Theatre season announced
Full productions to include Oedipus Rex, The Crucible and Meet Me in St. Louis
The Wells Theater is just one of the performance venues featured during the 2016-2017 theatre season at Monmouth College.
The 2016-17 theatre season at Monmouth College will feature three full productions, sandwiched between a pair of newer traditions.
Fusion Fest III, a 24-hour play festival, will open the season Sept. 9-10, and one-act plays directed by students in one of Monmouth’s 300-level theatre classes will close the curtain on April 27-30.
The three larger productions are Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, which will be staged Oct. 27-30 in Wells Theater; The Crucible by Arthur Miller, which is scheduled for Nov. 17-20 in the College’s downtown Fusion Theatre; and the musical Meet Me in St. Louis, which will be performed April 6-9 in Wells Theater.
“This season, we are excited to offer some familiar works which reflect the past and very much the present,” said theatre professor Doug Rankin. “We expect our audiences to be engaged with thought-provoking ideas that tie in with current events, as well as good old-fashioned entertainment with our musical in the spring.”
Each of the full productions will have a different director, leading off with a new faculty member, Visiting Assistant Professor Ron Zank.
Oedipus Rex has been called “the first detective story.” In Monmouth’s production, Greek tragedy will crash into the gritty pictures and colorful words from film noir, in a shadowy, dangerous world of detectives, secrets and femmes fatales.
More than 2,300 years after Sophocles, Miller wrote what is widely regarded as one of the greatest American plays of all time. Written as an allegory of 1950s McCarthyism, The Crucible will be directed by senior Ellen Johnson of Kewanee, Ill.
Based on the heartwarming movie, Meet Me in St. Louis tells the story of the Smith family at the 1904 World’s Fair. Assistant Professor of Theatre Vanessa Campagna will direct the musical, which includes such memorable numbers as Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas and Whenever I’m with You.
Purchase tickets online for a production or for the whole season (at a 20 percent discount).
Fusion Fest III, a 24-hour play festival, will open the season Sept. 9-10, and one-act plays directed by students in one of Monmouth’s 300-level theatre classes will close the curtain on April 27-30.
The three larger productions are Oedipus Rex by Sophocles, which will be staged Oct. 27-30 in Wells Theater; The Crucible by Arthur Miller, which is scheduled for Nov. 17-20 in the College’s downtown Fusion Theatre; and the musical Meet Me in St. Louis, which will be performed April 6-9 in Wells Theater.
“This season, we are excited to offer some familiar works which reflect the past and very much the present,” said theatre professor Doug Rankin. “We expect our audiences to be engaged with thought-provoking ideas that tie in with current events, as well as good old-fashioned entertainment with our musical in the spring.”
Each of the full productions will have a different director, leading off with a new faculty member, Visiting Assistant Professor Ron Zank.
Oedipus Rex has been called “the first detective story.” In Monmouth’s production, Greek tragedy will crash into the gritty pictures and colorful words from film noir, in a shadowy, dangerous world of detectives, secrets and femmes fatales.
More than 2,300 years after Sophocles, Miller wrote what is widely regarded as one of the greatest American plays of all time. Written as an allegory of 1950s McCarthyism, The Crucible will be directed by senior Ellen Johnson of Kewanee, Ill.
Based on the heartwarming movie, Meet Me in St. Louis tells the story of the Smith family at the 1904 World’s Fair. Assistant Professor of Theatre Vanessa Campagna will direct the musical, which includes such memorable numbers as Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas and Whenever I’m with You.
Purchase tickets online for a production or for the whole season (at a 20 percent discount).
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