Posts tagged theater
Drama professor Kirk Jackson shares his recent and upcoming work outside of the classroom.
All Bennington faculty members are teacher-practitioners, meaning they also do work and/or research in the areas that they teach. Just like the students with Field Work Term, these experiences add so much to the vibrancy of this place and its relationship to the rest of the world.
Stay tuned for more short videos documenting these stories in the coming weeks!
- Ezra, Michael, Sarah, Evan, Alan, & Michaela
This Field Work Term I split my time between two community-based theater groups, the Los Angeles Poverty Department (LAPD) and the San Francisco Mime Troupe (SFMT). As a senior, these were amazing case studies in my exploration of political and grassroots theaters, theaters with methodologies directly related to the expansion of participatory democracy. I’ll leave it to you lovely readers to explore their websites and dig into the details of these remarkable organizations, but basically: the LAPD makes performances in Skid Row, reversing a lot of the stereotypes and stigmas associated with “the homeless capital of America.” The SFMT is legendary for its infusion of radical politics and physical/musical comedy, doing free shows in the parks of SF since 1959. During the winter, when I was there, they were working on their annual Youth Theater Project, where high school students from all over the Bay Area get together to write and perform a play based on burning political or social issues they think are important.
It was really amazing to seek out exactly the kind of work I’ve focused my studies around, and to get a sense of what the work is like from day to day. Some questions remain, intensified by first-hand contact with these groups. Most importantly, does this activist application of theater constitute art? Does it have intrinsic aesthetic value, or does it lie more in the realm of art therapy (in the case of LAPD) and political protest (with the SFMT)? And if it does not count as art, does that matter? I saw more process than performance at each place, which was extremely helpful to my goal of doing my own work in this field, but left me wondering how or if the work transcends the group of participants. I’m loving my last term here, but I’m also so excited to go and do more of this community-based theater work when I graduate in June!
Ezra ‘13
Sometimes Things Click
This is the type of story any student here would preface with the phrase: “So today I had a total Bennington moment.”
This Field Work Term, I set out to write a play with my free time. Basically, my goal is to have a solid draft with a plot that makes sense and characters that have at least begun to be developed. Right now, for me, its more about having a complete work than about having something that is stylistically brilliant. I sent what I’ve got to a few friends for feedback and at the beginning of next term (or whenever I’m comfortable enough with what I’ve written) I am hoping to organize a reading of some sort. I love play-readings and its a great opportunity to get other people’s opinions.
Anyway, my play is about how identity is constructed in the gossipy climate of high school, specifically for gay men. Just as I was losing momentum in my writing, I stumbled across a book — actually, because someone mentioned it on admissions material — that was a sociological study of masculinity in high school. I cannot put it down. It’s called ‘Dude You’re a Fag’ and its by C. J. Pascoe.
My Plan at Bennington is in Linguistics and Drama (more specifically playwriting). The driving question is sort of “How can the role of language in every day life inform art?” and vice versa. I like to think about how people understand one another and interact one another in daily life, how they form ‘meaning’ and how that can be translated onto the stage. Similarly, how does an audience member learn a theme? How can a writer (or director, or actor, or set designer, etc.) communicate those ideas most clearly?
Now, through the most beautifully serendipitous moment, I have a perfect example of how this could work. Through the book, I am learning about how norms were established in one particular high school through the language used by students, teachers and faculty. I am planning on adapting these real life, meaningful moments onto the stage, turning them (hopefully) into literary tools that can further my point. I’ve already started scouring Crossett library for similar books. More importantly, I got my groove back and I can’t wait to keep writing.
-Alan ‘15
Finals
The sun majestically perforated the clouds this morning, striking one lone snow-tipped mountain. For some, these rays breaking through the windows of their sleepy dorm rooms stimulated their natural circadian responses, and they rose up like the rest of their animal brothers and sisters in the woods. For others, however, this dawn meant only that another hour had passed in their sleep-deprived delirium. Why, I sometimes ask myself, at a school where there are ostensibly no “requirements,” where we are free to design our own education, do we CHOOSE to do this? The answer, I think, is because we love our work so much.
Here’s what some of us are doing for finals. Check it out:
yes, but not always the kind you’d expect.
Last night I sang a couple songs in a concert organized by 3 seniors in a tutorial with the amazing Nick Brooke — it started as just a tutorial in arranging but the students decided to focus on Steven Sondheim.
Next term voice teacher Tom Bodgan and directing teacher Jean Randich are teaming up to tackle Myths and Hymns, a musical theater piece/song cycle about humans and Gods by Adam Guettel. Can’t wait. Also, the student production next term is Vinegar Tom, a 1970s 3rd wave feminist musical about witches by Caryl Churchill.
Also there’s a student group called Broadway@Bennington that screens musicals, and this term for the first time ever, is producing a musical — Tick, Tick, Boom.
