By Wendi Wheeler ’06

Imagine writing one play every day for a year. Also imagine the challenges presented to 14 actors each playing several roles in 54 plays presented in one evening. That is the task of the cast of Suzan-Lori Parks’ 365 Days/365 Plays, directed by Augsburg theater professor Martha Johnson.

In the fall of 2002, Pulitzer-prize winning playwright Suzan-Lori Parks decided to take on the challenge of writing one play a day for a full year. 365 Days/365 Plays is the successful result, featuring 365 short plays exploring such divergent topics as sex, war, fairy tales, Indian mythology, American historical figures, love, politics, race, contemporary celebrities—and numerous other issues from American life.

In the introduction to the play, a 374-page book that looks like a formidable novel, Parks writes, “The plan was that no matter what I did, how busy I was, what other commitments I had, I would write a play a day, every single day, for a year.  It would be about being present and being committed to the artistic process every single day, regardless of the ‘weather.’  It became a daily meditation, a daily prayer celebrating the rich and strange process of a writing life.”

This is the first work by an African American playwright to be presented on Augsburg’s main stage. Jasmine Gilbert ’13, a theater performance major from Minneapolis, said that is precisely why she was interested in the play. “I wanted to be a part of it in any way I could.”

Gilbert [shown here with Jackson Mboma] plays the role of Parks. She said performing 54 short plays—some less than one minute in length—has been challenging. “One of the main things is that doing these plays isn’t easy because you want the audience to get her point, and you only have a short amount of time to get that across.”

Selecting only a portion of the 365 plays presented something of a challenge for Johnson in finding a “frame” for the pieces. The setting for each play is Parks’ apartment, and her mind serves as the unifying theme to help the plays connect to one another and to move the audience along through the story arc.

This is the first time that Leah Tillman ’13, a psychology major with a theater minor, has been in the cast of an Augsburg play. “So far,” she said, “I have learned that what you represent on stage could be interpreted by the audience differently when it comes to performing gender roles, ethnicities, or stereotypes.” Tillman said the cast has been very mindful of how their performances might be received by the audience.

Johnson said the production has required a great deal of artistic and logistical discipline from the actors. Usually an actor will develop the details of one character throughout the six- to seven-week period of rehearsal and performance. “This time, they create many characters, have to let go of a character, and support everyone around them through the process.”

Both Gilbert and Tillman encourage the community to see the production because of the themes in the play and because it is written by an African American. “We all worked really hard on it, so we want everyone to come out and see it. It was challenging, and we hope our hard work pays off.”

About the production:

The plays are organized into two acts, and each act is under an hour. With the intermission, the production is about two hours in length. Some of the plays contain adult language and themes, with some controversial content. 365 Days/365 Plays may not be appropriate for children 12 years of age or younger.

Performances are February 3, 4, 9, 10, 11 at 7 p.m. February 5, 12 at 3 p.m. Tjornhom-Nelson Theater. Click for ticket information

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Written by Sarah Ruhl, Eurydice is a retelling of the Greek myth of Orpheus told from the point of view of Eurydice, his wife. “It’s almost like a dream,” Johnson said. “The play uses images you would only see in a dream but is also very human. There’s a little bit of ‘Alice in Wonderland’ in it.” Johnson believes patrons will appreciate the contemporary humor, Ruhl’s ability to play with language, and the unusual set designed by Joe Stanley.

Johnson calls Eurydice a poignant and humorous exploration of death, loss, and memory. Written when Ruhl was grieving the loss of her father to cancer, the play focuses both on the relationship between husband and wife as well as on Eurydice’s relationship with her father. Ruhl used the play to imagine what would happen if Eurydice met her father in the underworld, since he had been dead at the time of her wedding, in the underworld.

The role of Eurydice is played by Shannon O’Brien, a sophomore theatre major whose father, Paul O’Brien, is also an actor and a student in the Augsburg MBA program.

“I wanted to become an actress because of my father,” Shannon said. “I saw him in Amadeus at the Guthrie when I was in middle school, and I fell in love with the theatre.” Paul offers advice when his daughter asks for it and helps her memorize lines but says he tries to stay out of her way. “She is doing things that are very tough, being a student and playing the lead in the play,” he says. “I just try to be there and be a supportive dad.”

Paul learned about Augsburg’s MBA program when he brought his daughter to campus to begin her first year. After he was accepted into the program, she told him not to expect to see her every time he was on campus. “In my first year, this was kind of my territory,” she said, but soon she came to enjoy seeing her father at Augsburg. The pair has dinner together every Monday before Paul goes to class and Shannon goes to rehearsal. “All my friends love him.”

Shannon builds on the close relationship with her father in her role as Eurydice. “Toward the end of the play when my father and I are in the underworld, he is bringing me to Orpheus and we are walking down an imaginary aisle as though at my wedding. At that time, I think about what it would be like to lose my dad,” she said. Her father, who lives with multiple sclerosis, said “Every father dreams of walking his daughter down the aisle. Because I have MS, that is uncertain.”

Performances of Eurydice are Oct. 31, Nov. 1, 6, and 8 at 7 p.m., and Nov. 2, 8, and 9 at 2 p.m. in Tjornhom-Nelson Theater in Foss Center. Tickets are $10 general public; $8 ACTC, faculty, staff, and students; $2 Augsburg students and children under age 12. For reservations or other information, call 612-330-1257.

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Johnson, who recently completed her 20th year teaching and directing plays at Augsburg, says the play explores mature women’s lives and choices, particularly choices that go against the rules of family and society, traditional religion, and the conventional female roles of wife and mother. It features women from India, Japan, and the United States.

The play’s development began when Johnson received a sabbatical leave from Augsburg to write an original theater piece in the spring semester of 2004. Her sabbatical culminated in June of that year with a reading of an early draft of “Dipped in Love” at the Mu Performing Arts New Eyes Festival of New Plays.

Based on the June reading, the core artistic group of Mu Performing Arts selected the piece for further development as a new play-in-progress at the company’s New Directions Festival the following season. It was given two staged performances, directed by Jen Weir, featuring professional actresses Maria Kelly, Katie Leo, and Augsburg theater alumna Carolyn Pool.

The play was fully staged as a New Directions Festival Workshop Production at Mixed Blood Theater in July, 2007. Because of the strong audience response, it was chosen by Mu Performing Arts for presentation at the 2008 Fringe Festival. The festival production of “Dipped in Love” is directed by Jen Wier and stars Momoko Tanno, Maria Kelly, and Jen Rives.

Johnson described her motivations for writing the play. “On the whole, women tend to be under-represented on the stage, particularly middle-aged women, in spite of the richness of their personal stories and mature insight. ‘Dipped in Love’ explores the sometimes painful, sometimes surprising, familial and societal repercussions of such choices. It portrays revolutionary changes in three women’s views of family and marriage, from their strong beliefs in the rules and mores they absorbed as young girls, to the major life choices they have to make as women in their middle years. Artistically, the play combines theatrical storytelling, dialogue and monologue with choreographed movement and music to create a fictionalized work inspired by the lives of these three women.”

Information about the Fringe Festival and bios of Johnson, Wier, and the three actresses can be found at .

Photos — 2007 production featuring Maria Kelly, Katie Leo, and Carolyn Pool

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