University of Southern Maine USM Digital Commons

Theatre Programs 1970-1989 Theatre Programs

2-1984

Miss Julie Program

University of Southern Maine Department of Theatre

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Recommended Citation University of Southern Maine Department of Theatre, "Miss Julie Program" (1984). Theatre Programs 1970-1989. 24. https://digitalcommons.usm.maine.edu/theatre-programs-1970-1989/24

This Program is brought to you for free and open access by the Theatre Programs at USM Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theatre Programs 1970-1989 by an authorized administrator of USM Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Russell Square Players present

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General Information

Performances Lost Articles Thursday through Saturday at 8:00 Inquire at the Box Office. p.m.; Sunday matinee the first weekend the show runs at 2:00 p.m. Telephone Reservations Russell Square Players The Box Office is open Monday Mail Orders through Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to present All mail orders should be sent to: The 4:00 p.m. The Box Office phone number Russell Square Players, Russell Hall, Uni­ is 780-5483. versity of Southern Maine, Gorham, Maine 04038, with a check or money order pay­ Concessions able to University of Maine. General ad­ The concession area is in the main Miss Julie mission $5.00, students $3.00. Please lobby. No food or drink in the audi­ inquire about group discounts. torium. by Rest Rooms Photographs One flight down from the main The taking of photographs in this entrance. theatre is strictly prohibited. August Strindberg

Directed by Schedule Change Walter Stump

Due to an unforeseen situation, the Square Players' final production. Unfor­ Scenic Design management of the Russell Square tunately, History of the American Film by Players wish to announce changes in the has been removed from circulation by Charles Kading season's program. its publishers for an undisclosed period King Alfred's College will be making of time pending negotiations for film Costume Design an exchange tour with a production to rights. In its place, we are pleased to an­ by USM late in March. They have changed nounce its replacement, The Matchmaker Cil Cutter their selection, and their company will by Thornton Wilder. The Matchmaker is be performing The Royal Pardon by John a delightful comedy of love and philo­ Arden. This play, with a cast of 14, sophy set in New York at the turn of had a successful and extended run in the the century. It is a proper play to herald London theater. our coming spring. A second change deals with Russell

The taking of photographs, smoking, drinking, or eating is expressly prohibited within the theatre. ··------···------

