With Piccolo Spoleto reaching its last weekend, I've just finished reviewing my last batch of plays for the local papers. Since the festival is about more than just theatre, there are still other events to cover; tonight I'll be spending An Evening with Jay Clifford at the American Theatre.

Last night I was at the fifth Felder Film Festival, and it was great to watch my short film Undead on Arrival with a crowd of people - a very different experience from watching hit counters on a YouTube site. That's why internet video won't be replacing TV or movie theaters just yet...

On Tuesday I saw Cloud Tectonics at Lance Hall, near the Circular Congregational Church. PURE Theatre managed to breathe fresh life into a show they've done a few times already.

The next night I saw The Great War, a multimedia story told with miniscule models that were videotaped and beamed onto a big screen. One of the best elements of the show was the sound and music, provided by

The Charleston SC-based abstract artist on the evils of phone messages. In the background is his painting, Don't Answer the Phone.

Maidens Gone Wild: An all-female show flips Shakespearean stereotypes

Of all of Shakespeare's fictional women, Desdemona got a particularly tough break. Framed for an affair she never had, she was suffocated in a fit of jealous rage by her husband Othello.

However, the heroine of Paula Vogel's Desdemona: A Play About a Handkerchief is, to quote Britney Spears, not that innocent. This female protagonist is no minor character or shrinking violet; she's an intelligent, inquisitive woman who chats with her friends in the man-free zone of a laundry room as if she's hanging out at an office watercooler. She gabs with Emilia, the wife of Othello's rival Iago, and they're joined by Bianca, the lover of Othello's chief lieutenant Cassio.

Vogel, a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, reinterprets the connections between these characters and puts a new spin on our perceptions of them. Instead of being chaste and innocent, Desdemona has sexual desires and acts on them at the local brothel run by Bianca.

Vogel takes an entertainingly ironic stab at Elizabethan stereotypes by empowering her women, while acknowledging that the only way for them to get ahead in a male-dominated society is to get hitched or start whoring.

But sex is only part of the equation in Desdemona. There's also an interesting class distinction between the three characters, emphasizing the put-upon Emilia's modest social status compared to Desdemona's eminence.

Vogel uses accents to denote the trio's different classes. Dealing with this proved to be one of director Wayne Wilson's biggest headaches when he first produced the play last year.
"It was the scariest problem I had," he says. "I believe that when you do Shakespeare you use your own accent."

Thanks to his many years of experience in community theater, the CofC professor knew accents were hard to maintain, that they risked being too thick or misunderstood, or "sounded like a bunch of mishmash."

Actresses Kaitlin Winslow, Kim Rogers, and Meredith Potter rehearsed their roles without accents — which was particularly difficult for Rogers. Her character, Bianca the brothel madam, was written as a Cockney. She had to translate all her dialogue into Americanese.
Eventually, dialects were used.

"The girls worked very hard on their accents," Wilson says. "The roughest of the three was Meredith (Emilia) Potter's Irish accent. She worked as hard as she could to clear up things and be understood. It works well because it gives you a difference in characters that's not only physical, but you can hear it as well."

Camaraderie has grown since they first appeared in the play last August. Now they've revived the show again for the Piccolo crowd.

"What amazes me is how powerful this play is," Wilson says. "During the most recent rehearsals, Kaitlin said, 'It doesn't matter where I am in my life, this play has meaning.' It touches these girls and they've become really close. They trust each other. Seeing them again is like visiting an old friend."

With this cozy ensemble, it's easy to believe that Desdemona, Emilia, and Bianca are well acquainted. That's fortunate since they're required to do some naughty things to each other.

"The spanking scene is pretty awesome," Wilson says. "The reason is because Kim and Kaitlin came up with a way of doing it, not me. I just told the two girls to be on a table and go for it."

The spanking, a fake orgasm and an improvised dildo should add some extra spice to a play that's mostly three people sitting around talking. But the lashings of humor and feminist commentary make Desdemona a memorably bawdy celebration of self-empowered women.

