By SAMANTHA WHITE, Special to The Oakland Press

Read original article here.

Dave Toomey as Cyrano

Wayne State University’s production of Frank Langella’s “Cyrano” wins by a nose at the Hilberry Theatre this season with an amazing lead actor.

Dave Toomey, who plays Cyrano, is a force in the local theater. He has timing, presence and talent that speak of his time spent in the theater mecca, New York City, during his time at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. He is just a few performances shy of Broadway stardom.

Frank Langella’s “Cyrano” is an adaptation of the play “Cyrano de Bergerac” by Edmond Rostand. Langella’s version doesn’t sacrifice the story and its dramatic impact. It instead tones it down and gives it a bit more humanity and relatability.

The lead character is a poet and soldier in love with his cousin Roxane, played by Sara Hymes. But she is in love with the inarticulate Christian, played by Topher Payne.

Cyrano believes his long nose makes him too ugly for Roxane to love. Christian knows his own inability to express himself romantically prevents him from communicating his love in a way that will appeal to his beloved.

So the two devise a plan to use Christian’s good looks and Cyrano’s poetic talents to win Roxane’s heart; and the complexities and complications begin.

The Hilberry set is basic — they utilize set pieces such as long cloths hung from the ceiling to the stage floor to emulate a tree in a garden. That may speak to the simplicity meant for Langella’s version of the show. But the moon, a light toward the front of the stage, caused some issues for the viewing audience as it illuminated the stage even during moments where there should have been a blackout. You could see characters rising between scenes after a dramatic death, for example.

The costumes aren’t the best Hilberry has to offer from its presumably extensive wardrobe.

The other actors didn’t always give Toomey the support he needed. There were a couple of scenes where it felt as if he were Michael Jordan playing basketball with a high school team.

Hymes began the first act without any emotional depth. It was hard to believe she was in love with Christian and disgusted with De Guiche, played by the engaging Christopher Ellis. But by the second act she was playing with Toomey and providing the emotional support he needed to deliver the last difficult scene.

The show is pleasing and well worth the trip to Midtown Detroit — the last scene in the garden with the cast makes it a winner.

The cast includes Vanessa Sawson as Marguerite, Christopher Call as Ragueneau, Danielle Cochrane as Lise, Edmund Alyn Jones as Le Bret, Andrew Papa as Carbon and Brent Griffith, Alec Barbour and Joshua Blake Rippy as soliders one, two and three, respectively.

Q: What brought you to the Hilberry Theatre Company?

A: I was a costumer at Oakland University for 11 years, and I wanted to further my education. I knew a lot about the Hilberry’s program, and I’m a nontraditional student with children. I needed to stay in the area for school. The Hilberry has a lot to offer while allowing me to stay close to home.

Q: What was your approach to the Frank Langella’s Cyrano costumes? What informed your designs?

A: Well, right away the director decided that he wanted to do this differently than a traditional Cyrano production because it is an adaptation, and it’s different than a typical Cyrano production right off the bat. It’s paired down to the bare bones of what’s necessary to tell the story.  So you don’t have multiple soldiers, additional people, etc. Right away, he wanted to stay true to that and streamline our production.  And, he didn’t want it historically stuck in one time period.  And it isn’t.  So, he wanted to have modern sensibility combined with the 17^th century, which is a huge challenge. It was difficult. How do you meld two time periods that are completely different? For a lot of my research for the modern sensibility, I looked to runway fashion to see what was current, and oddly enough there’s a lot out there right now that’s reminiscent of 17^th century fashion.  They’ve taken corsets, for example, and tweaked them with a modern flair. So, I did that with the women’s corsets. They’re not accurate to the original period, but they maintain a hint of it. When you look at stuff from the 17^th century it’s very heavy and silhouetted.  My designs combine those two worlds, the present and the 17^th century.

Q: What’s it like to work with the Hilberry Theatre Company?

A : Scary (laughs). Not that they’re scary. It’s just the process of doing your first design at the graduate level.  It’s intimidating. What was difficult about it is that the process was during my first semester, and I was still getting acclimated to being a student.

Q: What’s your favorite thing about costume design?

A: What got me into costume design was acting. I played a role at the Renaissance festival where I was the Queen, and I was making my gowns. It was the combination of a love of acting, a love of theatre, and a love of history. With costume design you can combine all three. You can take all of those elements and be creative, and make characters come alive visually. It’s not that you’re performing on stage, but your clothes are performing on stage. You’re helping to create characters. The actor brings their elements, the director brings their elements, and then the costumer brings theirs, all to help flesh out this two dimensional character on the page into a three-dimensional character on the stage. I find that process exciting. It’s exciting that you can take theatre and change people’s lives and make them think about things that they wouldn’t normally think about. Sometimes it’s just frivolity, but sometimes it’s a statement that draws attention to an issue in society that we need to look at. Theatre can do that in ways that no other medium can. I like that.

