UBC THEATRE & FILM PRESENTS THE CRUCIBLEON THE SUBJECT

— WHEN EVERYONE IS SUSPECT, THE MOST DANGEROUS THREAT TO THE COMMUNITY,
MAY BE THE COMMUNTY ITSELF! —

The Crucible is a timeless parable of morality, a scorching indictment of intolerance, and a central work in the canon of American drama. In a tight-knit Puritan town in the late 17th century, a group of girls are discovered dancing in the woods and then immediately fall ill, causing panic to percolate. Buried secrets are brought to light, and scapegoating leads to treachery and betrayal. Miller himself was questioned by the House of Representatives' Committee on Un-American Activities in 1956 and convicted of contempt of Congress for refusing to identify others present at meetings he had attended. MFA Director Jessica Anne Nelson puts a 2018 spin on this classic play: “The female characters have been oppressed for so long that rising up against the male centric theocratic control, initiates them to find their power and autonomy.” 

Cast: Rebecca Nurse: Natalie Backerman, Abigail: Heidi Damayo, Rev. Hale: Jed Weiss, Rev. Parris: Louis Lin, Mary Warren: Olivia Lang, Elizabeth Proctor: Shona Struthers, Ann Putnam/Marth Corey: Sabrina Vellani, Giles Corey: Daria Banu, John Proctor: Aidan Wright, Judge Hathorne: Tebo Nzeku, Mercy Lewis: Daelyn Lester-Serafini, Betty/Sarah Good: Cassandra Bourchier, Thomas Putnam: Matthew Rhodes, Francis Nurse: Tomas Balli, Susanna Walcott: DrewAnn Carlson, Tituba: Sophia Paskaladis, Herrick: Elizabeth Young, Cheever: Gray Clark, Danforth: Frank Zotter

The Crucible by Arthur Miller. Directed by MFA Directing Student Jessica Anne Nelson
March 15 - 31, 2018, no show Sunday, Monday or Tuesday
Preview: March 14. Opening Night Reception: March 15; Post-Show Talkback: March 22, 2018

SINGLE TICKETS: Adult: $24.50, Seniors: $16.50, Students: $11.50, Youth: $5.
VENUE: Frederic Wood Theatre, 6354 Crescent Rd.
BOX OFFICE
: 604.822.2678 or box.office@ubc.ca or www.ubctheatretickets.com
Media Contact: Andrea Rabinovitch. Andrea.rabinovitch@ubc.ca | Office: 604.822.3723 | Cell:604.314.3905

THE CRUCIBLE Poster

THE DEPARTMENT OF THEATRE & FILM AT UBC PRESENTSTHE CRUCIBLE BY ARTHUR MILLER

Directed by
MFA Directing Student
Jessica Anne Nelson

BOX OFFICE: 604.822.2678 or box.office@ubc.ca or www.ubctheatretickets.com

Media Contact:
Andrea Rabinovitch. Andrea.rabinovitch@ubc.ca
Office: 604.822.3723
Cell: 604.314.3905

March 15 - 31, 2018
No show Sunday, Monday or Tuesday
Preview: March 14
Opening Night Reception: March 15
Post-Show Talkback: March 22, 2018

Frederic Wood Theatre
6354 Crescent Rd
University of British Columbia, Vancouver, CANADA
Wayfinding: http://www.maps.ubc.ca

 

 

Adult: $24.50
Seniors: $16.50
Students: $11.50
Youth: $5

604.822.2678 or box.office@ubc.ca or www.ubctheatretickets.com

 

Stephen Heatley, Head, Department of Theatre & Film

HEAD, DEPARTMENT OF THEATRE & FILMSTEPHEN HEATLEY

THE CRUCIBLE

The theatre has make-believe at its foundation.  Any of us who make theatre set out to create imaginary worlds and then invite audiences to live there for a few hours and experience a new perspective on events and circumstances.  It is always rewarding when the make-believe slices into the real world and sheds light on what is actually happening around us. 

Arthur Miller, that powerhouse playwright of 20th century American theatre, chose to revisit the Salem witch trials of late 17th century New England during the McCarthy trials, when communists were perceived to be hiding in every closet and under every bed.  The prevarications that took place in Salem were being repeated in the USA of the 1950s. 

The same kinds of questions are back in 2018.  Who is telling the truth?  What is the truth, anyway?  Whose “truth” do we believe?  In an era now known as “post-truth” where alternative facts and charges of fake news are abundant, it is no surprise that the trials in Salem are speaking to us all over again.  The power of Miller’s story speaks to us again today as history, unfortunately, seems to be repeating itself.

Welcome back to the Frederic Wood Theatre and the final production of the 2017/2018 Theatre at UBC season.  This year has taken us on many journeys; to Regency England (Wives and Daughters), to the 1990s Dungeons and Dragons craze (She Kills Monsters), to the modern day traumas of urban life (Naked Cinema: Unspoken), and to the land of dancing goats and an interrupted Camelot (King Arthur’s Night).  We hope you have enjoyed the ride and will join us in 2018/2019 for more stories on stage and screen.  The department is 60 years old next year, so stand by for announcements of parties, events, and other special presentations to celebrate our longevity.  

