet it is not the group’s male leader who draws her in, but instead the girls — particularly the dark-haired Suzanne — he recruits for his commune living on a farm who do. The themes explore the lengths to which people go to feel loved, to feel seen and to feel powerful.
Cline, who went on to complete her graduate studies at Columbia University, writes with a hyperreal focus. She details the most mundane events in a burningly urgent way, the way a fourteen-year-old would obsess over the same things, for instance the gaze of an older boy, how her skin looks, the words of adults around her.
It is difficult not to compare the plot to the events that took place in the California desert in 1969. These events began in 1967 when Charles Manson, after his release from prison, began gathering followers who were mostly women. Over the course of a few years, the Manson Family evolved into a group of murderers, killing seven people.
The Girls is a quasi-retelling. Its plot certainly mimics the real events of the Mason family, like group driving an old school bus, dumpster diving to find food and escalating into darker and crueler territories.
What Cline does not do is write-off her main character.
“I took it as a challenge to write a book about teenage girls, who are so marginalized and objectified and given no agency and subjectivity,” Cline says. “How do you write about them in a way that takes them seriously? I knew this topic was begging a certain literary type to dismiss it.”
The story is told through the lens of a girl and focuses on how this girl’s relationships with other women are shaped by this disturbing experience with the commune — an experience cast beyond most of what we have encountered before.
Cline shapes her world by examining how we examine ourselves and questioning how we question others. It is told in the spellbinding way a car crash happens; though we might be disgusted and confused by what happens, we are also fascinated. All the while, the plot consumes us with the feelings we are all too familiar with but would rather not stomach: jealousy, embarrassment, the need for attention and discomfort.
Visceral and tightly woven, The Girls is neither Cline’s first success nor her last.
(04/21/16 7:50pm)
The Pitchfork Disney stupefied, disgusted and enticed audiences at the Hepburn Zoo from April 14-16. Written in 1991 by Philip Ridley, the often dark, sometimes grotesque comedy was directed by Kristin Corbett ’16.5 and produced by Alexander Burnett ’16 as his senior thesis work. The show began with a masked figure closing the door to the Hepburn Zoo stage and locking no fewer than seven bolts. This proved only the beginning of the isolation, fear and anxiety brought on by The Pitchfork Disney.
The play chronicles a slice of the lives of Presley and Haley Stray, portrayed by Burnett and Madeleine Russell ’19. The 28-year-old twins live very much like children, arguing over everything from chores to chocolate. Their fixations on oblivion, an imaginary apocalypse and violence, however, soon reveal that their childishness is more perverse than it is endearing.
Haley and Presley, whose parents died of mysterious and unknown causes, live cooped up together in their London home, subsisting mostly off of candy and stories spun from their past, their imaginations and their dreams. After Haley falls into a drug-induced sleep that lasts the majority of the play, the twins’ disturbing yet simple life is flipped on its head: a stranger dressed like a ringmaster, Cosmo Disney, played by Cole Merrell ’19, comes into their home and promptly vomits on the floor.
What unfolds thereafter is a crusade of fear through the minds of the characters and the audience members, as Presley and Cosmo detail their lives in twisted and shocking detail. The tension is not so much broken as it is supplemented by the bizarre humor stemming from the strange dynamic between the child like Presley and the devilish Cosmo.
Even before Cosmo explains his circus-like act by eating a cockroach, the audience can sense the palpable surrealism in this nightmarish play.
“This play is a safe space for dangers (not from them), a place to commune with the things we run from but secretly love,” Corbett stated in the Director’s Note.
If this summary sounds strange, it is because the story is strange. Beginning its run for London audiences in the 1990s, The Pitchfork Disney is responsible for inciting the British “in-yer-face” theatre movement. Audiences were shocked by the events onstage, with some people walking out or even fainting from the disturbing and graphic images.
These reactions were both the goals and the side effects of the dark script. The story is a tale of fear, if fear could walk around and knock on your front door. The events of The Pitchfork Disney unspool our fears in a way that appeals to the slimy places within us.
“The Pitchfork Disney is about fears on many different levels,” Russell explained. “I think Cosmo touches on this idea a little bit: our instinct to enjoy being afraid.”
She is referencing the unnerving appearance of a character called Pitchfork Cavalier, played by Daniel Fulham ’18 – a masked, cloaked and lurching figure whose apparently deformed face is never shown. Cosmo calls attention to the audience’s hunger for repulsion.