Desdemona: A Play About a Handkerchief • Piccolo Spoleto's Stelle Di Domani Series • $12-15 • 1 hour 30 min. • June 6 at 8:30 p.m.; June 5, 7 at 5:30 p.m. • Chapel Theatre, 172 Calhoun St. • (888) 374-2656

Dead Funny: Center Stage likes black comedy

David Lindsay-Abaire's A Devil Inside is about a guy named Gene who resides in New York's Lower East Side. He learns on his 21st birthday the truth about his father's disappearance 14 years earlier. His mom tells him that his 400-pound dad, while hiking in the Poconos, was stabbed in the back, his feet were lopped off, and he was thrown into a ditch.

But Gene is more interested in Caitlin, an ardent literature major, than hunting down his dad's killer. Caitlin in turn is less interested in Gene than in her teacher, a beleaguered genius steeped in Russian literature. Other characters pop up, including an enigmatic lady called Lily and her husband, a rut-stuck appliance repairman who writes children's stories as an escape from his dull existence.

In Lindsay-Abaire's hands it isn't dull for long, thanks to the aforementioned severed feet, which have a tendency to show up whenever the characters meet.

So far, so macabre.

But this whodunit soon becomes a bizarre comedy.

It manages to include a city flood, fits, delusions, train crashes, suicide, and self-mutilation amidst its murder mystery elements. Think of it like Dexter, the CBS series about a forensic detective who kills criminals, says Todd McNerney, chair of the CofC Theater Department. In an entertainment market where a network can cheerfully broadcast a show where the main character cuts people up, it's hardly a surprise that A Devil Inside has found a willing audience since its 1997 premiere.

"It's very odd how this really obscure crime could be funny, but it is," he says. "It has that very dark kind of humor."

The play is produced by Center Stage, a student group that, as McNerney explains, "operates somewhat independently of our department." This is the third year in a row they've put on a show for Piccolo. (Trust and Closer are previous productions.) As before, they'll be in the cozy little black box space in the Simons Center's Theatre 220.

The cast includes Richard Dunne (recently seen in Arabian Nights) and Jennifer McCormick (Quilters). The director is Kelly Jewell, who played a memorably swaggering Catesby in last year's CofC production of Richard III.

PICCOLO SPOLETO • $12-$15 • 2 hours • June 5-7 at 7:30 p.m. • Theatre 220, Simons Center for the Arts, 54 St. Philip St. • (888) 374-2656

True Romance: PURE Theatre restages its 2007 Piccolo hit

With Piccolo Spoleto upon us, it's surprising to learn that PURE Theatre has only been rehearsing Cloud Tectonics for a few weeks.

This is a show full of emotionally complex moments. It requires audience members to stretch their imaginations, with the actors conjuring set pieces out of thin air (there's no set dressing and only a couple of props). It's an out-there acting challenge, even by contemporary standards.

Has PURE lost its work ethic? Is the five-year-old company acting its age?

Not quite.

The short rehearsal period is a necessary evil caused by actor and director availability, along with the performers' confidence in the material. After all, they've done the show before, in their fourth season and during Piccolo 2007.

The lines of the play are stuck in their heads like primal poetry. All they have to do is put the play back on in a new venue and recast one role.

How much rehearsal time could that possibly require?

In a nutshell, Cloud Tectonics is a boy-meets-girl story. A hardworking man picks up a bedraggled hitchhiker on his way home. Back at his house, the pregnant hitchhiker fascinates him with her strange perspective on the world. His infatuation grows — until his brother turns up to shatter the magic.

But the play is more than a traditional love story, thanks to the careful writing of playwright Jose Rivera. The boy and girl are named Anibal de la Luna and Celestina del Sol, drawn together like celestial bodies in an ever-spiraling orbit. Celestina exists out of time, losing track of previous relationships and the date of her baby's conception. Clocks stop. A night lasts two years in Celestina's mesmerizing stride.

