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Is it
dirty?
I field quite a few phone
calls each and every "Surprise Theatre"
where people ask me about the content of the
shows. "Is it dirty?" and "What's the
language like?" seem to be the two
frontrunners. So it seemed to me a little
note might help to spread light on the
situation and save me the embarrassment of
being inarticulate on the phone.
When we started "Surprise
Theatre" we didn't think much about the
content beyond whether or not the plays were
good. Language never really occurred to us,
neither did the nature of the jokes. If the
plays were a little blue it just didn't
really strike us as important. However, one
of the things I've learned in over a year of
doing these shows is take it into
consideration when we choose shows. When you
go to the theatre with the knowledge that
something is going to have some juicy jokes
or a little language, then you go informed
and it's your decision to see that kind of
play. Since "Surprise Theatre" is, of
course, a surprise you're going in blind.
Is there ever blue language
or jokes about taboo subjects like sex? Yes,
some of the shows we've done contain those
elements, but that's never all they're
about. "Surprise Theatre" and The Balagula
Theatre in general select shows based on the
merits of their ideas before all else. We'd
never put on a show just to say a dirty
word, and we've learned how people feel
about those topics when we select plays.
It's very difficult to be
sure what everyone might find offensive. In
March of 2006 we put on a play called
Soap Opera by David Ives in which the
"Maypole Washing Machine Repairman" finds
himself in a love triangle between his girl
Mabel and the washing machine he inherited
from his mother. The show requires a washing
machine that can be moved around and inside
of it an actress who plays the machine. She
periodically raises the lid, pops up, and
delivers some of the funniest lines I've
ever read. In the show I double cast Tara
Adkins to play both the machine and the
repairman's mother in an early scene to
really push the Freudian angle of the story.
Nothing every happens between the machine
and the repairman, it's mostly dialogue
delivered in a very daytime soap fashion,
but a woman actually came up to me after a
performance to tell me how "wrong" that play
was. The implication of a man and appliance
in love offended her just a little, not
enough to walk out, but enough to mention
it.
With all that said we have
decided to dust off some scripts we had once
thought might be too risqué for previous
nights with our upcoming April 2007 show
"Surprise Theatre" RATED 'R.' We're putting
a rating on this one ourselves just to make
sure everyone knows the score. It might be
possible this could become a special once a
year event like our February 'a night of
love' shows. One show out of the series that
goes a little farther and gets a little
wilder, a night to leave the kids at home.
We'll have to see how people like it.
And although I'm always
happy to answer people's questions in person
or on the phone, I hope this note helps in
some way to clear up some ideas about what
"Surprise Theatre" is all about.
Thank for reading,
Eric Seale
"Surprise Theatre" artistic director
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