Photo credits: Jillian Zylinski and Alexandra Stewart

The film Man Of Aran has been re-released in theatres this year, along with a subsequent re-release of the film on DVD.  The English band British Sea Power have written and recorded a new soundtrack for the 1934 film Man Of Aran. The film has been re-released on DVD with the new British Sea Power soundtrack. The new Man Of Aran package includes two discs – the re-scored Man Of Aran film on DVD, plus the soundtrack by itself on CD.

“It’s a wonderful film,” says British Sea Power guitarist Noble. “The images vary between huge drama and a brilliant kind of ridiculousness – check out the amazing foot-wide bobbled berets that the fishermen wear. It’s a great look, like a 1930s Irish version of Jack White or Kraftwerk. It’s a film that’s also relevant to the current era – a time when the idea of living a simpler life is in the air. The film shows something I’d like to think I could do, but know I never will.”

Man Of Aran is a powerful and provocative dramatized documentary from the late American filmmaker Robert J Flaherty. In a series of startling black-and-white sequences the film presents daily life on the inhospitable Aran islands on the west coast of Ireland. The film was both celebrated and controversial on its release.

The film was created from half a million feet of film shot by Flaherty while living closely with the islanders. But Man Of Aran isn’t a straightforward documentary. The ‘family’ at the center of the film weren’t related, rather a group of islanders cast as the family unit by Flaherty. The fishing expedition for basking sharks which forms the film’s dramatic heart was based around methods that hadn’t been employed on the Aran Islands for decades. Blending reality and staged elements, Flaherty arrived at a compelling document that captures the elemental power of the island’s past and present. The film won the Grand Prix at the 1935 Venice Film Festival and the eminent film critic Pauline Kael described it as, “The greatest film tribute to man’s struggle against a hostile nature.”

Click below for more:
Review
Another review
Interview
British Sea Power video
Another video
New score available here

By John Quinn

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The French, they say, have a word for it. To sum up dash, flamboyance, swagger and verve, that word is “panache.” It leaped into English largely due to Edmond Rostand’s wildly successful 1897 play “Cyrano de Bergerac,” in which the title character not only embodies the traits, but makes “panache” his dying word.

Many artists have drawn inspiration from the 17th century poet, playwright and duelist with the big name, Hercule-Savinien de Cyrano de Bergerac, who, if tradition is right, had a big nose to match. Rostand created a romance of unrequited, unexpressed love Cyrano held for his cousin Roxane. But “Cyrano” runs about four hours in rhymed couplets, and is rarely translated or produced in that form.

Enter actor Frank Langella, who abridged the “heroic comedy,” removing extraneous characters and subplots, and played the title role in 1997. This script is given a stark yet lyrical treatment by an energetic cast at Wayne State’s Hilberry Theatre.

Cyrano, best friend and greatest soldier, considers himself unworthy of love because of his prominent feature. His life-long secret love, Roxane, confides she has fallen in love at first sight with a young recruit in Cyrano’s company, Christian de Neuvillette, remarkably handsome but a tongue-tied dolt. Rather than woo her for himself, Cyrano wins her for Christian, writing the poetry of which de Neuvillette is incapable. When Christian is killed on the battlefield, Cyrano continues the deception.

Under Blair Anderson’s taut direction, this “Cyrano” avoids extravagance. Even pared down, this script delivers a wealth of beautiful imagery. In the title role, Dave Toomey ably explores the subtext in his tortured character, playing both the humor and pathos with equal grace. Sara Hymes is a reserved, intelligent Roxane and provides a fine foil for the more out-going Christian, played by Topher Payne. Both Rostand and Langella are romantics, though, and the best dialogues are scenes between Toomey and Hymes.

One quibble – and that’s a point of translation. As Cyrano dies in Roxane’s arms (no spoiler there, I hope), he avows he will doff his hat before God and, “I will stand again and proudly show Him that one pure possession … Mon panache!” It’s often literally translated as “My white plume” – the feather on his hat. Langella renders it, “My shiny soul.” Considering all the power in that word, can anything replace “panache?”

‘Frank Langella’s Cyrano’ brings a modern classic to the Hilberry.

Patty Nolan, Detroit Theater Examiner

Read original article here.

The Hilberry Theatre Company’s production of Frank Langella’s Cyrano opened last night to an enthusiastic, if somewhat weepy, audience.  This abridged adaptation of the 1897 Edmond Rostand classic is compelling in that it captures the essential truths of the original – respecting its integrity in both the humorous and heart-rending moments.

