CAMP GIRLS reading a success

The reading of CAMP GIRLS AND GHOST MONK on Monday, April 8 went over really well. We got it on tape and will send the recording on to the playwright Matt Lyle. There was a small (maybe a dozen or so) audience. Not bad for a reading on a Monday night.

Special thanks to John Michael and Matt Tomvonovich of Nouveau 47 Theatre, Matt Lyle, all the actors (Jeff Swearingen, Natalie Young, Elizabeth Evans, Rhianna Mack, Becca Shivers and Ruth Engel-McEntire) and director Brad McEntire for setting the whole thing up.

Ruth Engel performs in Oklahoma

ATL Artist Ruth Engel was invited to present an original monologue at the Feastival of Lights on December 11, 2010 in Claremore, Oklahoma. She wrote and performed a short stroy called THE SERVANT, about a servant of one of the Magi.

Ruth Engel rehearsing THE SERVANT

And in performance.

Spotlight On: RUTH ENGEL

Ms. Ruth Engel

Continuing our series of profiles of the great artists associated with Audacity, we now present... Ms. Ruth Engel

Q: Hometown?
A: Keene, Texas

Q: Strangest Theatre-related job?
A: This is not exactly the strangest job, but a theatre job is an odd reason to fly to South Korea. I traveled to South Korea for a week to be the equivalent of a stagehand in a religious production at a University.
Then, some might consider this strange; I have and do take great pride in making clothes/costumes for puppets.

Q: What experience(s) made you want to go into the theatre?
A: My entire journey towards theatre is a long one, but the shorter version begins with my dissatisfaction on continuing work for a PhD in English Literature. You see, I went directly on to Master’s work in English after I graduated college so I never felt a scholastic completion with my college graduation like many of my friends did. But once I completed my Master’s degree in Literature I started to feel some of that completion. So I taught for a bit but if did not take me long to start to get restless so, while still teaching, I started taking Literature PhD classes. It was after a year that I knew that I craved another direction in my education. It was at that point that my brother suggested Drama. Now, I had always loved theatre and drama and had dabbled with it since elementary school, but I had never thought of it as a career. But I did some research, applied to the graduate program at Texas Woman’s University (I had some unusual circumstances since none of my undergraduate work nor my graduate work had anything to do with theatre), and was accepted. I told myself that I would try it for one semester and if I was not happy, then I would move on and find something else. After about two weeks of classes I was hooked and have never looked back.

Q: Tragic flaw?
A: I over think and question everything far too much.

Q: If you could change one thing about theatre, what would it be?
A: Its perception – the way many people view it. Theatre is magic but only because life is magic. So often in our society we do not stop to see the magic of life and therefore, we do not recognize the magic in theatre.
Also, if I could I would eliminate “bad” theatre (occasionally, including a few of my own production as well).

Q: Who are or were your theatrical influences?
A: This is a slightly difficult question for me to answer because many of my influences in the theatre are not solely restricted to theatre. Due to my background in British literature, the lives of many of the early women writers (such as the Bronte sisters and Jane Austen, for example) inspire me. The fact that they loved writing so much that they wrote under pseudonyms just to get their work out to the public inspires me. I have also been influenced by the great Greek and Roman philosophers. I see life and the philosophical questions of life present in theatre. As someone who loves to dwell on those fundamental and yet complex questions, theatre has given me a canvas to playfully examine what the greatest minds have wrestled with for ages (however, still not coming up with any answer). And lastly, I would also have to say that I have been influenced by Margo Jones and Paul Baker (especially since I have grown up in the Dallas area), and Peter Brook.

Q: What kind of theatre really excites you?
A: Making theatre. I know all theatre has to be made, but the very act of making it: building puppets, creating characters, building a set, telling a story that has never been told (at least in that way), and touching someone’s life - that thrills me to the core.

