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Texts&Beheadings/Elizabethr

Texts&Beheadings/Elizabethr

texts&beheadings/ Karin Coonrod NY Premiere Compagnia de’Colombari #BAMNextWave #texts&beheadings LOCATION: DATES: RUN TIME: OCT 21—24at7:30pm Approx 1hr BAM Fisher (Fishman Space) ElizabethR Season Sponsor: The Shubert Foundation,The Shubert Inc. The SHSFoundation The Morris andAlmaSchapiroFund Donald R. MullenJr. Foundation Trust The Francena T. Harrison provided by: fortheater atBAM Major support Rockefeller BrothersFund. in theBAMFisher providedby by NewYork Cityartists for programming Leadership support Executive Producer Joseph V. Melillo, President Katy Clark, Vice ChairmanoftheBoard Adam E.Max, Vice ChairmanoftheBoard William I.Campbell, Chairman oftheBoard Alan H. Fishman, Brooklyn AcademyofMusic BAM Fisher texts&beheadings/ElizabethR

CREATED AND DIRECTED BY In Four Movements with Four Games Karin Coonrod Movement 1 Strategy WITH Movement 2 Survival Monique Barbee Movement 3 Prayers Ayeje Feamster Movement 4 Sovereignty Juliana Francis-Kelly Cristina Spina

Music Gina Leishman

Dramaturgy and Scenic Design John Conklin

Lighting Design Peter Ksander

Costume Design

Voice and Text Coach Buffington

Movement Adrian Silver

Hair and Make Up Jon Carter

Production Manager Nick Ryckert

Stage Manager C. A. Clark This production premiered at Folger Theatre, Producer Janet Alexander Griffin, Artistic Producer, Alyce Dissette Washington, DC, in September 2015.

ABOUT texts&beheadings/ElizabethR texts&beheadings/ElizabethR Director’s Note

With one swift stroke of the sword There have been many fine bio- on Anne Boleyn’s neck, the Princess dramas of Queen Elizabeth I, played Elizabeth becomes a royal bastard. by compelling actresses, but here I Elizabeth, age 3: “How hath it wanted to depart from that approach yesterday ‘Lady Princess’ and today but and see what happens when four ‘Elizabeth’?” actresses take on the role….so that we shake free from a certain kind We “know” her by her iconography, of seeing. Our fractured portrait is proliferated in her own time to the like that caught for a moment by a present day, yet she remains as kaleidoscope, not a camera, more inscrutable as the Mona Lisa. in common with Picasso’s portraits than of any kind of naturalism, What happens if we bring her words inspired by Steinesque and Joycesque to the stage (from her poems, letters, observations. Can we catch the prayers, and speeches) so that we conscience of the Queen? can HEAR her words in the mouths of four different actresses, coinciding, In the making of texts&beheadings/ contradicting, overlapping, interrupting, ElizabethR, four stunningly different in collage-like confidence? actresses play the queen separately or together, depending on what the How do we create a piece in which moment requires. With my close the form uses her words ordered creative collaborators, I am struck with into various themes and just lets her good fortune: John’s deep simplicity speak her mind, with clamorous game of a set and astute dramaturgy, Gina’s interruptions, hence harking back to witty spot-on music, Oana’s gorgeous the “game” theater or “ludi” of the costumes, Peter’s fierce illumination, medieval mystery period just previous and Adrian’s sensitivity to movement. to Shakespeare? What happens? The readiness is all.

