SAVE tHE DAtES! <strong>Spunk</strong> boasts even more special events than we usually offer; and Blithe Spirit has pre-show parties, post-show celebrations, reduced ticket prices, and cast talkbacks, too. EVENtS SPUNK inside Scoop Free panel discussion with coffee & sweet treats! Lower-Priced Previews be a part of the process by seeing the show before the show opening, at a discounted price. Opening Night! Mingle with the cast at a post-show reception. Meet the Artists Matinees post-show chat with cast & creative team. Cal Shakers Get together with likeminded theater lovers in their 20s, 30s, and 40s. Blues Holla Jam Tru (Guitar Man in <strong>Spunk</strong>) presents a participatory Grove Talk tracing the history of the blues and teaching how to create the kind of call and response chant featured in the play. teen Nights a special pre-show event for students ages 13-18. Onstage Dance Nights stay after the show to get a <strong>Spunk</strong>-era dance lesson with choreographer Traci bartlow and members of the cast—onstage! Complimentary tastings enjoy pre-show samples from local purveyors. inSight Matinee post-show talk with the dramaturg. n/a 7/23 7/4–6 8/8–10 7/7 8/11 7/8 & 22 8/12 & 26 7/12 8/17 7/5, 12, 7/19, 26 n/a 7/13 8/16 & 24 7/6, 13, 7/20, 27 7/10 & 11 7/17 & 18 7/24 & 25 BLitHE SPirit n/a 8/14 & 15 8/21 & 22 8/28 & 29 7/15 8/19 for complete descriptions of these and other events, click calshakes.org/events. CONTINUED FROM PAGE 16. CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11. of <strong>Spunk</strong> on the Cal Shakes stage draws on three points in a single century—the 1920s, when Hurston’s story was written; the 1980s, when it was adapted; and 2012, where we now live. McGregor has granted her production the full force of music, movement, text, and expanded theatrical space, that “makes its own sense of” our unique stage. In a recent interview with Cal Shakes, McGregor mentioned the inspiration she drew from the Zora Neale Hurston festival, held each year in Eatonville, Florida, to celebrate the enduring value of Hurston’s writings. For McGregor, musicality and the natural environment are two key features that draw her to Hurston, making <strong>Spunk</strong>, to her mind, a perfect fi t for the outdoor Bruns Amphitheater. And then there is the element of the spectacular in the most ordinary expressions: “to elevate the expressions of the everyday,” as McGregor puts it, is to recognize the beauty—spontaneous and unique—in everything: “The way people speak, the way they might sew a little fl ower on their shirt, or the way the sun feels on your face—those everyday things, that poetry of the everyday is art.” According to Zora, art mustn’t patronize its subject or its audience. Art is a prism through which we see life in its beauty, its artifi ce, its transgression of all attempts to literally code or represent it. Art has to have <strong>Spunk</strong>. 20 california shakespeare theater www.calshakes.org nervous, excited laughter in response to a simple exercise like looking into someone’s eyes and making up a nonsense story, we are reminded that we are not used to communicating so directly and honestly, even when doing something silly. And all other kinds of bugaboos come up: self-criticism, embarrassment, and the crippling fear of judgment from others are demons not to be taken lightly. Remember that old study that found that more people are afraid of speaking in public than they are of death? Therefore, the teaching artist also must create a profound discipline and supported structure in the classroom in order to foster artistic expression in an environment of safety and trust. One of Wright’s favorite regular residencies is at Oakland High School, where often, she says, “when I show up to teach the kids are too bored, pent up, or terrifi ed to be interested in theater. One class in particular had a few kids who were hard to reach, but once they began to trust that I was actually interested in what they thought, without judgment or fear of being ‘wrong,’ they started to open up. One kid who wouldn’t look me in the eye began to smile whenever I addressed him, and after the residency, his teacher said he had transformed his class participation. Another student who wouldn’t participate at all in class, in the fi nal week came up to me and demanded a part. She became my stage manager and dove right in and kept the actors in line so well, I started taking her orders!” “Words are power,” says Carter, “and if you can stand up in front of other people and speak clearly, movingly, eloquently, you can change the world.”
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