Sea of Common Catastrophe

Showing at 7 Stages in Little Five Points through this Sunday, Sea of Common Catastrophe is a beautiful performance piece that moves the mind and heart. It shows not just the horror that so many who were affected by Hurricane Katrina, but a vast array of emotions—and lack of emotions—the natural disaster wrought on New Orleans.

Sea of Common Catastrophe | 7 Stages Theatre | Photo: Stungun Photography

"7 Stages presents New Orleans' based ArtSpot Productions ensemble as they lead a consideration of the profound transformations that have swept through New Orleans in the decade since Hurricane Katrina, and of our own roles and responsibilities as artists in the realities of gentrification and displacement. A dream-world imaging of a community inundated by a flood of change and upheaval."

The cast's performance and symphonic movement is outstanding. There was one cast member who I was most moved by...Lisa Shattuck, who plays Tobias. Her facial expressions perfectly presented what she was feeling in every scene. Every look, every turn, every nuance is tethered to your own heart...there's no escaping feeling what Tobias is feeling.

The performance is approximately one hour and the evening I went there was a "Talk Back" session with Heidi Howard, Artistic Director at 7 Stages, and Jeff Becker who conceived, directed and designed Sea of Catastrophe, as well as the entire cast! 

I love 7 Stages' "Talk Back" sessions...they're an opportunity for the "community" of theatre-goers that evening to share what they felt and to ask questions. It totally enhances the evening's experience...it greatly expands what you just witnessed.     

Sea of Common Catastrophe | 7 Stages Theatre | Photo: Stungun Photography

I personally did not at the time know anyone affected by the disaster. When one particular, unassuming, segment of the play showed two friends talking on the phone, presumably miles apart and away from New Orleans, enjoying jovial conversation and sipping on their over-priced, long-winded titled coffees, it took me back to remembering...to feeling...how helpless I felt watching the devastation of Hurricane Katrina on the news and feeling a guilty for not doing at least a little.

I don't pretend to think that everyone can help someone else in every horrible situation, but our collectively doing even a little can have a significant impact. I encourage you to challenge yourself to make even the smallest of gestures to help someone next time you see a life or lives affected by something like Hurricane Katrina. That's what I took away from this performance. 

7 Stages hosts a regular podcast by "a couple of crunchy 7 Stages interns, Sarah Summerbell and Ryan Williams," called "Cereal". In this episode, they discuss Sea of Common Catastrophe and gentrification. Have listen... 

I did not get to see this show opening weekend, thus the reason I'm writing about it so late in the run, but if you're reading this post by this Sunday, I highly recommend getting tickets and going to 7 Stages to see Sea of Common Catastrophe. And check out the rest of their season!

The Threepenny Opera

The Threepenny Opera, on stage at 7 Stages now through September 25 (extended through Sunday, October 2!), has been inspired by German Expressionist cinema of the 1920s, as well as contemporary struggles for social and economic equality. This show is beyond magnificent! Especially if you watch it for what it is and not for something you "expect".

The Threepenny Opera | 7 Stages | Photo: StunGun Photography

The star of the show is, without question, Aaron Strand who portrays Macheath. He's the lead, which isn't always my personal favorite, but in this case he totally is. His expertise as an actor is incredibly strong and present and his voice reverberates throughout the theatre beautifully and profoundly...the two coupled—his acting and his voice—are the theatrical gems theatre-goers are fearlessly seeking.

Stephanie Lloyd, who plays Polly Peachum, is delightfully brilliant. She's a wonderful actress, and wholly convincing that she's experiencing the vast array of emotions her character is going through. Her voice is distinctively pleasing and her character's expressions are the best!  

The Threepenny Opera | 7 Stages | Photo: StunGun Photography

I went in knowing little about the show, but expecting the typical brilliance that 7 Stages presents. They do not disappoint with this show. It's edgy, it's thought-provoking, it's gorgeous and sexy. This show makes you—or at least made me—ponder just how similar life in 1920s German Expressionist cinema is similar to life in so many cultures today.

There's love, there are in-laws, there's strife, there's social economic disparity and there's doing what it takes to survive. We often credit our parents for doing the "best that they could", but we don't give fellow citizens that same disclaimer...which sometimes leads to desperation. Sometimes, of course, it leads to people doing the same dumb stuff that they didn't learn from the last time they did it. 

The Threepenny Opera | 7 Stages | Photo: StunGun Photography

The Threepenny Opera was written by playwright Bertolt Brecht (born in 1898), whose image has graced the side of the 7 Stages Theatre building for more than a decade! I've seen that face for many, many years and never thought to think who it was. When I saw this play, that mural came alive.

