Drama Department’s "War Stories" Brings Variety of Military Voices to Life October 26-28

CHESTERTOWN, MD—The Washington College Drama Department will premier “War Stories,” an original play adapted from the modern anthology of wartime writings, Operation Homecoming, the weekend of October 26-28.

          The performances, scripted and directed by drama professor Dale Daigle, will take place in Decker Theatre, Daniel Z. Gibson Center for the Arts, with two evening showings, Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., and a Sunday matinee at 1 p.m.

            Daigle, who had been searching for a piece that dealt with the issues of war, was immediately drawn to “Operation Homecoming,” which was published by Random House in 2006 and later made into a documentary film. “Within ten minutes I was blown away by these people’s stories,” he says. “They were powerful and compelling in very simple ways.”

            “Operation Homecoming,” edited by “War Letters” author Andrew Carroll, was the result of a program launched by the National Endowment for the Arts to encourage U.S. Marines, soldiers, sailors, airmen, and their families to write about their experiences with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The final product is a collection ranging from eyewitness accounts and letters to poems and private journal entries, each offering a different perspective on the effects of war. 

            “The book was full of stories from people of all walks of life, and all sides of war, and I thought, ‘what a great place to start a piece,’” says Daigle of his source material.  This variety of perspectives carried over into the adaptation of the script, he adds.  “Unlike a normal play where you’re always aware of the playwright’s voice, the voices here are infinitely different.”

            The play has been a collaborative effort. Daigle has been discussing its development with juniors Harris Allgeier, Kristin Hammond, Zach Weidner, and Phaedra Scott since last June, and the play has continued to evolve with input from others in the 11-member cast. Daigle hopes the play will prompt discussion of the stakes of war and “remind us of its impact.”

            Daigle’s most recent directorial work was the world premiere of All Blues by Robert Earl Price, a lecturer in creative writing and drama at the College.  That play debuted at Washington College in the fall of 2011 and then traveled to 7 Stages Theatre in Atlanta, Ga.  In addition to Washington College plays, Daigle has directed productions in Maine, Hawaii, Scotland, Kyoto, Samoa, Denver, Los Angeles, and Washington, D.C.

            Tickets are priced at $5, or $3 for students and seniors, and proceeds will go to the NEA to help fund future Operation Homecoming projects. For ticket reservations, call 410-778-7835 or send an email to drama_tickets@washcoll.edu.  

Washington College and 7 Stages Theater Company in Atlanta to Premiere Price's Latest, "All Blues"

CHESTERTOWN, MD—A new work by the distinguished playwright Robert Earl Price, a play based on the story of a white newspaper reporter from Pittsburgh who traveled through the South in 1948 as a black man, will have its world premiere at Washington College on Sept. 15.

All Blues — named for the 1959 Miles Davis classic from Kind of Blue, one of the most influential record albums of the 20^th century — is being co-produced by the Washington College Department of Drama and the Atlanta, Ga., theater company 7 Stages, where the play will open with the same cast on Sept. 22.

Del Hamilton, co-founder and artistic director of 7 Stages, will play the role of Ray Sprigle, a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reporter who traveled through the South for 30 days in 1948 as a light-skinned black man named James R. Crawford. Sprigle’s guide was John Wesley Dobbs, an important political leader in Atlanta’s black community and an NAACP activist. Dobbs will be played by Chestertown musician Bob Ortiz.

Sprigle had already won the Pulitzer Prize for breaking the story that Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black had been a member of the Ku Klux Klan, and he was famous both for his hard-hitting stories and for his penchant for going undercover to get them.

All Blues is a compelling meditation on the moral complexities of Sprigle’s venture across the country’s racial and geographic divide, which the reporter learned in his travels to call not the Mason Dixon, but the Smith and Wesson line. Sprigle’s journey took place more than a decade before the publication of Black Like Me, John Howard Griffin’s bestselling account of his own travels through the South as a white man passing himself off as black.

The lyrics and music of All Blues form a subtext to the play, which weaves light, movement, and a cast of characters that include the light and dark sides of Sprigle’s own soul into a moody meditation on race.

“The project will be built on the juxtaposition of one of the seminal pieces of music from the 20th century and a forgotten story,” says WC drama department chair Dale Daigle, who will direct the performance. “These two pieces provide a foundation for us to explore the ubiquitous and unavoidable feeling of being the ‘other’ and the complicated responses that we all have when confronted with the unknown in the form of another human being. By exploring these encounters — what Robert Earl Price calls a ‘slight’ and personifies in an eponymous character — we hope to take our audience on a journey that will be discomforting yet, hopefully, revelatory.”

The cast of All Blues includes acclaimed Kent County jazz singer Karen Somerville; Polly Sommerfeld, lecturer in the Washington College Department of Drama; and Washington College students Mike Zurawski ’12, Marta Wesenberg ’12, John Lesser ’12, Phaedra Scott ’14, Harris Allgeier ’14 and Zach Weidner ’14.

The set designer is 7 Stages co-founder Faye Hamilton. The lighting designer is Josh Schulman ’00 of Cohesive Light in Philadelphia. Brigid Lally ’12 designed costumes. And the video designers are Marta Wesenberg ’12 and Corey Holland ’10, who works on the staff of WC’s Multimedia Production Center.

