{"id":426,"date":"2015-02-05T19:09:33","date_gmt":"2015-02-05T19:09:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/?p=426"},"modified":"2015-02-05T19:09:33","modified_gmt":"2015-02-05T19:09:33","slug":"theatre-and-dance-brings-pinocchio-to-the-stage-in-brilliantly-updated-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/2015\/02\/05\/theatre-and-dance-brings-pinocchio-to-the-stage-in-brilliantly-updated-way\/","title":{"rendered":"Theatre and Dance Brings Pinocchio to the Stage in Brilliantly Updated Way"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Pinocchio<\/a><\/p>\n

VALDOSTA \u2014 Valdosta State University Theatre and Dance will help children learn the importance of honesty, love, friendship, hard work, taking responsibility, and other values when it presents \u201cPinocchio Commedia,\u201d the 2014-2015 season\u2019s Theatre for Young Audiences touring production.<\/p>\n

Performances are scheduled for the general public at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 6, and 10:30 a.m. on Saturday, Feb. 7, in Sawyer Theatre on the first floor of the Fine Arts Building. Tickets cost $15 for adults, $12 for senior citizens, $10 for children and non-VSU students, and $9 for groups of 10 or more at a single performance, plus tax and a nominal processing fee; they are free for all VSU students with a valid university identification card.<\/p>\n

Tickets may be reserved by calling the VSU Theatre and Dance Box Office at (229) 333-5973 between the hours of 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday. Cash and check payments only will be accepted this season; there will be no online sales or credit card transactions until further notice.<\/p>\n

\u201cPinocchio Commedia\u201d is Johnny Simon\u2019s commedia dell\u2019arte adaptation of Carlo Collodi\u2019s classic children\u2019s novel, The Adventures of Pinocchio<\/em>, published in 1883. It is a fresh take on an old favorite, and children of all ages are sure to be captivated and entertained as they watch Pinocchio emerge from a seemingly ordinary block of wood and encounter mischief, magic, and mayhem \u2014\u00a0like getting turned into a donkey and watching his nose grow every time he tells a lie \u2014 on his journey to becoming a real boy.<\/p>\n

\u201cPinocchio\u2019s adventures, made famous by the 1940 movie by Walt Disney, were wild and fantastical with broad characters and unbelievable circumstances,\u201d said Michael Hegarty, director and temporary assistant professor of theatre at VSU. \u201cCommedia is a form of physical theatre that requires an audience\u2019s willing suspension of disbelief. This is not highbrow comedy. Thinking is not required \u2014 only your attention and enjoyment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following the weekend\u2019s on-campus performances, VSU Theatre and Dance will kick off its Theatre for Young Audiences area tour, which typically includes 15 to 20 performances at schools, art centers, and so on throughout South Georgia and North Florida. The first stop on this year\u2019s tour is Cook County High School\u2019s Performing Arts Center on Wednesday, Feb. 11. The tour will end on Friday, March 20, in Crisp County.<\/p>\n

The goal of the university\u2019s annual Theatre for Young Audiences production, shared Jacque Wheeler, head of the Theatre and Dance Area and professor of theatre, is to expose children in the rural South to live theatrical performances. The touring productions are also an opportunity for VSU to share with the children the importance of post-secondary education.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe students are excited and engaged by the performances,\u201d she continued. \u201cWe provide educational materials for pre- and post-performance activities. Many, many places ask us to return, which speaks to the popularity and educational value of the performances.\u201d<\/p>\n

Theatre for Young Audiences productions are primarily geared toward elementary school boys and girls, in kindergarten through the fifth grade.<\/p>\n

VSU has a long tradition of serving the kids of South Georgia and North Florida by bringing live theatrical events to them. The College of the Arts has offered Theatre for Young Audiences productions for over 30 years, Wheeler noted.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe intend to continue the long history of presenting plays for young audiences,\u201d she said. \u201cIt is a service to our region and part of our commitment to outreach activities in our community. It also assists in the academic preparation of our Bachelor of Fine Arts students by offering another unique performance opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

VSU\u2019s Fine Arts Building is located at the intersection of Oak Street and Brookwood Drive.<\/p>\n

Contact Jacque Wheeler at (229) 333-5829 or jwheeler@valdosta.edu<\/span><\/a> to learn more Theatre for Youth performances.<\/p>\n

Contact Michael Hegarty at (229) 219-1358 or mjhegarty@valdosta.edu<\/span><\/a> to learn more about the touring production.<\/p>\n

On the Web:<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.valdosta.edu\/colleges\/arts\/communication-arts\/theatre-and-dance\/<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

Visit https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/vstatenews?ref=hl<\/span><\/a> to view more promotional photos and a list of the production\u2019s cast and crew.<\/p>\n

Director Michael Hegarty\u2019s Notes on Commedia Dell\u2019Arte<\/strong><\/p>\n

Commedia dell\u2019arte, which is <\/em>Italian for \u201cplay of the professional artists,\u201d is a popular form of theatre that originated during the Italian Renaissance. <\/em><\/p>\n

Commedia companies typically consisted of 10 members \u2014 seven men and three women \u2014who would travel the countryside performing for the masses. Though there were times when they staged serious works, they usually staged comedies, and as a result, commedia dell\u2019arte has come to be associated primarily with comedy. <\/em><\/p>\n

Commedia flourished in Italy from 1550 to 1750, not as a written form but an improvised one. Members of a company would write short scripts without dialogue, scenarios, which served as an outline of a plot, and then all the lines were improvised on the spot. The conventions of commedia made the actor\u2019s job a bit easier than it might seem. For one thing, no matter what the scenario was, actors always played the same stock characters. They would base their entire careers on perfecting a single stock character. The characters performing \u201cPinocchio Commedia\u201d are based on stock characters more than 450 years old. <\/em><\/p>\n

The popularity of commedia dell\u2019arte eventually extended outside of Italy into France, Spain, and England. The historical significance of commedia can be seen in its influence on later theatre. The stock characters, which seem to have grown out of Roman comedy and medieval farce, were further refined by later playwrights like Moli\u00e8re. The comic servant Pulcinella evolved into Punch in the English \u201cPunch and Judy\u201d puppet shows, which appeared in the 18th century and are still performed today. Comparisons can also be made to classic comedy film actors like Charlie Chaplin, Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello, and The Three Stooges. The Marx Brothers used many techniques reminiscent of commedia as well. <\/em><\/p>\n

Johnny Simon\u2019s idea of adapting Carlo Collodi\u2019s classic 1883 children\u2019s book The Adventures of Pinocchio into a commedia-style play makes perfect sense on so many levels \u2014 not just because it is an Italian story, and not just because it features Arlecchino and Pulcinella, two classic commedia stock characters. <\/em>Pinocchio\u2019s adventures, made famous by the 1940 movie by Walt Disney, were wild and fantastical with broad characters and unbelievable circumstances. Commedia is a form of physical theatre that requires an audience\u2019s willing suspension of disbelief. This is not highbrow comedy. Thinking is not required \u2014 only your attention and enjoyment.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em>Jessica R. Pope<\/p>\n

Communications Specialist<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

VALDOSTA \u2014 Valdosta State University Theatre and Dance will help children learn the importance of honesty, love, friendship, hard work, taking responsibility, and other values when it presents \u201cPinocchio Commedia,\u201d the 2014-2015 season\u2019s Theatre for Young Audiences touring production. Performances are scheduled for the general public at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 6, and 10:30…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":184,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-communication-arts","category-theatre-dance-communication-arts"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/184"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=426"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":428,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426\/revisions\/428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.valdosta.edu\/coa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}