Some other personal favorites in the show are Suzi Bass Award nominee Don Finney (Mrs. Peachum, pictured above), who is absolutely brilliant! She...he, has a wonderful voice, and his acting steals the stage during multiple scenes. I love this bit of casting.

Another favorite is Adam Lowe (Tiger Brown/Filch)...I very much enjoyed this character! He's the (serious) comedic relief as the Chief of Police (and old Army comrade of Macheath's), as well as the role of a rather hilarious peddler (Filch). I didn't realize it, but I met Adam during a Cinco de Mayo celebration in Little Five Points...he was amazing! Don't judge, please...it was Cinco de Mayo!    

The Threepenny Opera | 7 Stages | Photo: StunGun Photography

Having seen the advertisements for this show, I would not have been at all surprised if it had been presented in a dramatic, over-acted silent film format...it was totally dramatic! In a wonderful way. 

This show is a musical.

Among the songs performed are songs of revolution like 'How to Survive' along with classic numbers (contemporary to some of us) like 'Mack the Knife' and 'Pirate Jenny'. 

The Threepenny Opera | 7 Stages | Photo: StunGun Photography

This play is billed as a "raw musical about power, sex, and the evil things one must do to stay alive in a corrupt world." And it delivers on every single word. I loved it and if you're the least bit edgy, curious, culturally open, I think you'll enjoy it too. 

I think what I most enjoyed about this play, in addition to Aaron Strand's voice and performance, was the portray of today's challenges in a setting of generations ago...making one wonder what, if anything, has changed...and what it will take to affect change.



Above is a video trailer for "The Threepenny Opera", now playing at 7 Stages Theatre.

The Threepenny Opera | 7 Stages | Photo: StunGun Photography

The Threepenny Opera is on stage at 7 Stages through Sunday, September 25 (extended through Sunday, October 2!). If you have any sense of adventure, be sure you see this show...it's truly...so many things!

"Inside I" Gives an Insightful Voice to Autism

In the State of Georgia, 1 in 68 children are born in the spectrum of Autism. 

Inside I, a world-premiere now showing at 7 Stages Theatre, brilliantly showcases a portion of the life—birth through 18—of one young person living on a more misunderstood side of Autism, one who also is a lovable character and one who endears compassion, empathy and understanding.

One of the things that you'll learn about Autism in this experience is that "If you've met one person on the spectrum, you've met ONE person on the spectrum." That's to say that every person who lives with Autism is living a different experience.

I Direct Myself is a magnificent 15-minute show presented before Inside I, written by and starring Sam Gross, a 7 Stages intern living on the spectrum who has been working at the theatre for a long time.

Sam's passion for acting is immediately apparent. His performance is wonderful and wholly brilliant. This young man is also quite brave...he's doing something I've never, ever considered doing—acting on stage before a live audience. 

I believe you're going to love his performance...for which he received a generous round of applause at the performance I attended. Congratulations, Sam!

Inside I utilizes multiple technologies, including live-feed camera, large-screen projection and smartphone technology, and is performed, rather surprisingly, via masterful and magnificently acted puppetry.

This story features episodes of the life and dreams of character named Ben, from birth to age 18, who lives on the spectrum and it tells the tale of his obsession with, and escape into the world of video—early on with his mother's smartphone and later with one of his own.

The large-screen projections feature Ben's perspective via projections from his smartphone—his view of the world...giving "voice" and image to life on Autism's spectrum of unheard and unseen effects, including the heartbreak and love of family and the bullying of kids who have no understanding of what they're seeing.

This play delves deep into one of the many possible experiences of Autism, offering an insight unlike any other I've ever seen.

I had the honor of meeting a number of the actors, as well as Michael Haverty, one of the creators of Inside I, immediately after witnessing him bringing food to a peaceful homeless person on the street. Michael didn't see that I saw him, that I saw an act of friendliness and compassion. It was a touching moment and the conversation with him afterward about the play was insightful and quite riveting.

Of the actors I met, and I'm grateful for every one that I met, it was a great honor to meet Suzi Bass Award-winner Matt Baum, who performed the role of Ben, the main character. Talk about range...it's not often that you see someone on stage perform the role of a character from birth to 18. Matt did so brilliantly and quite convincingly. His wife was also in attendance and is wholly delightful.

On Saturday, May 7 at 2:00 p.m. there will be a sensory-friendly performance of Inside I. Feel free to call the theatre for more details about this particular performance.




I also encourage you to listen to this interview with Inside I co-creators Michael Haverty and Erwin Maas.

While Inside I is geared to a neuro-typical audience—people not living on the spectrum—many who have Autistic children, know someone (or many) who live on the spectrum, research Autism, are caregivers, and advocates, are showing great interest in the show. 