Q: What is in the near future for you as far as your work in the theatre?
A: Well, currently I am working on creating three one-woman historical pieces about three extraordinary women in the early 20th century. The first one that I am working on is about the life of Sara Murphy, then, next up will be a piece on Violet Jessop, and lastly the life of Ruth Draper. All three amazing women were quite humble, but left a tremendous impact on those around them.

For more information on Ruth Engel visit her website at: http://www.ruthengel.net/

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Five Things I Like About Sara Murphy

Sara Murphy, with her legendary pearls draped over her back for sunbathing, and Ada MacLeish (under umbrella), La Garoupe beach, Antibes, 1924.

ATL artist Ruth Engel is currently developing a series of biographical pieces for the stage. Each will feature a historcal "strong" female from the early 1900s. The first in the line of "historical portraits" will involve maven of the Jazz Age: Sara Murphy.

Sara Murphy, along with her husband Gerald Murphy, were wealthy, expatriate Americans who moved to the French Riviera in the early 20th century and who, with their generous hospitality and flair for parties, created a vibrant social circle, particularly in the 1920s, that included a great number of artists and writers of the Lost Generation.

Engel lists out below a few of the things that she has learned so far and come to love about Sar Murphy:

1. She was a consummate hostess

2. She was classy in a way that she wore a string of pearls when she sunbathed on the beach.

3. She had such a magnetic personality that everyone loved her.

4. She was compulsive neat freak (I can identify) to the point that when she and Gerald traveled with their three kids on trains she would always take their own linens for her kids to sleep on.

5. She had a big heart.

Look for workshops of Engel's Sara Murphy project in the spring of 2011.

Ruth Engel tackles early 20th Century

Gerald and Sara Murphy

Titanic survivor Violet Jessop

Monologuist Ruth Draper

ATL Managing Director Ruth Engel has announced plans to create a theatre piece about several early 20th Century historical personalities, including Gerald and Sara Murphy, Violet Jessop and Ruth Draper.

These historical persons may be a presented as a series or interwoven together as a single piece.

"It is a long term project," Engel reports. She is in the research stage at this time.

Stage Directions Interview with ATL A.D. Brad McEntire

... and Ruth Engel makes a cameo appearance, too. Chris Taylor and Dan Purcul of the STAGE DIRECTIONS blog interviewed McEntire recently on the patio of the Amsterdam Bar in Dallas' Exposition Park for a video/podcast about the new directions Audacity is heading and the EYE IN THE SKY PROJECT. Interview should be up soon. Check back for more details.

VOLUME OF SMOKE opens

VOLUME OF SMOKE by Clay McLeod Chapman has opened to good reviews here in Dallas.

Here on TheaterJones

Here on the Dallas Observer

Here on the Dallas Morning News


On December 26th, 1811, the Richmond Theatre burned to the ground. Over 70 people perished, many trampled to death in the chaos. The incident made headlines as far away as Germany and gave rise to the Second Great Awakening.

From one of America's most unique emerging playwrights comes this historical account of grim humor, heart-breaking tragedy and profound heroism.

Plays March 11-27,2010 at the Bath House Cultural Centre.

VOLUME OF SMOKE approaches

“No tongue can tell, no pen describe the woeful catastrophe. No person who was not there can form any idea of the unexampled scene of human distress.”

—The American Standard, December, 1811

Directed by Ruth Engel

Featuring: Angela Parsons, Elizabeth Evans, Rhianna Mack, Oscar Contreras, Chris Piper and Tyson Rinehart.

Lighting design by Jaymes Gregory.

On December 26th, 1811, the Richmond Theatre burned to the ground. A standing-room only audience of 600 people had gathered that night to see a touring company present a billing of several different pieces. During The Bleeding Nun, a short play of haunted star-crossed lovers, the fire began. Of those 600 in attendance, seventy died—many women and children, many trampled in the panic that ensued. The dead included the newly-elected Governor, George W. Smith, who died after saving his wife’s life. The incident made headlines as far away as Germany and gave rise to the Second Great Awakening. 