Full disclosure: I’ve never met a Cyrano I didn’t like; I am glad to have met this one.  If you’ve never seen Cyrano in any of its iterations – or are perhaps a fan of the Steve Martin film ‘Roxanne’ – you would do well to see this play at the Hilberry.

Sara Hymes as Roxane and Dave Toomey as Cyrano

Dave Toomey gives us an honest, spare representation of Cyrano, the charismatic swordsman-poet with the absurd nose. (Kudos for the beautifully executed fight choreography.) Cyrano hopelessly loves the enchanting Roxane, played with grace and understanding by Sara Hymes.  She, of course, loves the handsome but tongue-tied Christian, played by first-year Topher Payne. Chivalrous and selfless, Cyrano sets up an innocent deception with inspired words for Christian to win Roxane. It is only years later, when Cyrano is near the end of his life, that Roxane discovers his secret … and the soulmate she has always known.

This production, directed by Blair Anderson, strips away the high-style of the Rostand’s language and uses an abstract, minimalist set designed by 1994 alumnus Greg Loftus.

‘Langella’s adaptation is less transparent, more ambiguous’ says Loftus. ‘It is romantic, idealized, lyrical and modern. There is a balance between designers being literal and ambiguous. We use realism to lead audiences to an interpretation. We use concept to force audiences to come to their own conclusions. I hope our audiences see deep and human characters in a complex, non-literal world.’

As always, the Hilberry company delivers a solid ensemble performance; other cast members include: Vanessa Sawson (Margeurite), Christopher Call (Ragueneau), Danielle Cochrane (Lise), Edmund Alyn Jones (Le Bret), Christopher Ellis (De Guiche), Joshua Blake Rippy (Montfleury), Alec Barbour (Valvert), Andrew Papa (Carbon) and Brent Griffith (Priest).

Frank Langella’s Cyrano runs in rotating repertory at the Hilberry Theatre with The Cripple of Inishmaan and Summer and Smoke until March 20, 2012. Tickets are $12-$30 and are available by calling the Hilberry Theatre Box Office at (313) 577-2972, online, or by visiting the box office at 4743 Cass Avenue on the corner of Hancock.

By Lawrence B. Johnson, Special to The Detroit News

Read original article here.

Topher Payne plays Christian and Sara Hymes Roxane in a production of “Cyrano” director Blair Anderson says is geared to modern sensibilities. (Hilberry Theatre)

If you boil Edmond Rostand’s epic play “Cyrano de Bergerac” down to its Freudian essence, the story of a great swordsman and poet who suffered from a sense of inadequacy, you have Frank Langella’s “Cyrano.”

It is Langella’s distillation, in which half the huge cast of characters and most of the subplots are removed from Rostand’s original, that Wayne State University’s Hilberry Theatre brings to the stage Friday night for a run through March 10. Director Blair Anderson calls it a “Cyrano” for modern sensibilities.

“This man is larger than life but has the same human foibles and insecurities that all of us possess,” says Anderson. “He is master of the sword and the word, and seemingly has the world by the tail. But he also has this one debilitating frailty. His nose is unusually large, and he believes it makes him ugly in the eyes of the world. So he hides behinds his nose. It freezes him.

“He loves the beautiful Roxane but doesn’t dare tell her because he fears she will reject him and his nose. So he chooses to dissemble at the very time he should be totally honest.”

The result is tragic. Rostand’s “Cyrano de Bergerac” has endured as one of the great modern romances, and even in that respect it is intriguing. Though set in mid-17th century Paris, the play actually dates from 1897. Moreover, in keeping with its historical setting, Rostand devised the work entirely in rhymed couplets. Langella, who based his adaptation on Brian Hooker’s 1923 English translation, dropped the couplets in favor of conventional dialogue.

While “Cyrano” involves a love triangle, it’s not quite the classic case of two hearts competing for the favor of a third. Unwilling to reveal his love for Roxane, Cyrano sublimates his affections by lending his poetic gifts. He writes amorous verses for one of Roxane’s suitors, Christian, a handsome albeit witless young soldier. Through his mentor’s words, Christian readily sweeps Roxane off her feet. In the end, Cyrano loses even that indirect connection to his beloved and must play out his life near Roxane but with his heart in silent hiding.

“Langella’s adaptation is very American,” says Anderson. “It deals with psychological realism. Those who want all the pomp and grandeur may be disappointed. We’re trying to avoid period style to focus on motivation and the decisions that each character — Cyrano, Roxane and Christian — have to make.”

Dave Toomey, a third-year member of Hilberry’s graduate acting program and a native of Lansing, plays the brilliant but conflicted Cyrano. Even in Langella’s reduction, he says, the swordsman-poet’s generous and poetic language is a challenge to bring off.

