Something sold, something flew, something Bergman and… a lot of things they haven’t told us about yet. The Yale Cabaret has changed hands as it does every Autumn. The new team has announced the first three shows of the ten or so they have planned for this semester.
Sept. 15-17: Slaves, a musical performance featuring three actors, “each of which is a slave to the other… put to work in the theater, for us…” The two female performers, Adina Verson and Jillian Taylor, both did exceptional work in the Yale Summer Cabaret Shakespeare Festival season that just ended—Verson as Ariel in the Tempest and Rosalind in As You Like It, Taylor in the title role of the history-play conglomeration Rose-Mark’d Queen. Their Slaves castmate Chris Henry distinguished himself in the ensemble cast of Romeo & Juliet at the Yale Rep last season. All three were in the original musical Jib at the Yale School of Drama last winter. Slaves’ script and music are by Yale dramaturgy student Sunder Gangliani, with “additional text” by Paul Celan and Ariana Reines” and “additional music” by Ben Sharony.
Sept. 22-24: HUNDREDYEARSPACETRIP. Another original, form-bending piece, this one devised for players who create “an uncompromising piece of entertainment that investigates the connections between human ambition in art, in science and in family.” Co-creators Kate Attwell (like Slaves’ Sunder Gangliani, a YSD dramaturgy student) and Nina Segal work under the collective title We Buy Gold, joined by Brenda Meaney (Caliban in the Summer Cabaret’s Tempest, various Dukes in As You Like It) and Ryan Davis.
Following the century-long rocket voyage, there’s a weekend off. Then…
Oct. 6-8: Persona, a fresh adaptation of the Ingmar Bergman film by Alexandru Mihail. Mihail was responsible for the extraordinary environmental/interactive Cabaret production of Chekhov’s The Wedding last spring, and is slated slated to direct Chekhov’s The Seagull as his thesis project at the Yale School of Drama next semester. Bergman’s Autumn Sonata, of course, was given a lavish stage reinterpretation at the end of the Yale Rep’s 2010-11 season by Robert Woodruff. Mihail was the Assistant Director for the new musica that opened that same Rep season, We Have Always Lived in the Castle.Persona, an extremely intimate, personality-morphing drama about a disabled actress and her caretaker, stars Laura Gragtmans, Monique Barbee, Lucas Dixon and Emily Reilly.
This is the 44th season of the Yale Cabaret, which began (in the same underground space where it still is now) during the Robert Brustein years of the School of Drama. Shows get five public performances Thursday at 8 p.m. and Friday & Saturday at 8 & 11 p.m. (plus a late Thursday one for classmates only). Food and drinks are served before shows. Details here.