I personally have known a couple of mothers of Autistic children, but my exposure has been extremely limited, so I'm grateful to 7 Stages for bringing this show to the Atlanta community...I learned a lot, enjoyed the performances immensely and left equipped to better understand, sympathize and share 7 Stages' mission with this play to help spread awareness of Autism.

You can see I Direct Myself and Inside I at 7 Stages Theatre now on stage through Sunday, May 8, 2016.

Heads Will Roll...and You're Gonna Laugh!

The Revolutionists is about women of the French Revolution, also known as "The Reign of Terror", who wanted to cause change for women's rights. They were courageous, terrified, brave, brash, steadfast and some of them lost their heads. 

7 Stages presents the gravity their plight—actions that would help form modern societal norms—and does it in with a quite a few laughs along the way. Yes, it's a comedy.

Park Krausen, Parris Sarter, Rachel Frawley, and Stacy Melich

The Revolutionists | 7 Stages | Photo by Stungun Photography

There's nothing funny about someone losing their head to the guillotine—which continued to be used in France for executions until 1981—but humans otherwise offer us quite a lot at which to laugh. 

Award-winning playwright Lauren Gunderson said—of the fight for gender equality—that she tends "to fight with humor more than anger. Making someone laugh invites them into the conversations, it equates us as people as opposed to dividing us by ideology."

This story is based on three historical figures and a fourth fictional character based on historical fact, each of them fighting for liberté, égalité, fraternité, French for "liberty, equality, fraternity". Today that's the national motto of France and the Republic of Haiti.

While the four women may not have been friends in real life, writer Gunderson imagines for us how their common plight might have made them dearest of friends and supporters of each other. As much as this is a tale of inciting change, it's a touching tale of sisterhood. 

Stacy Melich and Park Krausen | The Revolutionists |  7 Stages
Photo by Stungun Photography

Allow me, please, to share a few notes about the amazing, brilliant and talented cast. Also, I'll share a link to a video about the historical figures, should you wish to learn a lot in a little time about their respective histories. My friend Barry, who is a documentary and YouTube aficionado, turned me on to history teacher and YouTuber Tom Richey, who entertains and mesmerizes while teaching history...not an everyday feat! The links to the videos are him/his.

Stacy Melich, magnificently performs the role of Olympe de Gouges—a radical feminist playwright who also penned the "Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen"—unfortunately did not, in her time, produce the results she'd hoped for. As noted in the play, sometimes heroes are not identified until many, many years later. [Tom Richey VIDEO about Olympe de Gouges]

I saw Stacy perform in a revenge thriller late last year, The Thrush & the Woodpecker, in which she also was magnificent. I think you're going to love her performance as Olympe de Gouges. 

Park Krausen, who performs the role of Marie Antoinette—the Tragic Queen of France—is playful, splashy and quite lovable. Even if you know nothing about the French Revolution, you've probably heard of Marie Antoinette and that she met her end at the guillotine. As depicted in The Revolutionists, she didn't say some of what history says she said and she wasn't a horrible, dismissive person, either. [Tom Richey VIDEO about Marie Antoinette]

Park Krausen and Parris Sarter | The Revolutionists | 7 Stages

Photo by Stungun Photography

Rachel Frawley, perfectly cast to perform Charlotte Corday—is riveting! Her performance is emotion-evoking and full of heart. I think audience members, myself included, felt the most sad and moved by this character. It's terrifying what happened to women in those days—it's shocking what still happens today for that matter, another great reason to see this show. [Tom Richey VIDEO about Charlotte Corday]

I see a lot of Charlotte Corday, actually. A friend has a spectacular reproduction of the famous Hauer painting of her in prison—following the assignation of Jean-Paul Marat (stabbed in his bathtub), which led her also to the guillotine. I am truly amazed at how incredibly well Rachel brings Charlotte to life. And whoever was responsible for props in this show brought a whimsical touch of humor in the giant kitchen knife she's wielding throughout the show.

Parris Sarter, who performs the role of Marianne Angelle, is moving, passionate, bold and more than lively. She's a brilliant actress and I hope I get to see her again.

From an interview with Sarter, she said, "I want the audience to walk away saying that these women were truly badass, but also say that it's important to stand and fight for something that is important to you. To remember that these women didn't wait around for anyone to fight their battles." 

I wholeheartedly agree!

Marianne is the only fictional character in the show, playing a revolutionist fighting against France's enslavement of black Haitians—happening at the same time the French were fighting for freedom! Gunderson cleverly named this character Marianne after the symbol for French freedom, La Marianne. 




A wonderful surprise, you don't have to have a degree in 18th Century French history or even be a history buff to enjoy this show, directed by the talented Heidi S. Howard. You'll risk learning a thing or two, but mostly you'll be amazed, laugh a lot and find yourself on your feet applauding at the finale.
At the risk of being relegated to the Dark Ages, go see this enlightening, exciting and engaging performance of The Revolutionists at 7 Stages through Sunday, March 20. 