In response to the tragedy, Richmond, VA, erected a church on the ashes of the theatre and banned all public performance (including street musicians) for eight years. The price of breaking the law was a ticket for six dollars and sixty-six cents. 

Weaving together a narrative out of more than twenty different characters in his signature lyrical-prose style, Clay McLeod Chapman constructs a narrative of the lead up to and aftermath from the Great Richmond Theatre Fire in the play VOLUME OF SMOKE. Based on interviews conducted with survivors of the fire in an unpublished 19th-century manuscript, VOLUME OF SMOKE is a beautiful, moving, surprisingly funny voyage into the heart of disaster and our responses to it. 

Playing March 11 - 27, 2010 (Wednesday thru Saturdays)

At the Bath House Cultural Center, 512 East Lawther Drive, Dallas TX. Map here.

Director Ruth Engel gives the cast notes.

PENS AND STRINGS is in rehearsals. If you're in the Austin area, don't forget to come out and see the show. Plays 7 PM January 16th at the Hyde Park Theatre (43rd at Guadalupe) as part of the 16th Annual FronteraFest.

After a cast change (these things happen... Jamie Marchi and Audacity parted ways while the excellent Ms. Angela Parsons stepped in to play a bit). The creative team has been hard at work at ATL's luxurious rehearsal studios (i.e. Ruth's apartment) and can't wait to present this short one-act about a writer with ideas... who have ideas of their own.

GRADING ON A CURVE playwright and cast talk with Audacity

About the Play

Grading on a Curve follows a bored artist with intense feelings of ennui. This leads her to embark on an epic hunger strike, complete with delusions, observations and yearnings- especially for nacho cheese.
About the Playwright

Writer and artist A.V. Phibes

A.V. Phibes is a mostly self-taught illustrator/designer based in Brooklyn, who has been working professionally in New York for nearly a decade.

As a freelance Illustrator, Phibes has done work for plays, events, catalogs, websites, party clowns and fire-eaters. She's also done illustrations for books published by Little-Brown, Penguin and Andrews McMeel. She's worked on staff in the design departments of Steve Madden, Acme Tees, Neu Industries and now-defunct teen website Sweet16.com.

Through her own company, Evilkid Productions, she has been producing original artwork and designs in her trademark cartoon style. Evilkid designs have been licensed for a wide array of products which have occasionally turned up in such places as Target, Urban Outfitters, Hot Topic and Spencer Gifts.

Phibes has shown her artwork in shows at Trinity Gallery in Philedelphia and Blue Ruin Gallery in Pittsburgh. She has also had art featured in the annual Dirty Detroit Show and the Seattle Erotic Art Festival.

For more information on A. V. Phibes click here.


An interview with the ladies of GRADING ON A CURVE

On January 31, 2008 Audacity Theatre Lab sent director Ruth Ann Engel and actress Jamie Marchi to Austin, Texas to present A.V. Phibes' one-person show at the Hyde Park Theatre's FronteraFest. FronteraFest is an annual 5-week, multi-venue "fringe" festival presenting over 800 theatre artists/companies from around the nation. Named "Best Theatrical Event" by the Austin Critics' Table, FronteraFest has garnered audience praise and critical acclaim. It remains the largest fringe theatre festival in the Southwestern United States. What follows is an interview with the ladies that put on this show, conducted by ATL's Artistic Director Brad McEntire.


AUDACITY THEATRE LAB: Ruth, Alia and Jamie - Thanks for agreeing to this informal interview. Alia, let's start with you. GRADING ON A CURVE was not originally a one-woman theatre piece. When and for what did you originally write GRADING ON A CURVE?