texts&beheadings/ElizabethR is a —Karin Coonrod fractured portrait in the words of the Queen herself. Using four movements, interrupted by games, and concluding in silences, the piece creates a theatrical portrait of a theatrical queen. Media, and the Classic Stage Compa- ny. Regionally, her work has been seen at the Wilma Theater (Philadelphia, PA), Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival Who’s (MA), Hartford Stage (CT), Long Wharf Theater (New Haven, CT), Shakespeare Theater (Washington, DC), Berkeley Rep (CA), ArtsEmerson Who (Boston), Broad Stage (Santa Monica, CA), MCA (), Shakespeare Theatre Company (Washington, DC), MONIQUE BARBEE Oberlin Dance Collective (San Francis- Elizabeth I co), Walker Arts Center (Minneapolis, MN), Peak Performances (Montclair, Monique Barbee’s theater credits NJ), ADI (Rockville, MD), Academy of include The Liar (Westport Country Music (Philadelphia), Curtis Institute Playhouse), (Actors Theatre of Music (Philadelphia, PA), and Cutler of Louisville), Majestic Theater (Boston). Internation- and Lover’s Tale (Berkshire Theatre ally she has designed for Festival), and The World is Round National Theater (), Arad is Round is Round (Compagnia National Theater (Romania), Bulandra de’ Colombari). She appeared off- Theater (Bucharest), Théâtre National Broadway in the New de Chaillot (Paris), Les Subsistances Workshop productions of Mrs. Hughes (Lyon, ), Budapest National The- (reading) and as ater, Cluj Hungarian National Theater as with the Metropolitan in (Romania), Bucharest Theater Die Fledermaus (understudy). Her (Romania), International Festival of television work includes Mysteries of Contemporary Theater (Adana, Turkey), Laura (NBC). Barbee is a graduate of Le Quartz (Brest, France), La Filature Yale University. (Mulhouse, France), Exit Festival/ Maison des Arts Créteil (Paris, France), Tanz im August Festival Hebbel am Ufer—HAU1 (Berlin, ), Centro OANA BOTEZ Cultural Universidad del Pacífico (Lima, Costume Design Peru), Centro Cultural (Lima, Peru), Oana Botez has designed to critical ac- Palazzo Simoncelli (Orvieto, Italy), claim for theater productions in many Edinburgh International Festival (UK), New York venues including BAM Next and Singapore Arts Festival. Botez is a Wave, Bard SummerScape/Richard B. Princess Grace Recipient, NEA/TCG Ca- Fisher Center, , reer Development Program Recipient, David H. Koch Theater/, and has received the Barrymore and Soho Rep, LCT3, , Drammy awards. 59East59, La MaMa, The Kitchen, PS 122, HERE Arts Center, , Ontological-Hysteric Theater, BRIC Arts Rep), When the Rain Stops Falling GIGI BUFFINGTON (Lincoln Center), The Heart Is a Voice and Text Coach Lonely Hunter (NYTW), So Help Me God (Mint Theater), The Good Negro Gigi Buffington is a member of AEA, (Public Theater), Chair (TFNA), and SAG/AFTRA, and VASTA, and her Endgame (BAM). Regionally his production credits include East of Eden designs have been seen in productions (directed byTerry Kinney, Steppenwolf at Bard SummerScape, Arena Stage, Theatre Company); Hamlet (starring Kennedy Center, Centerstage, Dallas David Tennant and Patrick Stewart), Theater Center, Kansas City Rep, Love’s Labour’s Lost, A Midsummer Wilma, Philadelphia Theatre Co., Night’s Dream, and Tim Carroll’s Walnut Street Theater, Prince Music Merchant of for its New Castle Theater, and Arden Theater Company. tour (Royal Shakespeare Company). Other work includes with Previous works with Karin Coonrod Bard SummerScape, Opera Boston, include The Tempest (Reg E. Cathey), Gotham Chamber Opera, the Curtis Love’s Labour’s Lost, I Killed My Institute, and Juilliard, and the film Mother, Lovers and Other Strangers, works, Untitled Josh Marston Project, A Small Family Business, Ernie’s A Woman, A Part, and Thank You for Incredible Illucinations, and The Sea Being Honest. and the Mirror. Other works include Othello (Chike Johnson); An Iliad, The Seagull, Richard III, Hamlet, Antony C.A. CLARK and Cleopatra, and Romeo and Juliet Stage Manager (APT); The Blonde Hurricane (Nemzeti Theatre, Budapest); and with Johnny C.A. Clark’s many theater credits Flynn and Company (Shunt, ). include the Broadway productions Currently an arts professor at Tisch , Take Me Out, Lynn School of the Arts (NYU), she has also Redgrave’s Shakespeare for My directed Vinegar Tom, , Father, and the Royal Shakespeare Unity, and Top Girl. Company’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Off-Broadway productions include Fit to Be Tied (Playwright’s Horizons); Helen and One Flea JON CARTER Spare (Public Theater/NYSF); Lynn Hair and Makeup Design Redgrave’s Nightingale ( Jon Carter’s Broadway credits include Theatre Club); Bach at Leipzig (New , Gigi, Act One, Golden York Theatre Workshop); Peter & Jerry Boy, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, (Second Stage); , Richard In the Next Room, A Tale of Two II, and Richard III (Theater for a New Cities, and Xanadu. Off-Broadway, Audience); and works with Labyrinth he has created designs for The City Theater Company and Primary Stages. of Conversation (Lincoln Center), 3C Regionally, his works include The (Rattlestick), Blood & Gifts (Lincoln Cherry Orchard, Much Ado About Center), Orange, Hat & Grace (Soho Nothing, and (La Jolla Playhouse); Agamemnon, Misalliance, Angeles), Actor’s Theater of Louisville, Hamlet, and The Tempest (American and Center Stage (). He has Repertory Theater); A in the Sun also designed for dance with such (Williamstown Theatre Festival); and companies as , Boston five summer seasons at the Berkshire Ballet, and Royal Ballet (London). He Theater Festival, as well as works has worked with many other directors with CTG-Mark Taper Forum, Hartford including Joanne Akalitits, Simon Stage, Long Wharf Theatre, Two River Callow, Martha Clarke, Karin Coonrod, Theater, Dallas Shakespeare Festival, Oskar