Themes of fear are approached through the eyes of childlike characters, those most prone to loss, phobia, nightmares and weaknesses. In his numerous monologues, Presley spins visceral and agonizing tales of violence, isolation, fear and the subject of his recurring nightmares: a serial killer called the Pitchfork Disney.
The tone dances between hilarious and menacing, though often hovering in both realms at once. Presley’s story of the snake he bought with his allowance money and subsequently fried and ate turns our stomachs, but also intrigues us. Cosmo’s description of Pitchfork’s horrible features frightens us, but also pulls us in.
“The journey of bringing this play to life has been equal parts terrifying and hilarious,” Burnett wrote in his Producer’s Note. “In rehearsals, we would frequently break down in laughter at its absurdity.”
Although unsettling, the performances were sharp and entertaining, the plot engrossing and fantastic. In many ways, to watch The Pitchfork Disney is to test the limits of what one can bear to witness — and yet still enjoy every moment of it.
(03/23/16 11:48pm)
This weekend marked the premiere of Detroit ’67, a play written by Dominique Morisseau and directed by Rebecca Johnson ’16.5. The recipient of the 2014 Edward M. Kennedy Prize for Drama Inspired by American History, the show ran from Mar. 17 -19 to sold-out audiences in the Hepburn Zoo.
The story focuses on brother and sister Lank and Chelle, portrayed by Jabari Matthew ’17 and Diku Rogers ’16, as they struggle to make ends meet in the summer of 1967. It takes place in the basement of their home, which they have converted into an after-hours club in order to bring in extra money. Chelle’s seriousness is offset by the hilarious honesty of her friend Bunny, played by Qadira Al-Mahi ’19. Meanwhile, Lank’s desire to build a better life for himself is complemented by the cool ambitions of his friend Sly, played by Debanjan Roychoudhury ’16. Just outside the relative safety of their basement, however, boils the 1967 Detroit riot — an event marked by civil disobedience, violence and destruction — that disrupts the lives of these five characters forever.
Detroit ’67 begins on a light note, but the tone turns grave in the second scene when Lank and Sly carry in the limp and bruised frame of Caroline, played by KJ Davidson-Turner ’17.5, a white girl whom they found nearly unconscious and badly beaten earlier that evening. Caroline’s story and secrets unfold over the course of the play, as does a tentative and subdued romance between her and Lank. What follows is a series of events that raise tensions between brother and sister and beg the question of how willing one is to stand up for what he or she believes in.
The show is a mix of the fictitious and the historical: Lank, Chelle, Sly, Bunny and Charlotte’s lives are overlaid by the Detroit riot of 1967, which began after a police raid on an after-hours club during the early morning hours of July 23. What began as violent public disorder escalated into one of the deadliest civil disturbances in the history of the United States. The Michigan Army National Guard brought an end to the riots after five days, resulting in over 40 deaths, 1,000 injuries, 7,200 arrests and 2,000 destroyed properties.
As a backdrop, the riots infuse a sense of urgency, realism and humanity into the simple story of a brother and sister struggling against a society of intolerance. The change that takes place within Chelle is particularly evident, as her worldview shifts in the fallout of a tragedy.
This tension is illustrated by the sounds of Motown floating over the story. Chelle and Lank clash over whether to play music on the record player or on the eight-track player. Chelle’s tendency to stick with the more outdated method, the record player, symbolizes her ambivalence toward the tumultuous and ever-changing world beyond her doors. Lank’s enthusiasm for the new form, the eight-track, signals his desire to revel in something new while he builds a better life for himself.
Detroit ’67 bears a profundity that stretches far beyond the reach of a simple review. In its characters lies the truth that every emotion and action stems from painful, lived experiences; in its plotline simmers the harsh reality of these events; and in its message cries a need for justice, answers and serious structural change.
As the first in a three-play series about playwright Morisseau’s hometown, Detroit ’67 is an undoubtedly Black story, a story too seldom told at Middlebury. Although the depicted events took place almost fifty years ago, they could have happened yesterday. It is not only the heavy realism of the play that makes it such a memorable work, but also the obvious love, attention and pride that went into its production by the cast and crew. Hopefully, the messages and meaning behind Detroit ’67 – difficult as they may be to navigate – will carry on long after the curtains have closed.