“Cyrano likes to elaborate. He never makes his point simply,” says Toomey. “Every time he speaks it’s a three- or four-minute monologue. The trick is to understand why he keeps talking when we get it already. It’s similar to Shakespeare in that you have to speak as if it were everyday language. To drive through Cyrano’s monologues, you have to make it as casual as possible.”

At the same time, says Toomey, Langella’s concise treatment of the story brings to mind the terse, crisp style of playwright David Mamet.

“It’s quick,” he says, “but it doesn’t compromise character development.”

lawrencebj@gmail.com

Guest scenic designer and Hilberry Theatre alumnus Greg Loftus researched Paris and the Art Nouveau style as inspiration for his design for the upcoming production of “Frank Langella’s Cyrano.” Here are some samples of his research and his initial model of the set. “Frank Langella’s Cyrano” opens this Friday, January 13, 2012.

Company members were encourage to wear fun holiday attire and kudos to 2^nd year MFA Lighting Designer Brian Scruggs for his light-up sweater and 2^nd year PhD Jennifer Goff for her reindeer antlers. The highlight of the evening was the 3^rd Annual Gingerbread House Contest. The three competing groups included MFA Actors, MFA Designers and Stage Managers, and the Undergraduate Learning Community. Third year MFA Theatre Managers Alex Goodman and Rick Fosbrink had the pleasure of judging the contest. The decision was a difficult one, but the Undergraduate Learning Community won with their clean, realistic house, accented with a Poinsettia flower.

Photo credits: Rebecca M. Pierce and Alexandra Stewart

December 22, 2011

View original press release here.

By Lawrence B. Johnson, Special to The Detroit News

Read original article here.

Joshua Blake Rippy, left, Lorelei Sturm, Megan Dobbertin and David Sterritt star in the play set on an Irish isle. (Wayne State University)

Life is rough in Martin McDonagh’s wry comedy “The Cripple of Inishmaan,” and among the weathered denizens of this small isle off the west coast of Ireland, hard truths come unvarnished.

That’s how actor David Sterritt, in the title role, sees McDonagh’s landscape from inside the production of “Inishmaan” now playing through Feb. 4 at Wayne State University’s Hilberry Theatre.

“It’s not politically correct to call him Cripple Billy, but to the people on the island that’s just reality,” says Sterritt, an Atlanta native in his first year in WSU’s graduate theater program. “Actually, Billy is a pretty complex character. At one point he says there are plenty of other people on the island who are crippled, it just doesn’t show on the outside.”

Now in early manhood, Billy — with the rest of his fellow islanders — is stirred to action when an American film company comes to the area to make a sort of documentary about these sea-faring people. McDonagh based the idea on an actual production in 1934 by filmmaker Robert Flaherty, who recruited Irish locals for all the acting parts. Despite his infirmities, Billy joins the starry-eyed throng hoping for at least fame, if not fortune.

Though the film production draws McDonagh’s characters together in a shared fascination, that fantasy serves mainly to shed light on these plain, rugged Irish folk and the shadowy line they walk between stark candor and whole-hearted dissembling.

“They’ve created their own little world,” says Sterritt, “and McDonagh surprises us with unexpected truths about them. Billy may be the most normal of them all. When he hears about the film, that’s something real he can latch onto. He’s treated horribly and he wants more than anything to get off the island, to get away.”

Yet there is one inhabitant of Inishmaan who charms Billy’s life — a girl about his age called Helen, or Slippy Helen as the locals would have it, an apparent reference to her murky reputation. Billy has an eye for her, even if she generally has only harsh words for him. Helen is one flinty lass.

“But Billy can talk to Helen, and the mere fact that she talks to him gives him hope,” says Sterritt.

Indeed, the mere act of talking — in a rigorously coached Galway accent — is also one of the plays great challenges, he says. Another, for him, is getting about on a “crippled” right foot that he must keep turned in at a severe angle toward the arch of his left foot.

“I have to turn my right hip and keep most of my weight on my left leg,” he says. “I’ve worked on it a lot with a movement coach.”

Bringing this motley bunch to credible life, Sterritt says, has been the knowing work of veteran Detroit director Lavinia Hart.

“She drove home the point about the harshness of these people’s lives and their personal truths,” he says. “Lavinia helped us see them as real people, and to create that on stage, to make characters — not caricatures but three-dimensional humans.”

‘The Cripple of Inishmaan’

Through Feb. 4

Hilberry Theatre

4841 Cass Ave., Detroit

Tickets $25-$30

Call (313) 577-2972

www.hilberry.com

Lawrence B. Johnson is a cultural writer and critic. lawrencebj@gmail.com