The busiest department at UBC is not done yet for this academic year!  The Undergraduate Film Students Association is holding Symposium 2018 on March 23; Canadian National Film Day on April 18  features short films from the Rogers Multicultural Filmmaking class; the Persistence of Vision Festival (POV28) April 28 and 29 celebrates 4th and 3rd year film production students; first year MFA Directors showcase their one-acts April 12-14; and our Theatre Studies graduate students will present at the Tri-University Colloquium at U Vic April 27 and  28. Watch our web site for more details.  www.theatrefilm.ubc.ca

Have a great evening in the theatre!

Stephen Heatley

 

Playwright ARTHUR MILLER

playwrightARTHUR MILLER

(from Arthur Miller Biography)

Born in Harlem, New York in 1915, Arthur Miller attended the University of Michigan before moving back East to write dramas for the stage. His first critical and popular success was Death of a Salesman, which opened on Broadway in 1949 and won the Pulitzer Prize along with multiple Tonys. He received more acclaim for his award-winning followup The Crucible, which reflected his unwavering refusal to cooperate with the House Un-American Activities Committee. Miller's public life was painted in part by his rocky marriage to Hollywood sex symbol Marilyn Monroe. The playwright died in 2005 at the age of 89, leaving a body of work that continues to be re-staged internationally and adapted for the screen.

More at en.wikipedia.org.

 

Theatre Director Jessica Anne Nelson

Theatre DirectorJessica Anne Nelson

Jessica Anne Nelson is an award-winning Theatre Director, Creator, and Producer, having won the Best Site Specific Show Vancouver Fringe Festival Award (2013) for her devised site-specific show Meanwhile; a Graduate Support Initiative Award (UBC, 2016); the John Brockington Scholarship in Theatre (UBC, 2016); and the Sydney J. Risk Award in Directing (UBC, 2018); and she was the Director of Ithaka (Jessie Award for Best Supporting Actress (2016/17). Her focus in directing is on theatre productions that uncover the full range of humanity and heart even within the most negatively-viewed characters, as well as exploring the meaning of enacting our gender in stage performance as well as in our daily lives. Jessica will be continuing her research with her thesis production of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, March 15-30, 2018. Nelson has been a part of many theatre workshops and trainings, as well as working with such companies as The Only Animal, ITSAZOO, Collective Hallucination, dream of passion productions, Shift 1 Act Festival, The Cultch’s IGNITE Festival. She was the Apprentice Director for Othello (Director Bob Frazer) at Bard on the Beach (2016).  Nelson is currently working on an immersive exploration of present technology mixed with the stories from her Grandmother’s life growing up on Commercial Drive, Vancouver, BC, during the 1940’s and 50’s.

REMINDER AND WARNING

Katrina Dunn, PhD Candidate, Theatre Studies

In the early 1950s, Arthur Miller came across a copy of Marion L. Starkey’s book The Devil in Massachusetts: a modern inquiry into the Salem witch trials (1949), which looks at the trials of Salem witches in 1692 and features chapters with titles like “The Easiest Room in Hell”, “On Gallows Hill” and “Village Purge”. He had been searching for an image or metaphor through which to render the experience of living through McCarthyism’s paranoid cleanse, or as his autobiography Timebends chronicles, he wanted “a sonorous instrument whose reverberations would penetrate to the center of this miasma” (330). It was the ritualistic nature of the hearings in Washington, to which a number of his friends and colleagues had been summoned, that allowed him to draw a line of connection back to 1692. Studying the actual court records in a Salem library, Miller came to love the feel of the gnarled language world he found there; “like hard burnished wood” (336). Starkey’s book and the court documents provided him with a full dramatis personae for an epic allegory of the Red-hunt. Miller now had his sonorous instrument, and he set about figuring out how to play it in such a way that would penetrate the atmosphere of rampant blacklisting and disregard of civil liberties that reigned the day.

When Miller was finally called before the Un-American Activities Committee in 1956 it was partially the success of this allegorical play that prompted his interrogation. His critique had summoned his own crucible. He said later that “My memories of the hearing itself are always scattered, like those that follow violence” (406). The overarching theme of Miller’s autobiography, the sense of history and memory as things that bend and warp with traumatic shifts, is especially clear in this moment of his life, as The Crucible’s preoccupations with names and naming came doubling back at him. The committee demanded the names of others in attendance at left-wing activities Miller had participated in. He refused to comply, and was found guilty of contempt of Congress, sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. His conviction would be overturned in 1958, but the haunting imprint of life follows art would be with him always.

In time, The Crucible would become Miller’s most frequently produced play. As it moved around the world in translation, Miller said: “I can almost tell what the political situation in a country is when the play is suddenly a hit there – it is either a warning of tyranny on the way or a reminder of tyranny just past” (348). As a diagnostic political tool this play is one of Modern Drama’s finest, whether we remind ourselves of past injustices, or heed its warning of what may be marching towards us. 