(02/17/16 11:52pm)
Murder, fame and the unsettling relationship between the two were the subjects of this year’s J-term musical, Chicago, which sold out for every show. The classic American work, with music by John Kander and lyrics by Fred Ebb, ran from Jan. 28 to Feb. 1 at the Town Hall Theater (THT) in Middlebury. Premiering three weeks after rehearsals began, the production was directed by THT Executive Director Doug Anderson with musical direction by Middlebury Affiliate Artist Carol Christensen and band direction by Bear Irwin.
Chicago tells the alluring and despicable tale of two murderesses caught up in the glamor and clamor of the 1920’s vaudeville entertainment age. Roxie Hart and Velma Kelly, portrayed by Erin Craig ’19 and Liana Barron ’18 respectively, are jailed for murdering their lovers – but this does not last long. With the help of their charming and clever lawyer, Billy Flynn, played by Kahari Blue ’19, the two manipulate the power of the press in order to reshape their story into a “not guilty” verdict – all while gaining fame and publicity.
Perhaps more appalling than the plot is the fact that it is based on true events. In 1924, Beulah Annan and Belva Gaertner killed their lovers in cold blood. The press pounced on the stories and fascinated the public for months, chiefly because the perpetrators of such heinous crimes were women. Much like in the musical, the Chicago newspapers twisted, ignored and fabricated the truth almost as much as the women did themselves until they were transformed from murderesses into acquitted victims. The story was so compelling that it was eventually turned into a play, a book, a musical and a 2002 film.
Chicago is a story whose significance continues to be relevant to this day. As Doug Anderson, who acted as director, producer and set designer as well as being the Executive Director of the THT, stated in the program, “Today there seems to be no lack of people who ignore facts while rewriting history, cooking up narratives that play on sentimentality and deep-seated prejudice in a grab for power and profit.”
Even with the stomach-churning backstory, the show is difficult to not enjoy. The glowing red CHICAGO sign shone down on no fewer than fifteen faced-paced music and dance numbers featuring murderesses, matrons, judges, juries, executioners, reporters, husbands and a “sob-sister” who was not all she appeared to be. Perhaps it is because of this mixture of a thought-provoking plot and fantastic music that Chicago has become America’s longest-running musical. The J-term version, in all its glitz, glamor and “razzle dazzle,” continued this tradition of pure entertainment and tart wit.
For the eleventh year, the J-term musical brought together the College’s Department of Theatre and the local performing arts center. Production called for collaboration between the College, community members, students and faculty in order to achieve such a monumental effort in such little time.
“We know we have a little less than three weeks in January to get all the blocking, choreography and rehearsals with the pit band done, which is why we start vocal rehearsals in the fall,” Christensen, musical director and creator of the annual winter term musical, explained. “The cast is expected to have all the music memorized by the first day of class in January so they can rehearse the blocking and choreography ‘off book.’ In many ways it mirrors what it is like to put on a production in the professional world, where one is expected to know his or her part going in, and put the show together in just a few weeks.”
Alicia Evancho ’12 acted as choreographer of the J-term musical for the third time, having previously worked on Hairspray in 2012 and Ragtime in 2015. She was joined in her choreography efforts by two cast members, Connor Pisano ’18, who also portrayed Amos Hart, and Caitlin Duffy ’15.5, who played Liz in the Cook County Jail. Pisano and Duffy each choreographed a few scenes, which Duffy described as “a learning experience.”
Duffy reflected on her role in the production during her final semester at Middlebury.
“I hope to continue acting after I graduate, but I don’t plan on doing many musicals, so getting to do the J-term musical has been a gift,” she said. “It’s also been a great opportunity to be involved in town a little bit more. I will miss it.”
Apart from the six-hour-a-day rehearsals during the week, cast members were expected to practice and collaborate outside of class in order to accomplish the feat of memorizing every line, step and note.
“It’s fast-paced and intense,” ensemble member Paige Guarino ’18.5 said. “But there’s a great sense of camaraderie and of coming together to make something great. The collaborative spirit of the J-term musical is just phenomenal.”
The musical and the real-life events that inspired it illuminate both the power of the press and the weaknesses of our legal system. Chicago also offers a stark commentary on the hunger and gullibility of the American public. Our eagerness for more violence, more scandal, more hangings and more stories is as apparent as it will ever be in this musical. We must ask ourselves, then, who is guilty of the graver crime: Velma and Roxie for their lovers’ murders, or the people who follow their stories with a blind passion for violence and sin.
As Mama Morton, played by Victoria Isquith ’19, says, “In this town, murder is a form of entertainment.”
