We feel like we've been waiting all year—because we have!—to see second-year MFA directing student Malika Oyetimein's staging of Kia Corthron's Force Continuum. This is Malika's first solo full production for the School of Drama (she co-directed last season's Bus Stop with fellow directing student Sean Ryan), but you might have caught her work as part of Intiman's festival last summer. Since then Malika has been named to City Arts Magazine's 2016 Future List. Join us at the Jones Playhouse this April 27 through May 8 and catch the work of our talented students, including scenic design by Lex Marcos, costume design by Fawn Bartlett, sound design by Jack Conger, and lighting design by Bryce Bartl-Geller, as well as many of our second and first-year graduate actors.
Banner photo: "Force Continuum" actors Bria Henderson, Brace Evans, and AJ Friday (Photo by Mike Hipple).
MFA director Malika Oyetimein stages Kia Corthron’s explosive socio-political drama about three generations of African American police officers torn apart by the very organization to which they have dedicated their loyalty and working lives. Corthron tells an unflinching and deeply felt story of tragically flawed human beings trying to do the right thing in difficult circumstances and getting it very, very wrong. As timely now as it was when first produced in 2001, Force Continuum stands as a potent theatrical criticism of modern day police brutality and the relationship between police and the black community.
Force Continuum
by Kia Corthron
directed by Malika Oyetimein
April 27–May 8
Jones Playhouse
Patty Johnson, a new secretary at Cooney Lumber Mill, is a little overqualified and a little concerned. What's up with this mandatory Slim Fast Diet? Where do these women get their lumberjack jackets? And what is happening to all of the attractive lumberjacks!? Discover with Patty the truth of femininity in this satirical comedy about gender norms, sexuality, and empowerment.
The Secretaries
by The Five Lesbian Brothers
directed by Alyssa Karounos
April 21–May 1
Cabaret Theatre
by Simon Tran
It all starts with Drama and ends with Drama.
This last October and again this March I participated in the University of Washington Department of Communication’s Civil Rights Pilgrimage, a nine-day intentional trip to the Deep South to learn about the Civil Rights history in the places where the monumental Civil Rights events occurred. On the pilgrimage we met with living Civil Rights activists, saw theatre performances about the Civil Rights, and dove into the racial history and realities of our country. On these pilgrimages I was joined by 52 others. Our pilgrimage community included students from the University of Washington, Bellevue College, Utah State, faculty, and staff, in addition to adults from the community. The pilgrimage community was intentionally interracial and intergenerational. This fostered people on the pilgrimage to broaden their perspectives and the humanity and intersectionality within the pilgrimage community to unfold and shine through. By intimately learning about the Civil Rights movement and the past, we were also able to find inspiration and direction reflecting on the current state of racial and social injustice in the US.
So how did a Drama Performance major find himself on a Communications Civil Rights pilgrimage?
It started in October 2014. I was in...
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by Jay Eckard
“You’re getting a PhD in the theatre? …are you, like, an actor?”
“No,” I say, without dropping my smile. I’ve had practice with this response. You can tell: for example, I never, ever use the word “dramaturg” in the sentence, however accurately it might describe what I used to do for a living. “I used to be a director, but then I decided to go back to school. I’m a scholar: I study medieval and early modern drama.”
At this point, the faint look of bemusement on my interlocutor begins to fade into boredom and disappointment. “Like Shakespeare,” they say, their voice trailing off. Their response is ironic, because I think Shakespeare is boring and disappointing. “Sort of. Mostly before him, though,” I respond. At this point, my spooked interlocutor usually scuttles off to find the nearest wine (at best) or any other person they can eyeball up and be reasonably certain is sane (at worst). My mother made it slightly longer when we had this discussion over the phone, but I’m pretty sure she was also wrestling with a TV remote, trying to watch a re-run of Downton Abbey. I even get it a bit from my colleagues, most of whom study theatre more oriented towards 2016.
Which is sort of a shame, because I have a lot of fun doing what I do. The manuscripts I have to look over are full of the doodles of bored monks, like battle-armed knights dueling snails or...
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Susan Champion (PATP '95) earned her law degree in 2011 and is featured in a documentary film for her work as a lawyer for The Stanford Justice Advocacy Project (formerly the Three Strikes Project). "The Return" will have its premiere at Tribeca Film Festival.
J Jha (PATP '14) is currently playing in Rickshaw Girl at Bay Area Children's Theatre, through May 29, and can be seen in Ubuntu Theater Project's The Grapes of Wrath, through April 24.
Andrea Bush (MFA '07) was the featured artist for Five Friday Questions with Encore Arts. Andrea is designing for Stick Fly, part of the Intiman Festival and opening May 24.
Alum Mickey Rowe was featured on Evening Magazine, talking about working in theatre as an actor on the autism spectrum.
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