The Footnote

August Strindberg (1849-1912), in age for regarding them as angels. Event­ by extracting the nourishing juices from playwright saw an example of the way his grander moments, saw himself as the ually his plays would show signs of his foods before serving them to him. in which the disintegration of the ruling modern equivalent of the Renaissance stringent bias towards women. However, He suffered from a kind of morbid class was taking place. This class was man. He believed that he had delved into Strindberg was not at any time a woman neatness, and felt that he was constantly weakened and diluted chiefly through the the mysteries of the universe, had traf­ hater; on the contrary, women fascinated defeated in his efforts at housekeeping. looseness of its women. The class was ficked with the dark powers, and had him and he found it impossible to resist A single word was enough to precipitate therefore destined to be overthrown acquired insight into the workings of them. But he eventually found them more a quarrel that might last a week. sooner or later by pressures from below, elemental forces. He was a rebel who interesting as a source of pain than of In 1884, Strindberg published some just as Julie was destroyed by forces defied humanity and bore the marks pleasure, and he sought to marry the short stories, one of which included some emanating from the servile types to whom of his lifelong struggle with God. He the kind of woman who would aid him in unorthodox observations on the subject she was chiefly attracted. Her shame, her believed he was a great Ii berator of his desire to suffer. of Christianity. The author was summoned ruin and that of her father, and the ex­ his time, a martyr, and a messiah. His His first attempt to state a male view to appear on the charge of impiety. He tinction of the line she was meant to scope was vast; his ambitions, cosmic. on the question of feminism came after stood trial and was acquitted. But his fear carry on were all representative incidents After becoming acquainted with reading Ibsen's A Doll's House. Nora, of persecution for his writings did not of the process through which the lower Nietzsche, he came to the realization its heroine, became an emancipated subside, and he became convinced that class would ultimately destroy and that he was a superman. He attributed woman when at the end of the play she the trial had been engineered by a secret supplant the nobility. the hostility he aroused in others as abandoned her husband and children organization of feminists who sought For his remaining twenty-five years, a necessary consequence of his pre­ rather than be a puppet who complied revenge for his earlier piece Sir Bengt's Strindberg led an uncomfortable, self­ eminence and his power. with her mate's whims. Strindberg Wife. These feminists, he suspected, tormented I ife just as he had while True, he was a genius, but a genius answered with the drama Sir Bengt's formed a vast international complex, writing Miss Julie. But regardless of his tormented into the creative act of writing. Wife, in which a woman, after being the ultimate goal of which was the en­ misogynistic attitudes and his paranoia, Each of his three major creative periods slapped by her husband for a childish slavement of men and the re-establish­ he was a playwright of genius who helped followed a separation from one of his act, leaves him only to return after ment of the prehistoric matriarchy. to lead his fellow dramatists first into three wives. To his mind, the human realizing that her duty and her real Strindberg wrote Miss Julie in 1888. theater of realism and later into theater female was a creature who literally desire are to live with him and her child. It was partially a product of his paranoia. of symbolism. defied the order of the universal plan. The play was controversial and raised In Julie's uncontrollable impulses, the In 1876, Strindberg married a young criticism. To answer his critics, Strindberg actress, Siri van Essen. Their union was wrote: "It is about time that people to be an enlightened, modern relation­ begin to trouble themselves-thanks to ship, a comradeship founded on equality a play by the celebrated Norwegian 29 Elm St. and independence. However, Siri's stage bluestocking (lbsen)-over that good career faltered, and she left the theater joke called the feminist question. Now (just off Main St.) after four years to devote herself to her all the soft minds suffer the monomania Gorham, Maine home and husband. Strindberg's plays of seeing oppressed females everywhere. of that period reflected the happy atmo­ As I refuse to be the dupe of this absurd 839-3354 sphere of his domestic life and a belief story, I am called a misogynist for the that the problems of existence found rest of my life." their solutions in love, work, and the home. With the skill of a born dramatist, But the atmosphere changed, and their he was able to arrange situations in real railroad the marriage began to disintegrate. However, life from which he could conclude that a •tation of 1800'•··· in 1882 Strindberg's attitude toward he was being drained intellectually and nou, a unique dininB esperience women was still reasonably objective. emotionally, that he was betrayed, He blamed the French libertinism of the insulted, robbed, and systematically eighteenth century for viewing women as driven into madness. For example, he dolls, and the blind gallantry of his own was convinced that his cook starved him Steaks • Seafood • Cocktails PORT BAKEHOUSE The Cast 773-2217 ~ Miss Julie ...... Terry Drew ,g,oLLA.a ob Kristin...... Karen Rogers -v-V -~~ Jean ...... Bill Duffy HONEST BREADS ... 'r59W ltl"° ~ i The Townspeople £., ~ ~ EXTRAORDINARY PASTRIES Gigi Antonakos 434 FORE STREET, PORTLAND Victoria A. Charity Sheila Curtis Seth Minton '4.t,l: ao'tf&'t) Kelly Reynolds THE Philip A. Smith BAKERS TABLE Harold Withee

Enthusiastically Supports the Arts in Greater Portland * * * The action of the play takes place in the kitchen of the Count's 1111 manor house on Midsummer Eve in Sweden in the 1880s. ·775-0303 Creative cuisine

GORHAM4@ Gt1111l c.ot1'Jtll\tt1<.l SAVINGS p·s L~~~~~~ 6 64 Main Street I Gorham. Maine I 839-3342 Of f6l\llt'S iitTl c.llll Standish Branch I Route 25 I 642-4200 I tU,\f,os11ots Oil tllll\ Off\tt. \'Jlt:.\'Jl628S r=OIC Member FDIC Production Staff The Producing Company