Generally speaking, Bennington is a place where you’d be more likely to experiment with your own way of combining music and theater rather than to follow conventional forms. BUT there are plenty of opportunities for musical theater fans.
-Ezra ‘13
First of all, there’s no generals for Field Work Term — people seek out FWT opportunities that will contribute to their specific, individual educational Plans.
I study a lot of theater and came in as mainly an actor. I’ve been to New York City to work off-Broadway as a producer’s assistant and development intern the first two FWTs, then to rural Southern India last year to work at a small residential theater school. Right now, given my interest in theater as a social institution in America, I’m trying to go to LA to work at the Los Angeles Poverty Department.
It’s pretty hard to land an acting gig for 7 weeks in the winter, when you’re in school when you would need to be auditioning. Rarely happens. I prefer to save it for during the term or the summer. However, here’s a photo from a show written, directed, produced, and performed entirely by Bennington current students alums in NYC last FWT:
-Ezra ‘13
Weekend Socials
Social life at Bennington:
Gender Bender!
Dance Party / House Bonding!
“Studying” on the Lawn!
Hey! I’m not a drama student but, surprisingly, I actually know the answers to all these questions, so I gotcha.
1 - Not for admission to Bennington, no. If you have footage of your acting/other drama work and want to include it in your application supplement, then that’s great, but it’s not a necessity. As far as wanting to study drama once you’ve arrived at Bennington, you will likely be auditioning on a production-by-production basis, as well as for certain advanced classes. Intro-level drama classes don’t require any auditions as far as I’m aware, so it’s easy to get your feet wet.
2 - Yeah, totally! The availability of certain classes changes depending on what day of the week it is but I’d imagine that, once the semester starts back up, there’s at least one acting class you could sit in on for any day of the week. You can always schedule a visit around classes you want to sit in on, so if you decide this is something you wanna do once classes start this year, give the Admissions Office a call at (802)-440-4312 to talk about scheduling a visit.
3 - Yes, there are definitely video/film classes. Rather than bore you with a long list of them in this answer, I’ll just link you through to the visual arts curriculum on our website, which shows a good selection of video/film courses from the past couple of years (you might have to scroll down a bunch; there are loads of visual arts courses to choose from, although they are separated by discipline).
No need to apologize! Glad I could actually answer a drama question for once!
-Evan ‘13
Glad to hear it!
I think the theatre production program is great. The general theatre program is all about studying broadly within theatre, so even I, as an acting student, am asked to take things like theatre history, playwrighting, set design, etc.
So here’s the skinny: we offer all the things you mentioned in your post and more - here’s a sampling of the kind of drama classes we offer. And there are constantly productions going on, so there is ample opportunity as you become more advanced as say a lighting designer to apply your skills in a production environment, whether it’s working officially for credit on a main stage faculty directed production, or designing a set for your friends show that she wants to do in the woods behind Jennings.
If you have more specific questions about drama, feel free to send me an email at liamd@bennington.edu
Liam
We had a few requests for a photoset of theater spaces, so here’s one. Enjoy! And keep the photo requests coming!
-Evan ‘13
[Part 7 of the Posters at Bennington Series]
One of the most common questions I’m asked on tours is “What is there to do at Bennington?” I know that before I came here I couldn’t for the life of me imagine what one would do all day at a small liberal arts school in Vermont. But when I visited campus I realized that everywhere I looked, the walls were plastered with posters advertising clubs, performances, discussions, lectures, films, and more.
So I thought, for those of you who can’t visit campus just yet, that I’d start a weekly series where I showcase some of the posters around campus over the past year or two. All photo credits go to the folks behind the Bennington College Flickr!
-Ellie
Theatre Without Borders
One of my two FWT jobs this winter was working for this great organization that works to connect theatre artists internationally. The majority of the work I did for them was organizing and rewriting the content of their website, and the best part of that was, because I needed to learn as much as I could about their organization, anytime someone involved was in NYC, it was my job to go have coffee with them and learn about their work for a couple of hours, and they always picked up the check (which is important even for two cups of coffee in NYC). But obviouslyyyy the best part was getting to meet them, not the free coffee.
Liam
We had a request for photo/video of walking into VAPA entrances. Since there’s a lot of entrances and you can’t (as far as I know) upload a video-set, I figured I’d do a photoset of what seem to be the most commonly used entrances into VAPA and where they lead into.
If anyone would like to see photos of specific interior areas of VAPA, let us know and we can jog over and take some more pictures!
-Evan ‘13
P.S. yes my reflection is visible in most of those photos no i did not mean to do that i’m sorry photo gods plz hav mercy ;( ;(
![benningtoncollege:
Photo by Scott Barrow
[reblogged by Ellie]](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1vdcoBRX01qhdcs7o1_400.jpg)
Some photos from the Fall 2009 production of As You Like It directed by Kathleen Dimmick. (fun fact: Ezra and I were both in this production as freshmen)
[reblogged by Ellie]
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