The Columbia theatre community sure has a knack for originality. It is to be admired that at least half of the shows one hears about are student written. Adding to the Columbia canon, Cassandra Adair takes audiences on a multi-faceted journey of loneliness and humor in the premiere of her play, “The Lonely Play (A Not-So-Lonely Play). The production was put on by NOMADS, and Bwog’s resident theatre fanatic Harry Dahl gives us the scoop.

I ventured out last night to attend “The Lonely Play (A Not-So-Lonely Play)”, presented by NOMADS (New and Original Material Authored and Directed by Students). With a witty script and wonderful team, “Lonely Play” and NOMADS continue to showcase the vast talent within our community and the fantastic work that can be created as a result.

As the name implies, “Lonely Play” leads the audience through the lives and thoughts of six people suffering from extreme loneliness. The play consists mostly of monologues discussing the different characters’ feelings on issues like paintings, mail, and how each of them deals with being lonely. In addition, a few scenes involving multiple characters connect the play with a loose narrative. The plot of the play itself is not particularly profound, and in some ways very unrealistic, but works very well at bringing the six characters together and showcasing the impact that they have on each others’ lives.

As an original work, one must pay particular attention to how well written the script is. In particular, the various speeches throughout the play manage to discuss subject matter directly with the audience while still being realistic, and writer Cassandra Adair (BC ’12) deserves praise for being able to write on so many subjects in so many different voices. The script is quite quirky, and Adair’s writing is filled with humorous takes on life juxtaposed with profoundness, showcasing both her knack for comedic timing and her insight into the way we feel.

Read more…

Dancin' all the time.

Where Art Thou?, Bwog’s Wednesday feature, encourages you, as usual, to stay on campus and have some free/kind of free fun this weekend. If you’re a dance aficionado, this is the weekend to stay on campus and watch your peers roll around on stage and stuff. If you’d like your loosely dance-related event featured here, email events@bwog.com.

Thursday

• The Lonely Play (a not-so-lonely play), 8pm on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday in Lerner Black Box. NOMADS warmly invites you to their fall production of a brand new play written by Cassandra Adair, BC’12. $5 with CUID, $ 10 without.

Friday

• CoLab Fall Showcase, 7:30 pm on Friday and 2:30 pm and 7:00 pm on Saturday in the VagBox. Featuring pieces by 10 student choreographers in diverse styles. Free.
• Voice Ensemble Concert, 7:30 pm in 301 Philosophy Hall. Free!
• WBAR & POSTCRYPT ART GALLERY present: Student Sounds | Sound Students, 8 pm to 11 pm The Hive on the first floor of Altschul Hall. Throughout Student Sounds | Sound Students, you will hear sounds that have been configured into music by man or machine, and you will meet sounds that have been retranslated and transplanted to transport you elsewhere. You will make sounds that will be borrowed for music, and you will hear yourself as an environment. Student Sounds | Sound Students will also include a re-presentation of works of art from Postcrypt Art Gallery’s current exhibition Bodies of Sound. Free.
• Columbia Ballet Collaborative’s Fall Performances,  7 pm at MMAC, Saturday at 8 pm at MMAC, and Sunday at 8 pm at Streng Studio in Barnard Hall. Manhattan Movement and Arts Center (MMAC) is located at 248 West 60th Street. Tickets for the MMAC shows are $18 General Admission or $10 with CUID. Tickets for the Streng show are $7 with CUID and $15 without.
• metamORCHESIS, 9 pm and Sunday at 2 pm in Roone. Columbia’s largest dance group, Orchesis, presents it fall show of new student choreography! Featuring ballet, tap, jazz, modern, and more. $5 with CUID, $10 without.

Saturday

• Fruit Paunch in the College Improv Tournament!, 2 pm at the Magnet Theater, 254 West 29th St. between 7th and 8th Avenues. Fruit Paunch is competing in the College Improv Tournament, a nationwide competition among college improv groups. On Saturday, they’re going to be going head to head with other groups from the New York-area in order to get a spot in the Chicago Comedy Festival. They have to win their respective bracket at 2 pm, advance to the finals at 8 pm, and then win in the finals.
  

Tuesday

• Improvapalooza, 9 pm in Lerner Black Box. An unforgettable night of improv and sketch comedy featuring Columbia’s best comedy groups: Chowdah, Fruit Paunch, Control Top, Alfred, Shenanigans and Goings On, and Dog Court! With stand-Up by Eli Grober, Charlie Dinkin, Bob Vulfov, and special guests.

Apparently, Canada's themepark Wonderland has a ride entitled "Cliffhanger." Very clever, Cleffs.