Walter R. Stump (Director) A native of Theatre Manager .. . .. Eileen T. Sanborn Southern California, Stump began his Business Manager .. . .. Susan D. Beaulieu theatrical and writing careers at San Stage Manager ...... Julie Powers Diego State University. While in college Master Carpenter ...... Thomas C. Vail he wrote two one-act plays, one of Props Master ...... W.M. Kelly which was purchased by the CBS Radio ~ Photographer ...... Debra LaJoie Workshop. He was also one of two under­ graduate directors in the nation to receive GERRITY BUILDING Audio Technician Lighting a scholarship at the National Shakespeare Kevin S. Patterson Stephen Price Festival. CENTERS i I He has directed professionally for the RAILROAD AVENUE Props Master Management Personnel Tacoma Little Theatre; he founded Michi­ GORHAM, ME 04038 207-839-3381 Susan D. Beaulieu Suzanne Beaulieu gan's American Theatre Festival, and was Geoff M. Cyr II artistic director for the Tibbitts Reper­ Costume Crew Mark A. Daly tory Company. Louisa Picard Lori J. Gage A noted theatre historian and inter­ Ginger Schwicker Pamela Petersen nationally recognized authority on Melle Dietmeier Cat Purrington English stage censorship, Stump has Anne Jordon Cathy Record published several articles and has written ~%; Rebecca Eliot two books, Imitation: The Art of the J~:t~~ Cathy Palmer Theatre and Drama: A Mirror of Man. He is currently finishing his third book, en­ & titled A Struggle for a Free Stage in GORHAM London Revisited, which is a history of HOUSE OF PIZZA English censorship. Since joining the faculty of the Univer­ 2 STATE STREET sity in 1968, Stump has directed numer­ GORHAM, MAINE ous productions, two of which received Telephone 839-4958 honors from the American Co\ lege Theatre Association. Last winter he collaborated with Robert Russell to produce the Uni­ versity's first grand opera, W.A. Mozart's ~ ,,, Casi Fan Tutte. othe Town Players the Vocal Arts Foundation (Go Out Casa Mana Musicals, and the Fullerton Department, and is theatre manager for of Buxton, of which he is one of the Singing Company) and Harold Hill in Civic Light Opera. Kading has designed the Russell Square Players. Sanborn is a founding members and currently serving The Music Man at the Biddeford City 23 productions for the Russel I Square member of USM's award-winning for­ on their board of directors. In addition Theatre. Players and has been recognized by the ensics team and has won numerous American College Theatre Festival for awards. She is also a founding member of his design of Happy Birthday, Wanda The Town Players Community Theatre June. Local theatre audiences know his in West Buxton and vice-president on the work from settings in the productions board of directors. She has performed in of My Fair Lady, The Music Man, and many productions with the Town Players Casi Fan Tutte. including Godspe/1, Our Town, and The WE BUILD GARAGES Apple Tree. She has appeared in many Cil Cutter (Costumer) Cutter has designed productions with the Russell Square 839-2212 839-2212 costumes for You Know I Can't Hear Players including: Bobo in The Hostage, You When the Water's Running, The Maria in Twelfth Night, Harriet Porter Birthday Party, The Lion in Winter, My in You Know I Can't Hear You When Fair Lady, and Side by Side by Sond­ the Water's Running and Kate Keller heim for the Russell Square Players. in All My Sons. Sanborn plans a career in Cutter came to USM after five years of theatre upon graduation. SIDING INSULATION ROOFlNG professional freelance dressmaking and finds costuming a challenging and stim­ Susan D. Beaulieu (Business manager) is GORHAM, ME. ulating experience. Upon graduation she a sophomore theatre major at USM. INSULATED REPLACEMENT WINDOWS plans to continue her education in Beaulieu has had an early and continuing costume design, working towards an interest in theatre. She made her stage M.F.A. debut at the age of 11 in the title role in Snow White. Her interest continued all Julie A. Powers (Stage manager) is a through her school years, and she parti­ senior at USM, studying both English cipated in many productions. She served and theatre. She is a transfer student a three-month apprenticeship at the Lake­ from the University of Maine at Farming­ wood Theatre Company in the summer of ton. While there, her performances in­ 1982 and then came to USM to major in cluded: Midge Harvey in The Hollow and theatre. In her two years here, Beaulieu Sybil Chase in Private Lives. At USM she has been involved in many aspects of has played the fol lowing: Edith Berringer theatre. She appeared in last year's in You Know I Can't Hear You When the opera Casi Fan Tutte and played Princess Water's Running, Elaine Harper in Ar­ Alais in The Lion in Winter. Offstage, em senic and Old Lace, and a chorus member her credits include props and costumes in The Lion in Winter. She is currently for Personals and her latest job, theatre the student representative to the faculty management. She is also the secretary­ of the Russell Square Players Association. treasurer for the student theatre group, After graduation, she hopes to teach both the Russel I Square Players Association. '1\Jways thinking of ways to help you:· theatre and English. The Acting Company man communications major minoring in Cleopatra in Caesar and Cleopatra, the Bill Duffy (Jean) is