Porgy and Bess Program [pdf] - American Repertory Theater
Porgy and Bess Program [pdf] - American Repertory Theater
Porgy and Bess Program [pdf] - American Repertory Theater
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
Michael Lutch<br />
RE-IMAGINING AN<br />
AMERICAN CLASSIC<br />
Seventy-six years after its premiere, Diane Paulus,<br />
Suzan-Lori Parks <strong>and</strong> company revamp the Gershwins’<br />
l<strong>and</strong>mark masterpiece, <strong>Porgy</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Bess</strong> by Christopher Wallenberg<br />
George <strong>and</strong> Ira Gershwin’s l<strong>and</strong>mark “folkopera”<br />
<strong>Porgy</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Bess</strong>, with a libretto cowritten<br />
by DuBose Heyward, may be<br />
three quarters of a century old, but Diane Paulus,<br />
the director of the current re-imagining of this operatic<br />
masterpiece, has been steadfastly approaching<br />
<strong>Porgy</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Bess</strong> as if it’s a living, breathing entity<br />
as relevant today as it was in 1935. To that end,<br />
she’s simultaneously looking backwards to underst<strong>and</strong><br />
its history <strong>and</strong> its original inspirations while<br />
pushing forward to think about what this iconic<br />
<strong>American</strong> work means right now.<br />
“What makes a classic great is that it responds.<br />
Shakespeare responds. It’s not stuck in<br />
1598. And <strong>Porgy</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Bess</strong> continues to reverberate<br />
<strong>and</strong> hold universal meaning over time,” says<br />
Paulus, nestled in an armchair in her spacious<br />
office at the <strong>American</strong> <strong>Repertory</strong> <strong>Theater</strong>’s Loeb<br />
Drama Center in Cambridge, where her<br />
musical-theater version of The Gershwins’ <strong>Porgy</strong><br />
<strong>and</strong> <strong>Bess</strong> made its highly anticipated debut on<br />
August 17.<br />
“That’s been my whole interest as a director:<br />
How do we look to the masterworks of our the-<br />
GONE FISHIN’: (above, left to right) Norm Lewis<br />
(as <strong>Porgy</strong>), Joshua Henry, Wilkie Ferguson,<br />
Roosevelt André Credit <strong>and</strong> Trevon Davis perform<br />
a scene from The Gershwins’ <strong>Porgy</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Bess</strong>.<br />
6 AMERICAN REPERTORY THEATER