Signature Theatre Company

Monday, July 27, 2009

Dramaturg’s Diary: Countdown to The Orphans' Home Cycle

Kirsten Bowen is Signature Theatre Company's Literary Associate, and the Signature dramaturg for The Orphans' Home Cycle

I have been Signature’s Literary Associate for three years now and throughout that time have managed to always delegate the writing for Signature’s blog to a series of willing interns, whom I reasoned were more digitally in touch than I was anyway. So it seems fitting that I come out of hiding and make my blog debut by chronicling the world premiere of Horton Foote’s nine-play The Orphans’ Home Cycle, an epic event that will encompass Signature’s entire 2009-2010 Season beginning in November.

Grand events like this– a world premiere of nine plays spanning nearly thirty years with a cast of 22 actors playing over sixty roles – are rare, and everyone who will be involved in the undertaking, from the actors in the rehearsal room to the staffs in the administrative and box offices, will have the opportunity to be a part of something quite special and unusual. What’s more, Horton Foote was a beloved friend and colleague of Signature Theatre Company and our producing partner, Hartford Stage, and these plays tell the deeply personal story of the founding of his family. It’s extremely gratifying to not only be presenting works that tell a rich and compelling story, but also celebrate Horton’s history and legacy.

Horton Foote began writing The Orphans’ Home Cycle in the 1970s as nine separate plays to honor his late parents, Albert Horton Foote and Hallie Brooks Foote, basing the central character of the cycle, Horace Robedaux, on his father. The cycle begins in 1902 and takes us from Horace’s childhood in and around the fictional town of Harrison, Texas (Harrison, where many of his plays are set, is based on Horton’s hometown of Wharton, Texas), into his adulthood when he has established his own family and had his first son, a character based on Horton himself.

Many of the Orphans’ plays have been fully produced at other theatres, and almost half, Convicts, Lily Dale, Courtship, Valentine’s Day, and 1918, have been produced on television or as feature films. Two, Roots in a Parched Ground and Cousins, have never been produced in any medium. Horton had always wanted to see all nine plays presented together as a complete cycle. Two years ago that dream came to fruition when Michael Wilson, Artistic Director of Connecticut’s Hartford Stage and a frequent collaborator of Horton’s, approached him about paring them down into nine one-acts which would be presented together in three parts. Signature officially joined the project as co-producer in January 2009.

Over the course of the season, I and several others will be bringing you behind-the-scenes updates on the journey of bringing this monumental work to the stage. Right now casting is underway, design meetings are happening, and much reading and research on Horton and turn of the century Eastern Texas has been happening in Signature’s artistic office. This point in the process has been a long time coming for all of us – some have waited six months to get started, some two and a half years, and Horton waited for over thirty. We still have a long way to go until first preview but we’re well on our way.

Welcome to The Orphans’ Home Cycle…

ADDENDUM: I have recently been reminded that Roots in a Parched Ground, the first play of the cycle, was originally a teleplay entitled The Night of the Storm, and was produced by the “Du Pont Show of the Month” in 1961. Horton’s original title for it was A Golden String (from a William Blake poem), which the producers rejected as too ambiguous. They did like the second title, Roots in a Parched Ground (from a William Carlos Williams poem), but the advertising agency disliked it, and so they all compromised on The Night of the Storm, which, according to Horton, “None of us liked very much.” The play was subsequently published as Roots in a Parched Ground. Apologies for the oversight and no offense intended towards “Du Pont Show of the Month” producer David Susskind, Night of the Storm director Daniel Petrie, and actors Julie Harris, E.G. Marshall, Mildred Dunnock, Mark Connelly, Fritz Weaver, and Jo Van Fleet.

Thursday, May 28, 2009

Subscriptions for Signature’s 2009-2010 Horton Foote Legacy Season Now On Sale!

THE ORPHAN’S HOME CYCLE
A World Premiere Event Presented in Three Parts
written by Horton Foote
directed by Michael Wilson

Part 1 - “The Story of a Childhood”
November 5, 2009 – March 6, 2010

Part 2 - “The Story of a Marriage”
December 3, 2009 – March 6, 2010

Part 3 - “The Story of a Family”
January 7, 2010 – March 6, 2010

Subscriptions are available here!
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More information about subscriptions can be found here:
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Monday, April 13, 2009

Backstage with the Cast and Crew of ZOOMAN AND THE SIGN

Signature's institutional photographer Gregory Costanzo was at it again this past weekend, snapping shots of the Zooman and the Sign cast and crew as they got ready for the show. Check out the rest of the photos below!