a senior theatre major where she is majoring in theatre with a theatre. Miss Julie is Curtis's debut with youngest daughter in Sound of Music, at USM. Bill is a familiar face to USM minor in voice. During the spring of 1982 the Russell Square Players. Curtis is and maid Gwen in A Connecticut Yankee theatre·goers. In his years with the Drew toured England as the mute in a proficient clown, juggler, and unicyclist in King Arthur's Court. Russel I Square Players he has been USM's production of The Fantasticks. as "Curt the Comi Clown." She has worked for Opera New England and is involved in many productions. Just a few She also appeared as Lulu in The Birthday Philip A. Smith (townsperson) is a soph· a member of the International Juggler's omore theatre major at USM. Smith's of his many shows include The Imaginary Party and in last year's grand opera Cosi Association. Curtis has studied with the Invalid, Happy Birthday, Wanda June, Fan Tutte, understudying the role of main interest is magic, an art he has You Know I Can't Hear You When the Despina and playing the part of the town Maine Actor's Studio and is currently studied for many years. He was awarded working at the Ram Island Dance Center, second place in the New England Magic Water's Running, Oh Dad, Poor Dad, drunk. Last spring, Drew appeared in the where she is studying modern dance. Contest and was one of the charter mem · and last year's musical Personals. Aside critically acclaimed musical Personals. bers of the Maine Society of American from his university productions, Duffy Her professional theatre credits include Seth Minton (towns person) is a transfer Magicians. After graduation, Smith plans as also done much professional theatre South Pacific, The Music Man, The Fan· student from NYU's drama program and a full·time career in professional magic, in the greater Portland area. He has been tasticks, My Fair Lady, and Side by Side came to USM to be involved in a theatre touring the United States. in The Maine Theatre's True West, by Sondheim. In her most recent role, department where a student does not get the Portland Stage Company's Threepenny Anne Deever in All My Sons, she was "lost in the wings." In his beginning Harold S. Withee (townsperson) is a Opera, and is a member of the Maine nominated for the Irene Ryan award for career, he has appeared as Jerry in Zoo freshman theatre major at USM. He is a Children's Theatre. After Miss Julie acting. The play itself was selected to com· Story and in a musical version of Tom recent graduate of Carrabec High School Duffy will be performing in The Audacity pete in the regional American College where he performed in many productions, Theatre's production of Bent. His awards Theatre Festival in February. Upon grad· Jones. Most recently, he did a season of include the Green Leaf award for The uation Drew plans to attend graduate summer stock with the Camden Shakes· including Spoon River Anthology and peare Company. Shadowbox, the Golden Apple award for school and pursue a career in the per· Godspe/1. In 1981 he was part of the Fiddler on the Roof, and an Irene Ryan forming arts. company of Lakewood Theatre's South for acting. Kelly Reynolds (townsperson) is making Pacific. For his role of Petruchio in The Gigi Antonakios (townsperson) is a her first appearance at the USM theatre. Taming of the Shrew, he was selected for Karen Rogers (Kristin) is a senior theatre senior biology major and a graduate of Reynolds has had a wide experience in the All·State Cast at the State One·Act major at USM. In her four years with the Biddeford High School. Antonakios plans theatre, not only in college theatre but as Play Festival. Withee's most recent role Russell Square Players, Rogers has proved to enter the field of medicine upon grad· a member of the company The Barn in is Jonathan Brewster in USM's Arsenic and herself a versatile and dedicated student. uation, but she has a strong secondary Rumson, New Jersey. Her roles include Old Lace. She began her career in technical theatre, interest in theatre, particularly in the with emphasis on set construction and field of acting. She has had much exper· I ighting. Two years ago she discovered her ience in theatre playing Lily in Carnival, comic acting ability when she played the Daisy Mae in Lil Abner, Laura in The role of Anna in The Inspector General. Glass Menagerie, and Wanda June in PHINNEY LUMBER Last year Rogers travelled to Winchester, Happy Birthday, Wanda June. England to study Shakespeare and tele· vision production at King Alfred's College. Victoria Charity (townsperson) is a This experience sparked her interest in sophomore theatre major who comes to LOG CABINS television and led to an internship with USM from Biddeford. Her major interest PLYWOOD Portland Public Cable, Inc. in Portland. is acting and singing. In her first year with MILL TEL. 839-3336 SHINGLES After graduation, Rogers plans to con· the Russell Square Players, she was the INSULATION GORHAM, MAINE 04038 tinue her stage career and find time to stage manager for Personals, an experi· - work in television production. ence she felt necessary to better her - ARCHITECTURAL SERVICE - understanding of theatre as a whole. Terry Drew (Miss Julie) is in her final year at the University of Southern Maine Sheila E. Curtis (townsperson) is a fresh· Director's Notes

