Tuesday, February 23, 1987/The Battalion/Page 3
State and Local
inprize-winning playwright tries
o expand theater department
lue of
thatbesil
'oineii. If
'asm inf,
By Tom Cawthra
Reporter
he director in Los Angeles was
rouble ... he was having difficul-
relating a 1970s play to a 1980s
hence, and the show had to go
ime
mid alii
Btnter Texas A&M’s Pulitzer
jze-winning playwright Charles
Irdone, and the difficulties in Cali-
•niaquickly got fixed.
Ia y ^iB'Iwent to L.A. and had to take a
our so fen weeks to straighten the show
instituti'B,”Gordone explains. “I was living
e for fag life’ in New Mexico when they
|'i ]le|l tali (I me to help the director (in Los
HI ■geles). He was in trouble because
P . didn’t know how to direct the
nnimbi p a7 { or today’s audience.”
'm,"oulilBfJordone, the play’s author, was
ingusol*perfect solution. He directed the
ig ourfBginal production of “No Place to
■ Somebody’' in 1967 and made
■e that the 1970-1974 Broadway
r Mstoriapof I action ran smoothly. After all,
nnistfnrjdidn’t win the Pulitzer Prize, the
lama Desk Award and the Los An-
Critic Circle Award for writing
allay that audiences cannot under-
$|ud.
■Walter Kerr of the New York
Hmes notes that Gordone’s play is
■t simple, though.
■“The construction of the play is
cpmplex, rich, garish, improbable,
ovi rburdened, defiant and success-
” Kerr writes.
The play began in the late 1960s
Gordone can recall the audi-
I ces’reactions.
When the play first came out in
date ’60s and early ’70s, the audi
os had never experienced such a
iter experience,” he says. “The
Hpactwas really tremendous.”
■Gordone, a veteran erf the stage,
his theater career as an actor.
He received a drama degree from
I/)'Angeles State College in 1952.
Upon graduation, he immediately
moved across the nation to New
York, where he was cast in Broad-
■y productions. In addition to New
Ylrk, Gordone acted in Venice and
Hut European cities.
■He came to A&M’s theater arts
Rpartment to join the Aggie Players
■ a distinguished lecturer. He tea-
BKs acting and playwrighting and
ps encouraged several young actors
tojactively pursue theatrical careers.
Rudy Cordova, a sophomore the
ir arts major, says, “Being in Gor-
ne’s class makes me feel like A&M
really upgrading its theater pro-
am. He’s done so much in the act-
g world and he has so much to
are with us.
Aggie Player’s ‘King Lear’ opens Friday
The Texas A&M Aggie Play
ers’ production of “King Lear,”
William Shakespeare’s tragedy
centering around a story of politi
cal intrigue and family betrayal,
opens Friday at 8 p.m. in the
Rudder Theater to begin a two
weekend run.
The performances will feature
veteran Royal Shakespeare Com
pany actor Jeffery Dench as King
Lear and Aggie Players’ Pulitzer
Prize winning playwright/actor
Charles Gordone in the role of
Gloucester. The remainder of the
cast will be portrayed by A&M
students.
Director of Theater Roger
Schultz said, “King Lear presents
a wonderful opportunity for the
students involved in it and the
people of the community to come
and see a production of one of
the true classical scripts in the
world.”
The play will be presented in
the Rudder Theater Friday and
Saturday and on March 3, 4 and 5
at 8 p.m. Tickets for the produc
tion are $5.50 for A&M students
and senior citizens and $7.50 for
the general public. For reserva
tions, call the Rudder Box Office
at 845-1234.
“When he shares his past experi
ences, he brings them into the class
room with a special livelihood.”
Gordone was asked to teach at
other universities such as Sarah Law
rence, Columbia, Carnegie-Mellon
and Harvard, but he chose A&M.
“I feel that in the way I see the
theater of the future, you begin with
the youth,” he says. “You begin to
share with them your thinking.”
Gordone explains that he fre
quently is asked why he chose A&M,
a University with a small-scale the
ater arts department, over other uni
versities that are well known for
large theater departments.
“Here (at A&M) we’re learning,”
he says. “We’re learning because
we’re a very new theater depart
ment. I envision a theater that in
cludes the experience of all people.
One of the main thrusts here is to
provide an opportunity to recruit
blacks and Hispanics — to recruit
them for this department.
“I have always wanted to see, as
far back as college, a more true
American theater. That is, a theater
that speaks to all the people who in
habit this country — all races, colors
creeds.”
Dr. Roger Schultz, director of
A&M’s theater arts department, says
Gordone was hired as part of the de
partment’s efforts to recruit more
minority students.
“Theater ultimately must be a re
flection of today’s society and a
strictly ‘vanilla’ program does not do
that,” Schultz explains.
Schultz says he and Gordone have
been recruiting high school students
in Dallas, Austin and Houston
among other cities in Texas. The
most comrrion problem he noticed
with minority recruitment is that the
students feel they cannot meet
A&M’s requirements.
“I hear prospective students say
ing, ‘We’d like to go to A&M, but
we’d have to go to Prarie View
(A&M) anyway, so why bother?’ and
I don’t know why they’re still think
ing that,” he says. “We have faculty
and students who are concerned and
who are capable of changing that at
titude.”
Shultz enjoys working with the
well-known actor-writer-director, he
says. He praises Gordone for his
contributions to the department and
spoke highly of his personal charac
ter.
“He’s a man of tremendous vis
ion,” he says. “He can’t help but
make us understand where we’re
going individually and collectively as
a group.”
Schultz says the theater depart
ment is now about 20 percent black
and Hispanic. He estimated the de
partment’s total student enrollment
to be near 5p.
