Saturday, November 1, 2008

Sordid Lives cast & crew provide great experience

Coker College staged "Sordid Lives" by Del Shores October 30 through November 2 at the Elizabeth Boatwright Coker Performing Arts Center in the Watson Theater. I found it a great theater experience.

Ken Stuart was doing his first directing at Coker and he engineered a masterful production helping students develop talent that I am not sure they knew they have. This was a very quick two-hour production and there were acting achievements at every turn as all of the student actors developed portrayals that helped the audience move right into the story. In many ways this seems to be an actor's play because while there are sort of starring roles, the support characters are so critical to the story that when the parts are carried off as they need to be, all the actors have to feel like stars. (Friday night those roles made all the characters stars.)

Over the past several weeks I have watched the students (both cast and crew) put in some long hours to achieve the production they performed this weekend. Their hard work pays off in a very successful translation of Del Shores "Sordid Lives."

A couple of times the "crew" has been mentioned and one reason the show works so well on the Watson stage is an excellent set that with minor modifications becomes four different locations, sound effects that provide credibility to the scenes and lighting that sets the focus.

It all came together for an great night of theater from my seat.

No comments:

Post a Comment