Eustis, Robert Falls, Mark and Actors Theatre of Louisville. Lamos, Diane Paulus, Keith Warner, and Francesca Zambello. He teaches at the Tisch School of Arts (NYU), and is currently acting as artisic advisor JOHN CONKLIN for the Boston Lyric Opera. Formerly Dramaturgy and Scenic Design director of production at John Conklin has designed sets Opera and associate artistic director and costumes for New York City at Glimmerglass Opera, he sits on Opera, Opera Theater of St Louis, the boards of Theater Development the Glimmerglass Opera, and the Fund and Opera America. Among his opera companies of Dallas, Houston, many awards are the 2008 L.B. Tobin Minneapolis, Washington, Los lifetime achievement award, TDF Irene Angeles, Santa Fe, and Boston. At the Sharaff award, and the 2011 NEA he designed the Opera Honors (first designer to be so world premiere of John Corigliano’s cited). The Ghosts of Versailles and Jonathan Millers’ production of Pelléas et . Mélisande, among others. He has KARIN COONROD created designs for two complete Ring Creator and Director cycles (San Francisco, directed by Nichols Lehnhoff and Chicago Lyric Karin Coonrod is a theater maker Opera, directed by August Everding). whose work has been seen and heard In Europe he has worked for the across the country and around the , the Royal world. Born in Chicago with first Opera (Stockholm), Paris Opéra Bastille memories in Noli, Italy, Coonrod (costumes for ’s The studied English at Gordon College in Magic Flute), and the opera companies Massachusetts and theater directing of and Amsterdam. He has at , where her also designed for Broadway and mentor was Liviu Ciulei. She has off-Broadway (including The Public founded two theater companies: Theater) and extensively for regional Arden Party in downtown New York theater—including the American (1987—1997) which re-imagined the Repertory Theater (Boston), The classics (including Ubu Roi, Waiting Goodman (Chicago), , for Godot, Lear, Romeo and Juliet, Hartford Stage Company, Long Wharf Antigone, Marat/Sade, et al); and (New Haven), Mark Taper Forum (Los Compagnia de’ Colombari (2004— present), an international company (based in New York) which began a ALYCE DISSETTE new tradition of theater in Orvieto, Producer Italy, with the medieval mystery plays in public spaces (Strangers and Alyce Dissette has worked on more Other Angels 2004—06) as well as a than 70 productions and projects with music-theater piece More or Less I Am internationally known performing, (from Walt Whitman’s Song of Myself) visual, film, and digital artists in a wide performed around New York City. range of venues from staff member in Coonrod is known for her Shakespeare the Metropolitan Opera presentations productions, most recently Tempest at department to former executive La MaMa ETC (2014). Others include producer of the PBS national TV series her epic Henry VI (1996) and Love’s Alive From Off Center/AliveTV. She was Labour’s Lost (2011), both at The director of one of the first international Public Theater (where she was artist- digital works competitions New in-residence from 1995—96); King Voices, New Visions sponsored by Paul John (2000), (2003), Allen, the Voyager Co., and WIRED and (2005) with Theatre for magazine presented at Lincoln Center. a New Audience; Othello at Hartford She currently produces the work of Stage (2005), and many others. and David Gordon and Other seminal productions include her has been producing director of their own creation for the stage of non- Pick Up Performance Co(s) for over 10 dramatic material: Flannery O’Connor’s years. Everything That Rises Must Converge (developed at the University of Iowa, Sundance Theatre Lab, and premiered at New York Theatre Workshop, 2001), AYEJA FEAMSTER Anne Sexton’s Transformations (with Elizabeth I Arden Party, 1991—95), and a adaptation of Lorca’s Poeta en Nueva For Compagnia de’ Colombari, Ayeja York (with flamenco dancer La Conja at Feamster has appeared in Everything , 2002). She has That Rises Must Converge, More or prepared new translations, including Less I Am, and Strangers and Other Vvedensky’s Christmas at the Ivanovs’ Angels. Feamster holds an MFA from with Julia Listengarten (1996); Lorca’s University of Iowa. The House of Bernarda Alba with Nilo Cruz (1997); and Victor, or Children Take Over with Frederic Maurin (1994), all of which she also directed. Coonrod is on the faculty of the Yale School of Drama. 2006 he joined the curatorial board JULIANA FRANCIS-KELLY of the Ontological-Hysteric Incubator Elizabeth I and served as a curator of new and experimental works. In 2008 he won Juliana Francis-Kelly has performed an Obie award for the scenic design of in the US, Europe, and Asia for many Untitled Mars (This Title May Change), great theater artists including the late and in 2014 he won a Bessie award Reza Abdoh (as a founding member for the visual design of This Was the of Abdoh’s Dar a Luz Company), End. He is a member of the faculty (in Paradise Hotel, of Reed College and an associate Bad Boy Nietzsche!, King Cowboy company member of the Portland Rufus Rules the Universe, and Maria Experimental Theater Ensemble. del Bosco, for which she received an He has worked extensively with Obie award), and for Anne Bogart, Compagnia de’ Colombari in the past , Pavol Liska and Kelly including designing the scenery and Copper, Lear DeBessonet, Normandy lighting for , Laude in Urbis, and Sherwood, Hal Hartley, Marie Losier Gulia/Juliet. in collaboration with Guy Maddin, and David Michalek (for the Lincoln Center Festival.) Upcoming projects GINA LEISHMAN include her own play, The Reenactors, Music to be premiered at Abrons Arts Center in December 2015, directed by Tony Gina Leishman’s credits include Torn. Julianafranciskelly.com L’Histoire du Soldat (BAM Next Wave Festival) and Mr. Wau-Wa (BAMcafé