Connie Freeman, a sophomore
business major who met Gordone
and asked if she could enroll in his
Techniques of Acting course, says
she plans to change her major and
pursue a degree in theater arts. 1
“Going from business to theater
— most people think it’s crazy,”
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TEXAS CiUN EXCHANGE
■ ■mump muw mm&iskun
Freeman says. “I feel good about it,
though.”
Freeman says that Gordone is the
main reason behind her decision to
make the move into the theater de
partment.
“I think that he probably has the
best sense of what the (acting) pro
fession entails,” she says. “He tea
ches us that acting is not just mem
orizing lines, but living the
character’s life. He encourages feel
ing the character’s emotions by
doing background research or rely
ing on our own personal experiences
that may relate to those of the cha
racter.”
In addition to his daily classroom
schedule, Gordone is preparing for
a role in “King Lear.”
He will appear in the Aggie Play
ers’ production that opens Friday
night in Rudder Theater.
Meanwhile, he says he is waiting
to hear from executives at CBS Tele
vision about a pilot he wrote for a
potential network prime-time series.
Gordone says that television is
something he would like to be in
volved with in the future.
“It’s inevitable,” he says. “I haven’t
done that much television as an actor
because I am mostly a theater per
son. My moving into motion pictures
and television is yet to come, and I
don’t see that so much as an actor. I
see that pretty much as either a
writer or a director.”
He says his script has moved
through several areas of the net
work.
“There is nothing official on the
series yet because it’s all been sent
upstairs (to CBS executives),” he
says. “The pilot has been written, but
I’m waiting to see what the status of
it is right now.”
Gordone says a television script is
edited and revised several times be
fore final consideration is con
firmed.
“It’s been a month since I put in
the last draft,” he says. “Now that
script — by the time I get it, I don’t
know what it’ll look like.”
Since his arrival at A&M, he has
been checking in periodically with
network officials.
“I’ve been going back and forth to
..Hollywood since I’ve been here,” he
says. “I’m still waiting.”
Gordone says the producers of
the program, MGM-United Artists,
are pleased with the script about a
black family in Harlem.
“They’re very happy with it,” he
See Theater, page 4
Professional actors
work with students
in ‘King Lear’ play
By Beth Ross
Reporter
The Aggie Players’ “King
Lear” is an experiment that
brings the professional actor and
the student actor together, direc
tor Faynia Williams says.
The award-winning British di
rector is one of three visiting pro
fessionals at Texas A&M involved
in “King Lear,” which will run
Friday, Saturday and March 3, 4
and 5.
Jeffrey Dench, a 22-year vet
eran of the Royal Shakespeare
Company, plays King Lear and
Charles Gordone, a distinguished
visiting professor at A&M, an
American actor and Pulitzer-
Prize winner, plays the Earl of
Gloucester.
Williams, six-time winner of
the Edinburgh Theatre Festival
Award, brings a British approach
to “King Lear.”
An American actor often ex
amines internal motives in devel
oping a character, says Michael
Greenwald, the assistant director
and voice coach for “King Lear.”
A British actor concentrates on a
character’s external influences.
American directors emphasize
the blocking of a scene —where
an actor stands or moves on stage
— but British directors focus on
less-structured blocking, he says.
Williams interprets the Shake
spearean tragedy in a fresh way.
She says it is essential for the out
come of the play to be unex
pected. She wants the actors to
stretch their characters and make
them more believable.
Dench says, “Faynia has made
me see Lear differently. It’s not
the tragedy of King Lear — only
the play of King Lear.”
Jeff Carroll, a doctoral candi
date in history, says Williams, like
Shakespeare, works with the re
sources she has to sculpt the play.
Williams gives actors more con
trol over their characters.
Jonathan Burke, a freshman
theater arts major, says Williams
wants, her actoifs to use their in
stincts and discover for them
selves how a character should be
developed.
Dench says, “The only shared
experience is the play we’re
doing. So we’re all learning from
each other.”
Steve McCauley, a junior the
ater arts major, says Dench and
Gordone have two viewpoints of
acting. Dench constantly looks for
a new way to deliver a line or a
new way to use the language.
Dench says the Royal Shake
speare Company’s director, Peter
Hall, and its master acting tea
cher and voice coach, John Bar
ton, taught him the psychological
depth behind Shakespeare and
the verse techniques he uses in
the role of Lear.
Troy Herbort, a senior theater
arts major, says when Dench sees
another actor struggling with the
poetic meter, he counts out the
iambic pentameter to help him
deliver the line properly.
Herbort says Dench has taught
him that theater is hard work, but
it is important to relax and have
fun.
Gordone, who won the Pulitzer
Prize for his first play, “No Place
to Be Somebody,” considers him
self a “consummate theater per
son” who writes, acts and directs
— but his first love is acting. Un
like Dench, Gordone is a method
actor who bases his character on
himself and his environment.
Burke says the actors have
learned to search for what feels
right in acting out a character.
“King Lear”' has brought pro
fessionals and students together
as actors in a learning experience,
Williams says.
Dench says, “I don’t feel that
they’re students. They’re fellow
actors. It’s a company.”
Correction
A cutline in Friday’s issue of
The Battalion incorrectly identi
fied two local authors who were
displaying their books at a Bryan
restaurant.
The man identified in the cut
line as George Gaentnen should
have been identified as Walter
Buenger, a Texas A&M associate
professor of history, and the man
identified as Sam Coinen should
have been identified as Sam
Cotner, a horticulture sciences
project supervisor for the Texas
Agricultural Extention Service.
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