New York City has endless opportunities to enjoy some truly magnificent (and other not so magnificent) works of theatre, dance, art, and music. But they’re all so expensive?! We know. Stay home this weekend and appreciate what free and not-so-free cultural experiences Morningside Heights has to offer. If you’d like your local (or not so local!) Columbia arts event listed here, please email events@bwog.com.

Thursday

• Composer Portrait: Tobias Picker, 8pm in Miller Theatre. Described by The New Yorker as “a genuine creator with a fertile unforced vein of invention,” Picker is best know for his operas. Seven of the composer’s pieces will be performed. Tickets are $7 for students.

Friday

• Columbia New Poetry Launch, 8pm 606 W 114th St. Join the staff of Columbia’s experimental poetry magazine/commnity and Potluck house for dinner (potluck-style), live music, and an open mic. Bring words, food, and attitude. Free.

Saturday

• Clefhangers Fall Study Break Concert 2011, 8pm – 9pm in John Jay Lounge. There will be free food and, of course, a capella. The Clefs with have guest groups Duke’s Rhythm and Blue and Queens College’s Tizmoret.

Sunday

• Nomads presents Open Shop, 8pm – 10pm in Lerner E 477. A new weekly Nomads project to workshop new plays. The night will be broken up into two sessions: an open mic night, where anyone can feel free to bring some of their work, and a series of table readings from developing works.

The Cliffhanger via Wikimedia

NOMADS presented Sylvia Khoury’s (CC ’12) original play—”>

Crucifixes on Easter Weekend—how apropos!

Last night, NOMADS presented Sylvia Khoury’s (CC ’12) original play—Park Beautification. Bwog’s resident philosopher of fine arts Alex Jones now reports.

The play was performed in a basement room of St. Paul’s Chapel that looked like it was designed to display art, not host theater. For as unexpectedly cold a night as it was, that room was boiling. There was also a large column in the middle of the space that blocked much of the stage from view. However, we should remember that this is Columbia, where space is a valuable commodity, so students groups must take what they can get. The audience, upon entering the improvised theatre, was greeted by a creepy soundtrack of children playing (in a park!).

Park Beautification was written and directed by Sylvia Khoury (CC ’12). A disgruntled man, Gene, played by Taylor Owen (CC ’11), builds wooden crosses in a nondescript city park. Audrey, a college student played by Lida Benson (BC ’14), has a temporary job cleaning up the park as a maintenance worker. Everyday, she takes down the crosses that Gene builds, all the while engrossing herself in his ludicrous obsession. Harvey, played by Alex Katz (CC ’14), has been a regular at the park for 15 years to fish from a bench near Gene’s cross construction zone. Without spoiling any of the ridiculous relational intricacy, another college student, Logan, played by Lorenzo Landini (CC ’13) has a huge role in the story as it develops.

The character of Gene represents the sorrow that lingers after a traumatic loss of life. Gene mixes this deep sadness with an equal part of lunacy. Whether Khoury intended this or not, Owens’ portrayal emphasized the character’s instability to an uncomfortable point. Severely overacting the role, Owens made Gene seem better suited for an asylum than a park. His flat character oscillated between maniacal dialogue and shouting. A whole spectrum of emotion lies between these clichéd poles, but that emotion was left untapped. Gene was the main character, and yet I did not resent his absence when he was offstage “in jail.” Without his unbalanced presence, Benson, Landini, and Katz all had gratifying chemistry on stage. Katz’s was an especially emotionally-nuanced performance. It was delicate and fun to watch.

Read more…

Yes, all those are supposed to be capitalized. Caps-lock expert and intrepid Bwog tipster Alexandra Svokos reviews Thursday’s opening NOMADS WORDPLAY 2011 production, part of the two-week long CARAVAN (Columbia Artists Reaching Audiences ViA NOMADS) festival .

The CARAVAN experience begins with free food in a cozy atmosphere. The food and performance are free—and with such great shows you feel as if they are being too generous. NOMADS began its first annual campus-wide spring festival of student-produced new works last night with CARAVAN in the Diana Black Box.

The evening opened with “Hail Mary,” a dance choreographed by Dominique Nieves and performed by Hana Goldstone, Alicia Outing, and herself. The performance is about struggles with faith, especially in the face of Catholic preaching and habit for rituals. “Hail Mary” clearly conveys this message with the three women putting their hands together in prayer and laying with arms outstretched like Jesus on the cross. The women dance beautifully, whipping around the stage and viciously moving their feet in a futile attempt to run. It was an excellently executed piece. Read more…

I'm bringing sexy Bach.

Bwog’s Wednesday feature, Where Art Thou?, is here to keep you posted on what’s going on in the A&E department in Morningside Heights and beyond (basically all the cool events your friends are in/on/at). If you would like your club’s event, The Edgar Allen Floe Society’s Spring Concert, posted on Bwog, now you can! E-mail us at events@bwog.com.