AV PHIBES: I wrote GOAC back in 1999 not long after I moved to New York and still had designs on being a fiction writer. Amazon.com was sponsoring a short fiction contest with a $10,000 prize and I wrote the story with the intent of winning that contest, which, obviously I didn't. It's a testament to my youthful naivete and blind overconfidence that I actually thought I was going to win.


ATL: What has surprised you most about the stage life of GRADING ON A CURVE?


AVP: What surprises me most is that it has a stage life at all. Since, outside the support of Audacity Productions [and now Audacity Theatre Lab], the story was met with pretty much no response at all, I assumed that the story was just going to be another dead-in-the-water endeavor. But thanks to Audacity, it's managed to have a whole new life and get some positive feedback, which I appreciate.


ATL: Ms. Engel, how did you come across the script to GRADING ON A CURVE and what drew you to it as a director?


RUTH ANN ENGEL: I had seen the script in an earlier staging when Audacity [Productions] used it as the opening act for THE LAST CASTRATO. I thought it was just a brilliant script. I love the dry wit and rapid pace of the piece, not to mention the language. This script is ripe with so many possibilities and is so tightly written. It's just great fun to work on.


ATL: Alia, you are actually known more as a graphic artist more than a playwright. In fact, you've worn many artistic hats over the years. Cartoonist. Filmmaker. Sideshow performer. Illustrator. Cat Owner. How does being a playwright fit in with your many guises?


AVP: I'd say I've pretty much lived a life of obsessive dilettantism. Of being extremely focused on what I'm doing at any given time and then almost immediately thereafter losing interest and moving on to something else. This has produced a life full of half-assery, unfinished projects and existential malaise. Although if I may have a moment of megalomaniacal self-congratulation, I have been more successful being half-assed than many people using their entire asses! Still, I live in constant remorse that I am not living up to the potential of my full ass. I suppose I've found that the beauty of playwriting (or my paltry facsimile thereof), is that other people pick up the slack. There are producers and directors and actors to make something complete in a way that I probably could never execute of my own accord.


ATL: Ms. Marchi, in GRADING ON A CURVE, you play the protagonist, an artist, perhaps with touches of dilettantism, who develops cannibalistic tendancies arising from an intense ennui. Has boredom ever led you to do something extreme?


JAMIE MARCHI: Well, I've never been so bored I needed to do something as drastic as quit eating and/or chew on my fingers. However, I have spent my fair share of too much time online as well as watched a few too many television programs that only have commercials for the army and vo-techs.


ATL: You and director Ruth Engel worked on the piece over a few weeks before taking it to Austin's Frontera Fest. One-person pieces are difficult usually because the production team is so small, therefore the concentration on progress must be a little more heightened. A level of focus is higher comparatively with the rehearsals of a traditional play with a large cast, full crew and the like. How was the working relationship between you and Ruth?


JM: Awful. That Ruth Engel; I tell you.... It was great! Anyone who knows Ruth will tell you she's great to work with. It helps that we're both friends. Ruth took a lot of time putting me into the right space for the character, and she was a terrific director. More importantly, we are very popular in Irish bars.


ATL: Ms. Engel, same sort of question. How was your experience working on a one-woman piece in general and how was it working with Ms. Marchi in particular?


RAE: It is a challenge but I truly enjoy it. I like the intimate rehearsals and the ability to have a very narrow focus, giving all my attention to just one person. However, it does add the element to my part to help the actor keep the story going through creative blocking, props, and set pieces. It keeps me on my toes and constantly looking for new approaches. As for working with Ms. Marchi, she is a gem. She is smart, talented, beautiful and she brings so much to the piece. She takes directions beautifully, is tremendously playful and up for anything. Not to mention she does not back away from throwing out her suggestions. This is immensely helpful for me when I am the only one in the room watching. For me, collaboration in a production is a must.


ATL: Ms. Marchi, you've performed GRADING ON A CURVE before, though not with Ms. Engel as the director. How is it returning to something like this? Has your take on it changed?