"The Missing Generation"...Poignant and Profound

I had the honor Thursday evening of seeing the Atlanta premiere of Sean Dorsey Dance's "The Missing Generation", a profound dance and narrative performance on a 20-city national tour now playing at 7 Stages Theatre through Sunday, February 7.

[This post may contain content that is sensitive to some, but it addresses, through the art of dance and narrative, a current, real-life threat—the AIDS pandemic.] 

During the post-performance Q&A, one of the performers, Brian, was wearing a t-shirt peppered with superhero logos. To Sean, each of the performers, and to 7 Stages, I say you're all heroes for bringing to light a topic that many would call overdone, when in fact we're nowhere near done.

The Missing Generation | Sean Dorsey Dance | Photo: Lydia Daniller

Over a two-year period, Dorsey traveled the U.S. to record oral history interviews with longtime survivors of the early AIDS epidemic, hosted community residencies, and conducted extensive archival research...then spent nearly 500 hours reviewing the 75 hours of interviews and transcripts, eventually weaving 17 sections into the now-touring performance. 

Their voices are no longer relegated to history.

"There is an incredible urgency to undertaking this project now: during my lifetime, we will see the passing of the last generation of people who actually experienced the early years of the AIDS epidemic first-hand," Dorsey says. "We are already rapidly losing our community’s stories. I wanted to capture and share part of this important history and reckon with the loss and grief this generation endured, and to collectively face this history and grieve and heal together."

I invite you to read the excellently crafted review by ArtsATL, which shares many of the details I learned about tonight's performance. If you're not already following ArtsATL on Social Media, I encourage you to...they FULLY cover the Atlanta arts scene! 

The one thing that I would like to add to that review is that this project is not only about the loss of part of an entire generation of gay, transgender and straight people to AIDS in the 1980s and 1990s, I heard it as a call to activism for today's younger generation to continue the fight against the AIDS pandemic. 

Why is that call to activism so important? The CDC (headquartered here in Atlanta) reports that at the end of 2012, an estimated 1.2 million persons aged 13 and older were living with HIV infection in the United States, including 156,300 (12.8%) persons whose infections had not been diagnosed. In 2013, Georgia had the fifth highest number of HIV infection in the nation...That's why that call to activism is so important. 




The final comment from the audience during the post-performance Q&A was from a lady, around my age, who commented she had an epiphany during the performance. She shared that the performance brought a new meaning for her of the once-commonly-seen bumper sticker SILENCE=DEATH. I believe what she was saying is that the performance brought to light, rekindled memories of the early epidemic, that otherwise would have died had Sean not kept them alive.

A particularly emotional moment of the evening for me was meeting Gert McMullin face-to-face, who I wanted to personally offer her a word of gratitude. She was one of the founders of The AIDS Memorial Quilt, and continues to be active with the organization and its contributors. There are several panels from the Quilt on display in the lobby, with podcasts, and the auditorium.

I first saw the Quilt in Piedmont Park decades ago and then in Washington, D.C. on the National Mall in 1996, six years before I moved there. Gert moved from San Francisco to Atlanta when our fine city offered storage space for the all-too-quickly growing Quilt project.

In the lobby before the performance was Dr. L Nyrobi N. Moss of Making A Way Housing, a project that addresses homelessness in Southwest Atlanta. She was there with Empowerment Resource Center and they're offering anonymous, quick-result HIV testing, as well as lots of information about available resources.

There's a LOT of programming accompanied with this four-day run! In addition to what I've already mentioned, there's a Dance Workshop with Sean Dorsey Dance available for the public on Saturday, February 6, from 1:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m. To register for the workshop, email heidi@7stages.org with your full name and contact information. Sean and fellow dancers highly encourage novice dancers to participate! 

ALSO, 7 Stages is hosting a free brunch and "Art of Activism" discussion on Sunday from 1:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m., sponsored by Babs Midtown and Ansley Wine Merchants. The owner of Babs, Randy Adler, is a personal friend and colleague. I've dined at Babs and it truly is funtastic! Randy has a rather unique vocabulary and "funtastic" is definitely a word he would use and one that I totally agree with. I'm sure you'll enjoy brunch and find the discussion engaging and enlightening!

Sean Dorsey Dance's "The Missing Generation" is playing at 7 Stages Theatre in Little Five Points through Sunday, February 7, 2016.   

About 7 Stages Theatre (which I particularly like about it)
7 Stages Theatre has been bringing local and international emerging artwork of social, political, and spiritual importance to Atlanta audiences since 1979. Artists in performance, music, visual and the spoken arts have found the organization a haven in the support and development of new works and methods of collaboration.