PETER KSANDER Live). Other credits include the Lighting Design Broadway production of The Flying Karamazov Brothers; off-Broadway’s Peter Ksander is a stage designer and Tongue of a Bird and Helen (Public theater artist whose work has been Theater) Actaeon (La MaMa), and The presented at national and international World is Round is Round is Round, venues including the National Theater Ripe Time, and Septimus and Clarissa of Hungary, Maison des Arts de (Compagnia de’ Colombari). Regional Créteil, BAM, the Public Theater, works include Romeo and Juliet and Chocolate Factory, Walker Art Center, The Imaginary Invalid (Yale Rep); Arts at St. Ann’s, La MaMa ETC, PS Oedipus The King (Guthrie Theatre); 122, HERE Arts Center, Ontological- Uncivil Wars (Walker Arts Center); Hysteric Theater, The ICA (Boston), Alice: Tales of a Curious Girl (Dallas Theater for a New Audience, Portland Theater Center); Mother Courage and Experimental Theater Ensemble, Feast of Fools (La Jolla Playhouse); TBA Festival, and Under the Radar Burning Dreams and Noses (San Festival, as well as regional theaters Diego Rep); and Twelfth Night and As around the country. In 2005 Ksander You Like It (California Shakespeare was a recipient of the NEA/TCG Theater). Internationally, her works career development program grant. In include Orfeo in Orvieto (Italy) and Kamikaze Ground Crew at the Donaueschingen New Music Festival CHRISTINA SPINA in Germany. She has received NYC Elizabeth I Drama Desk nominations as well as Christina Spina’s off-Broadway credits Bay Area Theater Critics Circle and San include Diego Theater Critics Circle awards. () and Kaos Her recordings are available on Koch (New York Theatre Workshop). Credits Jazz, New World Records, gcq, and in Italy include War, Bizzarra, The Busmeat Records. ginaleishman.com Brothers Karamazov, An Inspector Calls, My Name is Rachel Corrie, The NICK RYCKERT Trojan Women, Orestes, Giulia, The Production Manager Holiday Trilogy, Orgy, Il Candelaio, That Terrible Mess in Via Merulana, Nick Ryckert’s BAM credits include The Wedding, A Midsummer Night’s Not What Happened (2013 Next Dream, The Tempest, and Measure for Wave Festival), and other credits Measure. Film appearances include include the Pick Up Performance Co(s) La Via Degli Angeli, Cuore Altrove, productions, If She Stood, The History Hecuba, The Italian Race, 141 Worth of Asking the Wrong Question, The Street, and So Be It. She received the Matter/2012: Art & Archive, In This Premio Stampa Teatro award for best Place (2012), and Dancing Henry V actress in 2006. cristinaspina.com (2011). He is also resident production manager, Kirov Academy of Ballet, Washington, DC.