JM: I first performed GRADING ON A CURVE about four years ago. I've had quite the four years myself since then, so it's interesting for me to follow my process of personal growth and how it translates into this performance. The changes from the original performance are pretty significant. I think I love performing this monologue so much due to my narcissistic need to follow my emotional growth. That and the spotlight. I don't have to share it with ANYONE!....I am an actor after all.


ATL: Ms. Engel, you also have experience with the piece. You originally directed GRADING ON A CURVE in Hong Kong last year? How has your take on the piece changed?


RAE: The first time I directed it I was more focused on the audience and entertaining them as opposed to just telling a story. I focused a lot on the mechanicals of the piece. And due to circumstances I tried to fit the piece into a peg that I wasn't as happy with (i.e. a waitress in a diner). This time around, I tried to let the story and character tell me what it wanted to be and where it wanted to go.


ATL: Ms. Marchi, how did you originally get interested in theatre and acting?


JM: When you have no particular set of skills, there are only a few things you can do. I like to talk and have people listen, so acting was a no-brainer. You know, I really hate this question. So many people have these great "moments" that called them to acting like God calls preachers to the church. God didn't call me to acting. I just have always thought it was fun. That's my great lame story. I think it's fun. How boring is that?!


ATL: And Ms. Engel, same question. What drew to the theatre?


RAE: Well my journey was a long one. I've always loved the stage but never thought of it as a career. I remember in the 2nd grade my class did a comic staging of Columbus receiving his commission to find the New World and I played Queen Isabella. But that was where I saw theatre for me, as a hobby and nothing more, that is until after I had taken some PhD classes in English Literature and decided that wasn't what I wanted. I knew my schooling wasn't over yet and my brother suggested theatre. So I enrolled in theatre classes at TWU [Texas Woman's University] and told myself I'd give it a semester. I was there for four years and I've never looked back. I couldn't be happier now!


ATL: Alia, now that you've had this experience with GRADING ON A CURVE, how's your take on playwriting? Do you plan to write more for the stage?


AVP: I would like to say "Yes! Definitely!" but when it comes to artistic projects, I'm a slippery eel who can't be trusted. I could tell you to your face that I am going to sit down today and write a three-act play about two suicides whose ghosts are haunting the same apartment that's like "Beetlejuice" meets "Before Sunrise," but then I'll go play nintendo wii and watch youtube videos all day instead. Or maybe I'll just come up with "high concept pitches" all day. It's like "Serpico" meets "All Dogs Go To Heaven!" It's like "Kramer vs. Kramer" in space!


ATL: Ladies, thanks so much for your time. One last question before we sign off. Artistically, what is next up for you?


JM: You can currently hear my voice on IFC in Witchblade as well as other anime on The Cartoon Network. I've been doing voices for anime for almost 6 years now, and I'm getting more immersed into that market. I've got more acting plans on the horizon, but I'm really, really lazy, so we'll see if anything happens.


REA: Well currently I'm trying to learn the producing side of things with the Undermain Theatre in Dallas for their show GREENDALE. As for independent projects, I am working with two playwrights developing two different scripts that I hope to get up on their feet by summer.


AVP: My goal this year is to get a book or two published. I'm trying to come up with ideas dumb enough to sell a zillion copies and make me rich. Something like "The Get Rich Quick Diet: Life Lessons I Learned From My Dog while Surviving Cancer." Oprah is going to eat that up! But in all seriousness, see above [answer regarding me as a] slippery eel.

First show as ATL... GRADING ON A CURVE

Audacity Theatre Lab's first foray out of the gate was A.V. Phibes' GRADING ON A CURVE. This one-woman piece about an artist with cannabilistic cravings (especially for fingers) made a great entry in Austin's FronterFest.

Directed by ATL's Managing Producer Ruth Ann Engel and featuring Jamie Marchi. Set Design by Jeff Hernandez.

Presented at Hyde Park Theatre, Austin, Texas January 31, 2008