(01/28/16 3:58am)
On Jan. 8, Senator Martin LaLonde (D) of South Burlington introduced bill H.527, an amendment to the 2014 ban on using electronic devices while driving on the highway. This bill allows policemen and other law enforcement officers to inspect phones and other electronic devices without a search warrant. Usually issued by a judge or higher legal authority, search warrants are normally required for officers to perform intrusive searches otherwise violative of the suspect’s privacy.
If the bill passes, Vermont police officers may take an electronic device away from a driver and check any text messages and other phone logs in order to determine if it had been in use while the vehicle was in motion.
According to the bill, anyone driving on the highway in Vermont “impliedly consents to an enforcement officer’s search of his or her portable electronic device” in order to see if the driver was distracted. If the driver does not agree to the search, he or she will be charged as if he or she had actually been using the device illegally. This includes texting through voice-activated applications, which is considered just as distracted by the Vermont Highway Safety Alliance.
To some extent, the search is comparable to a breathalyzer test. Just as Vermont drivers are implied to have given consent to a phone search, they are implied to have given consent to a breath test if an officer suspects them of driving drunk. Refusing to submit to a search can be introduced as evidence in a criminal proceeding. However, because blood alcohol content is time sensitive, and phone records are not, critics argue that the new bill overreaches.
“There’s no need to break down oneof the most fundamental protections we have in our lives,” said Allen Gilbert, Executive Director of the Vermont chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, in an interview with the Burlington Free Press.
Warrantless searches are most concerning when a driver appears distracted but was not actually using a mobile device. These ambiguous circumstances underscore the weaknesses of the bill, adding to the likelihood that it will be rejected as unconstitutional.
The Supreme Court declared in 2014 that it is unconstitutional to search a mobile device without a warrant, due to the troves of personal information contained in such equipment. Nevertheless, Vermont would be the first state to introduce a bill bypassing the requisite search warrants on the road.
(12/10/15 12:52am)
Before the musical began, director Maria Flanders ’18 spoke to the audience crowded inside Hepburn Zoo. Along with a kind reminder to silence our cell phones, she implored us to recognize the ability that seemingly inconsequential chance encounters have to change our lives. The show that followed, Ordinary Days, with music and lyrics by Adam Gwon, poignantly explored these moments.
Running from Dec. 3 to 5, Ordinary Days was performed by four members of the Middlebury College Musical Players. The story, in which almost all of the dialogue is sung, follows the lives of four young people as they weather the storms of relationships, graduate school and fizzling careers. It all begins on a busy street corner, where Warren, played by Logan Wahl ’19, attempts to hand out artsy flyers to passersby in New York City. As one woman passes, she accidentally drops a notebook.
This simple moment spirals into a strange and unlikely friendship between Warren and Deb, portrayed by co-producer Hannah Johnston ’15.5, after Warren reaches out to Deb in order to return her notebook. The two characters could not be more different: Warren is undyingly optimistic, whilst Deb, a struggling graduate student, is fiery and defensive. Yet as they get to know each other, the nuances of their struggles find their way to the surface, and both characters change for the better.
At the same time, thirty-somethings Claire and Jason, played by Liana Barron ’18 and Peter Dykeman-Birmingham ’18.5, must grapple with the tensions of the next stage of their relationship: moving in together. Interactions between the two of them reach a fever pitch, forcing them to confront their fears and uncertainties. By the end, the strength they find in each other proves great enough to overcome the pain of the past.
The relatable circumstances that the four characters struggle with – relationship problems, academic confusion, uncertainties about the future and the feeling of facelessness in a vast and crowded world – remind us of the power that our actions can have over those around us. The musical is effective in demonstrating how seemingly inconsequential moments can coalesce into bright and powerful life transformations.
Flanders echoed this sentiment in describing her experience as a first-time director.
“I feel so lucky to have been part of the sweetest, most mutually supportive team of cast and crew for this show,” she said. “They have been random, chance encounters, but wow, have they had an impact on my life story.”
Even with a strong sense of backstage camaraderie, however, there were a few challenges in putting the show together.
“Logistics were tough,” Flanders noted. “We had trouble initially with securing the rights [to the play], and of course it is hard to schedule with all the activities Middlebury students are involved in. One of the biggest obstacles was figuring out the accompaniment. We ended up with half live and half recorded tracks at almost the last minute, so our pianist [Gloria Breck ’18] and the cast and crew had to quickly adjust to new sound dynamics, tempos, timing and organization. Because everyone is amazing, they’ve done a great job of pulling through.”