The dramatic idea of Miss Julie, as own. The end result was the breakup of with much of Strindberg's writing, lies their marriage and, at least in Strindberg's in his relationships with the women in eyes, the disintegration of Siri. Inf! uences Russell Square Players his life. Strindberg had a pronounced from this period in the playwright's I ife physical attraction to women. So much can be seen throughout the ninety minutes 1983-84 Season so that he once published a collection of Miss Julie. of stories which, among other things, Appropriately set during a Swedish issued dire warnings against the conse­ Midsummer Eve where tradition has it quences of sexual abstinence. The book, that dreams and fantasy can become Arsenic and Old Lace Married, published in 1884, created real, Miss Julie moves deftly from the October 13, 14, 15, 20, 21, and 22 such critical outrage that he eventually erotic to the macabre. The first part of Matinee October 16 at 2:00 p.m. landed in court under the charge of blas­ the play is, simply, an erotic fantasy. phemy. The collection offended politi­ The second part of the play, on the All My Sons cians by advocating socialism, the clergy other hand, shows the total and absolute December 1, 2, 3, 8, 9, and 10 for referring to the Eucharist as a "shame­ disaster of Jean and Julie's inability to Matinee December 4 at 2:00 p.m. ful hoax," and the feminists by advoca­ separate life from fiction. Jean's whole ting that marriage was more concerned attraction to Julie is his image of her as Russell Square Dance Company with a woman's body than her mind. the embodiment of purity and gentility. January 27 and 28 Specifically, Strindberg based Miss For Miss Julie, Jean represents the rising Julie on his marriage to Siri von Essen. "nerve and brain" class, the virile man of Miss Julie The parallels between this ill-fated action who is unencumbered by tradition February 10 , 1 1 , 16 , 17 , 18 relationship and the play are so numerous and scruples that have made the men of Matinee December 12 at 2:00 p.m. that some scholars label the drama as her class effete. Ironically, when she sub­ autobiographical. Siri. when Strindberg mits to her valet, the image shatters into The Royal Pardon met and fell in love with her, was the stark reality and in Jean's eyes Miss Julie March 30 and 31 on the Portland campus twenty-year-old wife of a middle-aged loses her superior qualities. As E.M. baron. In spite of his strong sexual desire Sprinchorn tells us, "Once she has satisfied The Matchmaker for the young aristocratic lady, Strind­ her bodily desires in a brief nervous spasm April 12, 13, 14, 19, 20, 21 berg sublimated his feelings by idolizing and her unconscious wishes in a degrading Matinee April 15 at 2:00 p.m. her as a living symbol of motherhood. act, once she has yielded herself to a man Yet Siri's feelings for Strindberg were whom her conscience labels her inferior, equally intense, and Siri eventually left but whose every act reminds her of his the baron and married Strindberg. But superiority, there is no way out for her." All performances at 8:00 p.m. unless otherwise noted. their marriage was not a blissful union. Thus she must do the only thing that will The child of their initial union died two allow her to keep a few shreds of dignity. days after birth and one month into the The sober reality of Strindberg's life marriage. Baron von Essen's divorce was his inability to separate the ideal stripped Siri of her title and turned her from the real. Strindberg never found to a career on the stage. When she began love because he never really knew what to acquire some of the less desirable it was. If Miss Julie reaches tragic propor­ habits of the late nineteenth century tions, it is because Strindberg's tragic woman, such as vulgar language and an idea ultimately lies not only in the lack excessive use of make-up, she aroused of love, but in the act of love itself. Strindberg's disgust. The idealized aristo­ Whatever we think of the author or his cratic angel of his mind fell from grace to beliefs, Miss Julie remains today a master­ a social level that Strindberg detested: his piece of dramatic I iterature.

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