ADRIAN SILVER Movement

Adrian Silver works as a dramturg for the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company and as assistant director for Martha Clarke. He has performed for Martha Clarke, Ballet Contemporáneo de Caracas, Oakland Ballet, Kazuko Hirabayashi Dance Theater, and Cherylyn Lavagnino Dance, among others. He is currently translating a collection of plays from Yiddish, supported by the National Yiddish Book Center and a NYSCA grant. He is also a literary reader for the Play Company, directed by Kate Loewald, and holds an MFA in dramaturgy from Columbia University. COMPAGNIA DE’ COLOMBARI FOR COMPAGNIA DE’ COLOMBARI Producers Board of Directors Based in New York City, Compagnia Chris Akerlind de’ Colombari (Company Colombari) Reg E. Cathey was founded in Orvieto, Italy in 2004, John Conklin where the company re-imagined the Karin Coonrod medieval mystery plays and performed Anna Gincherman them in the streets and piazzas Ellen Peterson Lewis of Orvieto. Having revitalized the Michael Unthank tradition of theater during Orvieto’s Corpus Christi Festival each spring, the company launched a parallel Funding for theatrical tradition in New York, texts&beheadings/ElizabethR Strangers and Other Angels. Since New York City Department of Cultural 2007, the company has created Affairs and New York State Council on and performed More or Less I Am the Arts (inspired by Whitman’s Song of Myself), Everything that Rises Must Makeup provided by Converge (from Flannery O’Connor’s M·A·C short story), The World is Round is Round is Round is Round (based Music credit: on Gertrude Stein’s story), Giulia Spem in Alium (Thomas Tallis) (by Andras Visky), and Monteverdi’s courtesy of Linn Records performed by Orfeo. Following the performances Magnificat (dir. Philip Cave) from the of texts&beheadings/ElizabethR recording Tallis: Spem in Alium as part of the BAM’s Next Wave available from linnrecords.com Festival, Compagnia de’ Colombari has been invited in the summer of Costumes Constructed by 2016 to provide a centerpiece of the Lydia Gay planned commemoration of the 500th anniversary of the formation of the Special Thanks to: Jewish ghetto in Venice and the 400th Karen Altenberg, Kate Attwell, Frieda year of Shakespeare’s death—a new Bradlow, Joan Clark, Katherine Cornes, production of Mary Eaton, Patsy Gay, Christopher directed by Karin Coonrod in the still- O’Connell, Jeane O’Hare, Elizabeth extant (and newly revitalized) ghetto. Frengel, Kathryn James, David Scott Kastan, Catherine Sheehy, Rapahele Shirley, Anne Shirley, Greg Trupiano, and the Bogliasco Foundation. photo: Raphaele Shirley; portrait: Nicholas Hilliard; concept: John Conklin

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