The songs themselves did most of the talking, serving as a bold vehicle of emotion for the characters’ struggles. The set list grappled with a unique array of experiences, from feeling invisible to wanting to be anywhere else but here, from processing pain from the past to letting go of hopes for the future.
For Johnston, the show marked the moving end to her undergraduate theatre work.
“This musical is especially pertinent to me as I prepare to graduate this coming February; it’s a reminder to take a step back, take a breath and remember that things are going to work out, one way or another,” she said. “I think Ordinary Days has a message that speaks to a lot of Middlebury students – it’s important for us to remember that it’s not just impressive end-goals that matter. It’s imperative that we enjoy where we are now and what we’re doing along the way. The musical sings a message of perspective.”
With its sharp humor and sometimes painfully relatable storyline, Ordinary Days implores the audience to consider the fine line between the momentary and the momentous. Even if we never have a chance to see the lives we affect, the most ordinary acts in the most ordinary days can cause the most beautiful changes.
(10/21/15 11:26pm)
Pulsating music and dim lights greeted audiences as they entered the makeshift courtroom and took their seats in what felt like a jury box. The hunched figure of the Bible’s most famous sinner sat squarely in the middle of the stage.
Such was the setup of the 20th annual first-year show, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot by Stephen Adly Guirgis, which ran from Oct. 15 to 17 in the Hepburn Zoo. A tradition dating back to 1996, the first-year show gives new students an immediate opportunity to participate in the Middlebury College Theatre Department. Like many years before, the cast worked with a graduate from the College. Tara Giordana ’02 took the reins this fall to direct the often dark, often funny production of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot.
Set in a corner of Purgatory called Hope, the play depicts the trial of its titular character for his betrayal of Jesus Christ. A trial is both the simplest and most complex stage for this show: While we would all like to believe that the truth will come out, we do not always like to believe the truth itself. And the truth is, Judas is just like us.
Everyone from Mother Teresa to Sigmund Freud to Satan gives testimony, while appearances from Saints Thomas, Peter and Monica enlighten us to Judas’s life. But as the characters grapple with their own crimes and their judgments of Judas, the trial ends up unveiling more tension than honesty. Throughout the entire performance, Judas, played by first-time actor Alexis de la Rosa ’19, sat curled up in the middle of the stage, judgments orbiting wildly around him. Meanwhile, the audience members became keenly aware of their role in the story as jurors, and thus the ultimate deciders of his guilt.
The annual first-year show opens doors for students to explore the multiple facets of theater. Two first-years, Tatsatom Goncalves ’19 and Sabina Jiang ’19, participated in the sound and light board operation and acted as assistants to the director. Working alongside them were upperclassmen Aashna Aggarwal ’16, Alexander Burnett ’16, Caitlin Duffy ’15.5 and Tosca Giustini ’15.5, who used their theatre experience to offer support to the newcomers.
Because the cast consisted solely of first-years, the actors found solidarity through their shared anxieties. They were also able to build a sense of community, equality and lightheartedness in their work.
“I was inspired by my peers,” Lucy Grindon ’19, who played Bailiff and Sigmund Freud, said.
Rehearsals for The Last Days of Judas Iscariot spanned merely three weeks. Madeleine Russell ’19, who portrayed both Jesus of Nazareth and Fabiana Aziza Cunningham, described director Giordana as “funny, lighthearted and kind.”
“Tara is phenomenal, perceptive and clear in her understanding of what the play is about,” Russell said. “She was also good at including the cast in creating the meaning [of the play].”
This meaning, Giordana believes, resides in the characters’ internal conflicts.
“In the end, Judas is unable to forgive himself,” she explained. “His best friend, Jesus, offers him love and forgiveness, but Judas is unable to recognize and accept it, because he has sunk too far into despair.”
Self-love and forgiveness play thematic roles in the production, which questions whether we can accept love from others if we cannot give it to ourselves first. The answer is presented in a religious context, but delivered in an accessible manner, with modern language and garb.
Lucy Grindon ’19 observed that, as a Christian, she felt closer to the story because she was able to see the figures she had only read about emerge in living, breathing form.
Though the majority of the characters come straight from the Bible, the messages behind the play remain relatable to people of all beliefs.