All Blues is Robert Earl Price’s fifth premiere at 7 Stages during his 20 years there as playwright in residence. The award-winning playwright and screenwriter is also artist in residence in the drama department at Washington College, where he teaches creative writing and drama.

“By joining forces to take on Robert's excellent ideas about race and racism, we not only expose Washington College students to new theatre art, and new ways of making theatre, but we also are teaching core values about the nation and how each of us fits into society,” says Del Hamilton of 7 Stages. “This is one of the major questions on the minds of young people these days: how to have a purposeful life.”

The Chestertown performances of All Blues will be at the Decker Theatre in the Daniel Z. Gibson Center for the Arts at Washington College on Thurs. Sept. 15 at 8 p.m., Fri. Sept. 16 at 8:30 p.m. and Sat. Sept. 17 at 8 p.m. Admission is $10 for the general public, $5 for seniors and students. For reservations, call the Gibson Center box office at 410-778-7835 or e-mail drama_tickets@washcoll.edu.

The play will be performed at 7 Stages in Atlanta with the Chestertown cast Sept. 22-25. Seven Stages will produce All Blues with its own cast Sept. 29 to Oct. 2. More information about the Atlanta performances can be found at www.7stages.org. All Blues is produced in part with support from the National Endowment for the Arts and The Maxcy Visiting Artist Endowment at Washington College.

Photos: Middle: a photograph from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette circa 1948 shows newspaper reporter Ray Sprigle at his desk. Bottom: All Blues author Robert Earl Price is a visiting professor of creative writing and drama at Washington College and playwright in residence at 7 Stages Theater in Atlanta.

WC’s Timely Play, "Death and the Maiden" Examines Journey from Dictator to Democracy

CHESTERTOWN—The Washington College Department of Drama will present Chilean playwright Ariel Dorfman’s 1990 play Death and the Maiden on February 17, 18, and 19 at 8 p.m. in Tawes Theater, Gibson Center for the Arts. Professor Dale Daigle, assisted by sophomore Ellen Huffman, directs the production starring juniors Louisa Kathleen Muldowney, John Lesser, and Michael Zurawski.

Set in the present and in a country that has recently undergone the transition from dictatorship to democracy, Death and the Maiden examines not only the political fallout from such turmoil, but also the personal cost.

“The [recent] events in Egypt make the issues that the play wrestles with particularly poignant and relevant,” says director Daigle. It also reminds us that issues of torture and abuse of power are always present and imminent, and that we must constantly remind ourselves that whether we participate directly or not, we are all complicit in any torture or abuse of power that we allow.”

Seating in Tawes Theatre is limited; to reserve free tickets call 410-778-7835 or e-mail drama_tickets@washcoll.edu. The Gibson Center for the Arts is on the main campus, 300 Washington Avenue.

Bohemian Rhapsody: Alumni to Discuss Careers in the Arts during Fall Family Day

Chestertown, MD, October 18, 2001 — Washington College's Alumni Council will host a Life After Liberal Arts Symposium to coincide with Fall Family Day on Saturday, October 27 from 1:30 to 3:00 p.m. in the Norman James Theatre, William Smith Hall. Students, parents, alumni and the community are invited to this event to interact with and learn from alumni who have put their degrees to good and sometimes unusual use in the working world. This symposium will focus on "The Performance of a Lifetime: Careers in the Arts" and will feature alumni John Harris '94, Vicco Von Voss '91 and Michele Volansky '90 discussing the challenges, lessons, opportunities, and successes that they have encountered through careers in the arts. Drama Department Chairman Dale Daigle will moderate the event.

John Harris, a 1994 graduate in music, is a trombonist who decided to pursue a career in business, joining an Annapolis-based company manufacturing and marketing small wooden boat kits. He eventually bought the firm, Chesapeake Light Craft Company, and has made it one of the largest wooden boat kit companies in the nation, but he has not given up his love of music. John pursues a second career as a jazz musician and has created a small jazz ensemble that plays at music festivals, including Chestertown's Saturday Evening Concert series. John credits Washington College with fostering his love of the arts while helping him develop writing skills and business acumen.

Vicco Von Voss is a 1991 graduate who majored in art. During college, Vicco worked with a local furniture restorer and discovered his love of wood, bringing natural forms into functional existence. After college, Vicco began a three-year carpentry and furniture-making apprenticeship in Germany and returned to the Eastern Shore to pursue his dream as a master furnituremaker. Vicco credits the art department with encouraging his love of the visual arts and natural forms, an appreciation that inspires the function and unique aesthetics of his handmade furniture.

Michele Volansky is a 1990 graduate who currently works for the Philadelphia Theatre Company and lectures in drama at Washington College. An English major with a devotion to theatre, Michele pursued a masters in theatre and dramaturgy from Villanova University. She has been a guest dramaturg at the Atlantic Theatre Company, Victory Gardens and Next Theatre, in addition to serving on the staff of Actors Theatre of Louisville and as dramaturg/literary manager at the Steppenwolf Theatre Company in Chicago. Her play "Whispering City" was produced as part of the Steppenwolf Arts Exchange Program in 1999, and she is currently at work on a musical adaptation of Thulani Davis' novel "1959". Michelle serves on the advisory board of" Theatre Forum" magazine and is an artistic consultant for the Chicago-based Serendipity Theatre Company.

Life After Liberal Arts is sponsored by the Washington College Alumni Council.