As before, Sharon Graci plays Celestina del Sol. The PURE co-founder is fresh from a stint on Army Wives (presumably one of the reasons for the short rehearsal time). Her performance is the bedrock of this show; last year, she made her character a hauntingly beautiful pleasure to watch.

Anibal de la Luna is played by Rodney Lee Rogers, also appearing in Eurydice and The Tragedian (another reason for the stripped-down rehearsals). Music is provided by guitarist Michael Moran. Matt Bivins, who has played Anibal's brother Nelson, is moving to Chicago. PURE regular David Mandel takes Bivins' place.

The other major change is the space.

PURE has left its black box space in the Cigar Factory, its home of five years, now that the downtown building is being turned into condos, shops, and offices. Cloud Tectonics is being produced at the equally intimate Circular Church instead, with the same alley seating configuration on either side of the performance area.

Rogers' main concern has been transferring the play wholesale to a new place. "We had to research how to draw on the floor in the church," he says, referring to the lack of furniture in Anibal's house (there are mere outlines instead). "We're trying to keep the simplistic beauty of the piece."

PICCOLO SPOLETO • $25 • 1 hour 20 min. • June 5-7 at 7:30 p.m. • Circular Congregational Church, 150 Meeting St. • (888) 374-2656

An all-female show flips Shakespearean stereotypes

BY NICK SMITH

What is it? Desdemona celebrates Shakespeare's bawdy sense of humor shot through with 21st-century irony and intertextual wit. Writer Paula Vogel is a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright who gives Shakespeare's female characters their due. She fleshes out a backstory for the unjustly vilified Desdemona, providing her with complexity and a lust for life that propels her relationship with Cassio's lover, Bianca — a larger-than-life brothel madam (aren't they all?) who shows Desdemona a trick or two.

Why see it? Think Sex and the Shakespearean City, with Othello's Desdemona as Carrie Bradshaw. The show got a favorable review last August from City Paper critic William Bryan, who marveled at actress Kaitlin Winslow's fake orgasm. With nine months to incubate the show, CofC's Theater Department thesps should have a hit on their hands.

Who should go? If you think Shakespeare's women got a raw deal, you'll appreciate Vogel's attempt to reset the balance. If you have a short attention span, you'll like this too; the play is performed in 30 cinematic "takes."

Desdemona: A Play About a Handkerchief • Piccolo Spoleto's Stelle Di Domani Series • $12-15 • 1 hour 30 min. • June 5, 7 at 5:30 p.m. • Chapel Theatre, 172 Calhoun St. • (888) 374-2656

Center Stage likes black comedy

BY NICK SMITH

What is it? David Lindsay-Abaire's 1997 play about a young man who learns that his missing 400-pound dad was murdered while hiking through the Poconos. The youth sets out to avenge his father's death.

Why see it? Lindsay-Abaire has playwriting awards out the wazoo, including a Pulitzer, an L.A. Drama Critics Circle Award, and an award from the S.C. Playwrights Festival. With A Devil Inside, he's created a cruel yet wildly imaginative world that maintains a loose orbit around contemporary culture. The young protagonist and the wacky milieu are perfect for the College of Charleston's theater department.

Who should go? Fathers, sons, hikers, PURE Theatre regulars, and other fans of finely written, quirky, contemporary theater. Morbidly obese folks might want to sit this one out.

PICCOLO SPOLETO • $12-$15 • 2 hours • June 4-7 at 7:30 p.m. • Theatre 220, Simons Center for the Arts, 54 St. Philip St. • (888) 374-2656

A Brief guide to the Piccolo play This War is Live

Preview written by NICK SMITH

What is it? A left-leaning documentarian investigates the Armed Forces in Iraq — with shocking results.

