Erica Quaedvlieg

Written and directed by Yukich and presented as part of the Dream Up Festival at Theater for the New City, Apes at Play is a short but ironically succinct piece that gets to the core of what it means to live within the possibility of the inexplicable.

A seasoned assassin is hired to wipe out an obscure fringe playwright. Yet as she moves closer to the kill, she uncovers an inexplicable link between herself and the target. Part detective story, part meta-noir, this Kafkaesque comedy takes us on a topsy-turvy quest that explores everything from black holes to criminal clowns.

Coming up March 24th and 25th, we have the theater club's first short play festival. Completely student run, this festival will showcase published plays as well as two original student works. These plays are performed, designed, and directed by the students. As one of the student directors, I can't begin to tell you about how proud I am to be a part of this festival. This is my first time directing outside of classes and I am absolutely thrilled to be directing Smitten written by Mark Harvey Levine. The entire experience has shaped me as a director, actor, designer, and even an audience member. It has definitely impacted how I will look at future productions and has given me even more respect for the various positions involved in making a production happen. Let's meet some of my other fellow directors shall we?

I recently had the pleasure of joining classmates in the participation of the 49th Annual Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival for Region 1. I found myself immersed in a world of talented future theatre professionals and current professionals that helped to mold my experience and bring me one step closer to accomplishing my goal.

In taking the class this semester, I learned so much about how theatre makes an impact on our community (yes, that is the class title and it is self explanatory). I learned about other theatre companies make their impact such as La Poca Nostra, the Yes Men, and the San Francisco Mime Troupe. I got the chance to research issues affecting our communities and collaborate with my classmates to make art addressing those issues. This show was certainly one for the books. With a minimal amount of rehearsal time, we put this show together within a matter of weeks. Everyone took on a wide array of responsibilities and I couldn't be prouder of my classmates. Here is what some of them had to say about their experiences:

Welcome Back! Decisions have been made and by the time you read this article we are merely days away from displaying our work and findings from the semester. Our title has been finalized as ?em-p?-th?. If you notice or it needs to be explained, this is the phonetic spelling of empathy, which has been the overall theme to our work. Our company has been hard at work in rehearsals and in the classroom. I decided to get an inside scoop from my classmates on their thoughts about the production and the class this semester as a whole. Let's get started shall we?

Welcome back! By the time you see this article we will be 2 short days from OPENING NIGHT! Tech week is a time people dread, a time people love, a magical time where everything comes together. I decided to find out how my fellow cast members survive this week and comprised a not so short list of things that can help make this stressful time a little easier for everyone involved.

As stated last week, the concept of family is a very large aspect of this production. Last week, we had the pleasure of meeting the Gibbs family. This week we get an inside look at the perspective of theatre and the production from the Webb family.

Welcome back! This week's article features an art form that a production of Our Town would not be complete without: PANTOMIME! For those who don't know what pantomime is, I decided to give you the gift of the Oxford Dictionary definition:

Getting off book not everyone's favorite part, but a necessary one in the rehearsal process. Once the book is out of your hand, you can move freer and explore the character more. You can really dive into specific choices when you aren't preoccupied by the book taking up space in your hands. How does one get off book, you might ask? Well here are some tips and tricks based on what I've learned in my experiences, with input from some of the cast from Our Town.

Music is in the air at the University of New Haven as the Theatre Club prepares for their third cabaret. The tradition started last Fall under the direction of Robert Vaccaro, who also directed the Spring Cabaret 'Cabaret 2: Electric Boogaloo'. Upon Vaccaro's graduation, the Cabaret was passed to the direction of two time cast member Jared Reynolds. I had the pleasure of speaking with the director, choreographer, and a few cast members about their experiences with Cabaret III.