Amari Cheatom ("Zooman")

Peter Jay Fernandez ("Donald Jackson")

Ron Canada ("Uncle Emmett")

Rosalyn Coleman ("Rachel Tate")

Evan Parke ("Reuben Tate") warms up onstage

Portia ("Grace Georges")

Rosalyn Coleman vamps it up, making deck carpenter Derek Loehr laugh

Tre Davis ("Russell Adams"), Assistant Stage Manager Kara Aghabekian and Jamal Mallory-McCree ("Victor Tate") hang out before the show

Lynda Gravatt ("Ash Boswell")

Evan Parke, Peter Jay Fernandez, W. Tre Davis, Jamal Mallory-McCree and Amari Cheatom take a moment to check in with each other before the show

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

ZOOMAN AND THE SIGN: Links and Articles

Each season at Signature Theatre Company, the members of the Artistic staff contextualize the season plays for the creative team and actors. With materials from the personal collection of the season playwright and the New York Public Library, among other archival resources, we compile comprehensive facts and figures about events and ways of life specific to the plays. For example, we create a glossary of references for use by directors and actors, as well as supplement the glossary with additional suggested reading.

For Charles Fuller’s Zooman and the Sign – which is set in Philadelphia in 1979 but could take place at any time and in any city – much of the research has been drawn from newspaper and magazine articles spanning the 1970s through today about teenage gang violence and the communities it impacts. Also included is information on the music of the time that influenced our production. Please find below a sampling of the research compiled that we hope will enrich your theatre-going experience.

The Return of the Gang
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,878590-1,00.html

A View from the Inside
http://www.philly.com/inquirer/special/violence/

Hope Seen for Curbing Youth Violence
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0CE4D8133CF932A2575BC0A965958260

A Little Girl Shot, and a Crowd That Didn’t See
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/09/nyregion/09taj.html?ex=1185768000&en=1df6bd50153b38c7&ei=5070

A Brief History of Jazz
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=19:T691

Old School Rap
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=19:T2167

For an exclusive interview with Playeright-in-Residence Charles Fuller and information on the original NEC production of Zooman and the Sign, go to http://www.signaturetheatre.org/newsletter.htm and check out the online version of Signature Edition, the official newsletter of Signature Theatre Company. Or pick up a copy when you’re at the theatre!

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

ZOOMAN AND THE SIGN: First Rehearsal Photos

It's hard to believe, but it's already time for the first rehearsal of Signature Theatre Company's final show of the 2008-09 season celebrating the historic Negro Ensemble Company. The cast and crew of Zooman and the Sign, which begins performances March 3, 2009, along with Signature's staff, met and greeted each other before the cast began a powerful read-thru of Charles Fuller's classic drama. Check out the photos below!

Director Stephen McKinley Henderson

Signature's Artistic Director James Houghton and Amari Cheatom ("Zooman")

NEC Founder Douglas Turner Ward and Signature's Associate Artist Ruben Santiago-Hudson (who also directed The First Breeze of Summer earlier this season)

Sound designer Robert Kaplowitz

Costume designer Katherine Roth

Set designer Shaun Motley

Zooman and the Sign's set

Evan Parke ("Reuben Tate")

Rosalyn Coleman ("Rachel Tate")

Lynda Gravatt ("Ash Boswell")

Peter Jay Fernandez ("Donald Jackson")

Jamal Mallory-McCree ("Victor Tate") and Rosalyn Coleman ("Rachel Tate")

Ron Canada ("Emmett Tate")

Amari Cheatom ("Zooman")

W Tre Davis ("Russell Adams") and Portia ("Grace Georges")

All photos by Gregory Costanzo

Monday, February 9, 2009

Behind the Scenes: DAY OF ABSENCE Staged Reading

On February 1-2, 2009 Signature Theatre Company presented a staged reading of Douglas Turner Ward's Day of Absence, the landmark play that inspired the founding of the Negro Ensemble Company. Ward directed a cast of 17 for the reading, among them several original cast members. The cast included Peggy Alston, Norman Bush, Yaya DaCosta, Keith David, Brandon Dirden, Jason Dirden, Arthur French, January LaVoy, William Jay Marshall, Kathryn Meisle, Erica Peeples, Terrence Riggins, Heather Alicia Simms, Joyce Sylvester, Raphael Nash Thompson and Allie Woods.

The show, performed in white face, featured make-up design by Erin Kennedy Lunsford. Jessica Pabst provided the costumes, with Michael Jarrett on lights and Graham Johnson on sound.

Check out these pictures of the cast getting ready backstage before the staged reading.