Why see it? Plays at Footlight don't get any edgier than this. This War is Live, directed by local theater veteran J.C. Conway, premiered as part of the theater's Late Night program this year. It immediately split audiences between lovers and haters of its movie-style pacing, heart-on-sleeve characters, Bush-baiting, and coarse language. An added dash of nudity and a streak of violence make this a memorable night of theater. As the performers interact with video sequences and documentary-style footage, a serious attempt is made to resurrect the grimy ghost of the Iraq War's early phases.

Who should go? With its ironic humor and fatalistic storyline, the show's aimed squarely at a younger, HBO-watching crowd. Its overt criticism of the war, the media, and the government will have liberals nodding their heads in agreement; conspiracy nuts will love the Deep Throat-style character, Mr. X.

PICCOLO SPOLETO • $15-$20 • 2 hours • June 6 at 9 p.m.; June 8 at 7:30 p.m. • Footlight Players Theatre, 20 Queen St. • (888) 374-2656

A haunting, stage-struck love story that defies time, the natural order, and customary theatrical conventions

BY NICK SMITH

What is it? A haunting, stage-struck love story that defies time, the natural order, and customary theatrical conventions. This show is back by popular demand. The actors have had a year to mull over its subtleties, but they'll have to work hard to recapture the fresh, lively feel of their past performances.

Why see it? This is PURE Theatre in its truest sense — a great tale performed by a small cast with minimal props and an invisible set. The stripped-down production means there's nothing to distract the audience from the acting and Jose Rivera's magical realist dialogue. Rivera's work has been favorably compared to the writing of Nobel Prize-winner Gabriel Garcia Marquez. PURE has produced this show a couple of times to great acclaim, most recently at Piccolo Spoleto 2007.

Who should go? This one's for the lovers. Cloud Tectonics centers around the fascinating relationship between Anibal de la Luna and Celestina del Sol, played by real-life couple Rodney Lee Rogers and Sharon Graci. Luna and Sol's adventures are by turns bizarre, intriguing, and out-and-out romantic.

PICCOLO SPOLETO • $25 • 1 hour 20 min. • June 4-7 at 7:30 p.m. • Circular Congregational Church, 150 Meeting St. • (888) 374-2656

In this alternate take from a documentary on Charlestonian Patrick Pelletier, the artist discusses his abstract painting King of the Castle.

Piccolo Spoleto's "Vanishing Landscapes" is the 24th Annual Juried Art Exhibition. It's at the City Gallery at Waterfront Park through Aug 8. I spoke to 1st place winner Lidia Richardson at her studio.

Reviews!

As a roving Spoleto reporter, I've been able to catch a whole bunch of shows and let people know whether they're worth paying for or not (IMHO). Click on the links below to find out what I thought about the following productions.

I saw Harvard Sailing Team at the American Theater. Since they're from New York and they've been suriving the comedy clubs there for years, I thought the sketch comedians would be edgy as well as energetic. But their humor wasn't nasty at all; in fact it was good-natured and quite family friendly.

One of the highlights of the show was when the entire group did a stand up act in unison. For a polar opposite, I saw two one man shows: Rodney Lee Rogers' electrifying The Tragedian at Lance Hall and Marc Bamuthi Joseph's the break/s at the Emmett Robinson Theatre. Both performers are masters of their arts (Rogers, acting; Bamuthi, poetry and movement).

Marc Bamuthi Joseph, giving it some 'tude.

I also caught Under the Lights, ten short plays by ten College of Charleston playwrights at Chapel Theatre. A couple of very strong short plays made the show worth watching.

To lighten up, I also saw Scheer and McBrayer at Theatre 99. Both improv comedians are TV stars (Scheer's on MTV's Human Giant and VH1's Best Week Ever. McBrayers's a regular on 30 Rock). The joint was packed, so I stood to one side of the stage with Theatre 99 performers like Jenny Pringle and Lee Lewis. A good time was had by all.

More reviews (and blogs and photos and podcasts) to come as the festival enters its final week.