Thursday

• Wordplay 2011: Three Days and Three New Plays, running Thursday through Saturday at 7:30 pm in the VagBox. Staged readings of works written, directed and produced by students. Different play every night. Free.
• Pants! The Musical. A Reading., Thursday at 9 p.m. in Lerner Black Box. A new student-written musical. Free.

Friday

• The 18th Annual WBAR-B-Q, Friday from 3 pm to 11 pm on Lehman Lawn and in the Diana Event Oval. Check out a mixtape of the lineup! Free.
  

Saturday

• Bach Society Spring Concert, Saturday at 7 pm in St. Paul’s Chapel. Free.
• CMTS Presents “Miscast,” Saturday at 10 p.m. in Lerner Black Box. Free.

Last night, NOMADS held their customary first-show gala for their newest student piece: Portrait and a Dream. Bwog’s Katheryn Thayer now reports.

We know finals are coming up, but what better way to de-stress than to watch someone else worry about the end of the world, death, and losing everything important? Student writer Jacob Rice, CC ’12, quips, “People keep asking me what the play is about, and so far, the only answer I’ve been happy with is: ‘It’s about an hour and forty five minutes.’”

The concept began as four hundred Post-its on Rice’s wall and undoubtedly turned out much better than the four hundred Post-it notes crammed into your textbooks will. Its short scenes were artfully strung together into a thought-provoking work through the collaboration of writer, director, and actors. Student theater groups differ from repertory theaters in that the creative process includes collaboration; as actors familiarized with their characters, they offered suggestions for new scenes and changes. Rice made changes as he saw the show performed, and the director, Alex Brinkman-Young, could share Rice’s plans for the look and feel of the play. Rice enjoys “experimenting with a huge amount of power,” and recognizes how lucky he was to have the patience of the cast and crew: “I change things up a lot. I feel bad—the actors were incredible! They had to memorize their lines and then re-memorize and re-memorize as I rewrote.” Read more…

Bwog’s New Works Associate Megan McGregor reports from last night’s WORDplay event “Weekend in Boomtown: Act One” with a newfound fear of individuals who watch too much television.

Beginning Thursday evening and running through Saturday evening, WORDplay: A Festival of New Works has dominated Lerner’s Black Box with theatrical innovation. Each show consists of at least one new play and musical performance, with the exception of Friday night’s show, which only comprised a play. The festival is sponsored by NOMADS, which has been producing undergraduate student-written creative works since 2003.

Friday night’s show premiered the first act of “A Weekend in Boomtown.” “A Weekend in Boomtown,” written by Ariel Karlin BC ’10 and directed by Alyssa Lamontagne CC ’11, commences with a monologue by Becky, played by Katie Craddock BC ’13. Becky addresses a mysterious man and the audience, discussing the house she comes to see everyday–the house from the fictional acclaimed television show, “Home and House.” The mysterious man comes out of hiding, introduces himself as Sam, played by Adrian Soghoian CC ’10, and then knocks Becky unconscious. Becky awakens inside a love-based community of people who love and are heavily influenced by “Home and House.” Realizing where she is and that she is unable to leave, Becky runs around the perimeter of the stage shrieking ear-splitting screeches. Craddock’s ability to act so absurdly with the utmost sincerity was extremely impressive. The remainder of the act develops around Becky’s interactions with the other members of the love-based community and her discovering of its foundations and inner workings. Read more…

Black Box Correspondent Mark Hay attended last night’s performance of NOMADS’s latest production:

Your correspondent arrived early to last night’s production of “The (Love) Story of Myrtle Willoughby and Willough Myrtleby (and the Neighbors)” to attend its Opening Gala—mainly due to the promise of free food—where I happened to meet Kurt Kanazawa (CC’11), president of NOMADS (New and Original Material Authored and Directed by Students, the group behind the production).  He spoke briefly on his intent to bring the group into more exciting and experimental grounds, such as by adding an element of smell to theater and doing a play in ASL.

Not to sound stodgy, but when artistic undergrads use the word “experimental” to describe their work, red flags go off. I entered the theater with great skepticism, expecting possibly a strangled take on “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” or some long, painful indie experience. To Mr. Kanazawa, and especially to writer Cassandra Adair (BC’12) and director Katie Lupica (CC’11), your reviewer owes you a sincere and profound apology for my doubts. Read more…

World theatrical premiere correspondent Julia Mix Barrington brings Bwog this review of Three Spoons, a new play from NOMADS performing tonight at 8 and tomorrow at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m.

Samantha Carlin’s play Three Spoons may rely on some well-trodden storylines, but, to a certain extent, all clichés are clichés because people like them.  That’s why, for all its lack of innovation, Three Spoons is definitely an enjoyable show, with a tight and engaging plot and the three lead actresses who truly inhabit their roles as sisters. Read more…