“I think the play resonates regardless of what you believe in,” Sam Martin ’19, who played El-Fayoumy, said. “Guilt, redemption and forgiveness are hardly unique concepts to Christianity, so I think the play is pretty universal in terms of the questions it asks and the ideas it presents.”
This universality ultimately forces the audience to make their own judgments about not only Judas, but also themselves. If Judas Iscariot and a seemingly normal man like Butch (portrayed by Logan Wahl ’19) are both capable of betraying those who love them most, what about the rest of us?
A story so layered demands an equally complex production. As such, the original version of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot runs for a full three hours. Giordana was faced with the challenge of cutting it down to a mere 80 minutes.
“I selected scenes and monologues from the script and then made internal cuts to the text as well,” she explained. “This was based on the actors I had — to give each an opportunity to shine — but another goal was to keep the playwright’s story intact and maintain a thorough line for the audience.”
Despite the cuts, the performance kept a rhythm similar to that of the human experience: one minute, laughter would fill the room; the next, grave silence hung over the stage. The final scene, in which Jesus washes Judas’ feet, stood as the most poignant display of forgiveness and love in the entire show, with Jesus’ quiet reverence toward Judas lingering long after the lights dimmed.
Wrought with emotion and plagued with questions of morality, forgiveness and love, The Last Days of Judas Iscariot sets the stage for a year of great shows — and hopefully begins a long list of achievements for the first-years involved in its making.
(10/01/15 3:05am)
On Sunday, Sept. 20, Ingoma made its first appearance at the Middlebury A Cappella Jamboree. But rather than mmm-bopping through a Billboard Hot 100, the group performed music from another source: the African continent.
Ingoma, which gets its name from an African drum, was created in the fall of 2013 by Armel Nibasumba ’16, Mzwakithi Shongwe ’16 and Yuki Takeda ’14. They viewed it as a casual singing group that filled a gap they noticed in Middlebury’s a cappella scene. Shongwe, one of the two co-presidents, notes that even now, the Middlebury a cappella scene is lacking in a broader spectrum of culture.
“There is still no real Asian music a cappella group,” he observed.
Initially, Ingoma was merely a casual way to learn and have fun for its three original members. Their first performance took place at the International Student Organization (ISO) show in the fall of 2013, where Armel, Mzwakithi and Yuki performed a piece called “Shebeleza” by Joe Mafela about the perseverance of the people of the Democratic Republic of Congo. It was not until the spring that the group acquired more members and female vocalists and was able to put on an even bigger performance. At that point, however, Ingoma remained informal and, as Mzwakithi puts it, “underground.” Entry to the group required no audition and they performed mostly with and for international students and students of color.
Things began to change for Ingoma and its members about a year after its founding. Just as the group began to gain steam, Ingo- ma suffered through a series of challenges, the most difficult being that a large portion of the group either graduated or went abroad.
“We love being a small group... but you need to be big enough so that when half the group leaves, you still have a group,” Shon- gwe explained.
To combat the blow of losing so much talent, the remaining members of Ingoma held their first auditions, and Ingoma was able to recover in time for its second performance at the ISO show in December of 2014.
Now, after making its first appearance at the A Cappella Jamboree and holding another round of auditions, Ingoma looks forward to more growth, more exposure and more music. One of their goals is to record and produce a song to put on their Sound-cloud in order to reach a larger audience and garner more interest. In the coming months, Ingoma also plans to add music from the African diaspora to their repertoire. These new genres, which have Southern Gospel, Caribbean and Afro-Brazilian influence, will expand the cultural identity of the group while staying true to its roots in the African continent.
A goal less tangible than a recording and a larger body of work, however, is to gain more legitimacy as a singing ensemble.
As Shongwe put it, “The big thing is to be taken seriously, which is different from being considered a ‘good’ a cappella group.”
One necessary component of this plan is to encourage more students to audition for a role in the group. Ingoma also hopes that the songs they put on the Internet will incite more invitations to perform on and beyond the Middlebury campus.
Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, Shongwe emphasized that for him and his fellow Ingoma members, being taken seriously by others should not mean taking themselves too seriously.
“We have always been super casual,” he said. “And that is an element... that we want to retain.”
It is easy for people at Middlebury to become caught up in the fast-paced and demanding environment of the school. Finding a casual space to express oneself is a precious opportunity. Ingoma aims to be a relaxing, fun and easygoing outlet for people to make friends and create music that will continue to diversify and liven up the a cappella scene at Middlebury.