Works Cited: Miller, Arthur. Timebends. Grove Press, 1987.
Starkey, Marion L. The Devil in Massachusetts: a modern inquiry into the Salem witch trials, A.A. Knopf, 1949.

Q&A WITH SET DESIGNER KIMIRA BHIKUM

Tell us about your history with design and production
My love for the stage started at a very young age, growing up in South Africa. I grew up learning Indian classical dance forms performing on stages in theatres with beautifully designed sets. Intrigued by the wonderful worlds these sets created, I began my journey into the enchanting world of set design by pursuing my Bachelors degree in Performing Arts Technology. I specialized in scenic painting and prop making. My final thesis was a comparative study of methods and materials used to replicate period weapon props for the film industry. After graduating, I had the wonderful opportunity to work as a set dresser on “Free State”, a multiple award-winning South African film. This experience validated my pursuit of happiness and resulted in me moving to Canada to do my MFA in Theatre Design and Production at UBC.

The Crucible is an enormously well-known play.  How has your approach tried to break away from expectations of this Arthur Miller classic?
The unique creative vision that Jessica brought to the table, made this easier. We were not fighting expectation but rather exploring age old themes and ideas in our own ‘style’. With inspiration drawn from the period (1692), I focused on the story and incorporated the overbearing nature of a puritanical society that is rife with manipulation and control into the structure that makes up the set. The roof beams for example, reach out over the actors like an ethereal, conniving puppet master. The main goal was to create an ‘outside world’ and an ‘inside world’. The inside world, the main playing space, emphasizes the pressure of the town by trapping the individual while still being surrounded by the vast dark eerie outside world.

Besides being the set designer for The Crucible, tell us about your research for your MFA thesis. 
Early in 2017, I attended the Consumer Virtual Reality Expo. During the expo, I tested an architectural visualization demo which used the HTC Vive virtual reality headset. This demo allowed architects to bring their pencil sketches to life in a visceral, lifelike fashion. There are already many parallels that can be drawn between architecture and set design. I wondered if I could revolutionize the set design process by incorporating VR. Set design to me is always centered around the “vision”,  the elusive spark of creativity that forms in the mind’s eye that we then need to express in the real world. I believe that VR has many process efficiencies and design advantages but most importantly, I believe that VR could help bridge the gap between vision and expression.

What are your plans for the future?
I plan to continue my pursuit of happiness, by becoming a successful set designer and contribute to the industry with my VR research. 

 

THE CRUCIBLEdesign portfolio

Click here to view image detail

advance photos:
THE CRUCIBLE by EMILY COOPER

L-R: Jed Weiss, Heidi Damayo, Aidan Wright, Shona Struthers, Louis-Lin



 

 

 

Click here to view video

VIDEO TRAILER: Chelsea Chen

Actors: Heidi Damayo, Louis Lin, hona Struthers, Jed Weiss, Aidan Wright. Music: Erika Champion. Wardrobe: Cora Wu.

 

THE CRUCIBLETHE COMPANY

Directed by MFA Directing Student: Jessica Anne Nelson

Faculty MFA Directing Supervisor: Stephen Heatley

Cast: Rebecca Nurse: Natalie Backerman, Abigail: Heidi Damayo, Rev. Hale: Jed Weiss, Rev. Parris: Louis Lin, Mary Warren: Olivia Lang, Elizabeth Proctor: Shona Struthers, Ann Putnam/Marth Corey: Sabrina Vellani, Giles Corey: Daria Banu, John Proctor: Aidan Wright, Judge Hathorne: Tebo Nzeku, Mercy Lewis: Daelyn Lester-Serafini, Betty/Sarah Good: Cassandra Bourchier, Thomas Putnam: Matthew Rhodes, Francis Nurse: Tomas Balli, Susanna Walcott: DrewAnn Carlson, Tituba: Sophia Paskaladis, Herrick: Elizabeth Young, Cheever: Gray Clark, Danforth: Frank Zotter

UBC DEPARTMENT OF THEATRE & FILM STAFF AND ADMINISTRATION 

Stephen Heatley  Department Head
Cam Cronin  Department Administrator
Ian Patton  Academic Administrator
Zanna Downes  Theatre and Film Production Graduate Secretary
Karen Tong  Theatre and Film Studies Graduate Secretary
Borja Brown  Manager, Technical Theatre Production
Jim Fergusson  Stage and Lighting Specialist
Keith Smith  Stage and Lighting Specialist
Lynn Burton  Properties Specialist
Jodi Jacyk  Head of Wardrobe, Costume Specialist
Tony Koelwyn  Theatre at UBC Box Office
Andrea Rabinovitch  Marketing and Communications Coordinator 
Linda Fenton-Malloy  Web Developer
Sarah Crauder  Film Program Administrator
Stuart McFarlane  Film Equipment Manager
Dmitri Lennikov, Film Collections Coordinator

CREATIVE COLLABORATORS
Jonathan Wood  Graphic Designer
Emily Cooper  Advance Promotional Photography