Kōbō Abe’s rarely-produced 1957 play, The Ghost is Here, examines the impact of war upon a culture and a nation. Set in the ruins of post-World War II Japan, at a moment in history when the nation was forced to redefine itself, the play uses original music, stylized song and dance, and a multicultural cast to bring Abe’s story to life. As Japan’s people reinvent themselves in the midst of monumental challenges, The Ghost is Here echoes throughout modern day America.

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As a kid, I wanted to be a detective when I grew up. I carried around a PI kit that my parents got me for Christmas one year everywhere I went. I also grew up idolizing Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall—to me, they were the perfect couple. I didn’t know anything about their off-screen lives. In black and white, and even down through the decades, when they shared a screen it was electrifying to watch. There’s a scene in The Big Sleep where Philip Marlowe (Bogart) follows the beautiful femme fatale Vivian Sternwood (Bacall) to an illegal gambling club. Their confrontation goes as follows:

Vivian: Speaking of horses, I like to play them myself. But I like to see them work out a little first, see if they’re front runners or come from behind, find out what their whole card is, what makes them run.
Marlowe: Find out mine?
Vivian: I think so.
Marlowe: Go ahead.
Vivian: I’d say you don’t like to be rated. You like to get out in front, open up a little lead, take a little breather in the backstretch, and then come home free.
Marlowe: You don’t like to be rated yourself.
Vivian: I haven’t met anyone yet that can do it. Any suggestions?
Marlowe: Well, I can’t tell till I’ve seen you over a distance of ground. You’ve got a touch of class, but I don’t know how, how far you can go.
Vivian: A lot depends on who’s in the saddle.

Eventually I learned you could be something even more outlandish than a detective when you grew up—a playwright. But I never quite lost my taste for those seedy stories of fallen women and tough-talking shamuses, so when I was talking to Katy and Michael of Vintage Theater Collective last year about possible collaborations—and particularly possible adaptations for a female-centric show, we landed on Lysistrata.

Any modern adaptation of Lysistrata must solve the question of what is the war that’s ravaging the men of this world—and how those men can be tantalized by their wives and children. For that reason Iraq or Afghanistan seemed out, although in 2003 the Lysistrata Project organized hundreds of readings of Lysistrata internationally was intended to raise consciousness about the war in Iraq and advocate for peace. For me, though, the war needed to be brought closer to home—to the type of war that’s fought in our city streets. Chicago in the 1920s and 30s was known for its epidemic of gangland violence, particularly in the Beers Wars during Prohibition. From there an entire cast of underworld characters began to form in my mind—a femme fatale Lysistrata character, and her army of dames hardened by life on the wrong side of the law.

I wondered if there could be a marriage between the audacious, shockingly exciting sexuality of Aristophanes’ comedy with the smoldering, barely repressed sexual tension of noir. And then we had an even crazier idea—I dreamed of being Philip Marlowe when I grew up—why couldn’t there be a woman not only as the object of the mystery but solving it too. In noir, nothing and nobody are what they seem. In Lion on the Cheesegrater, this is taken to another level. Both of the protagonists are women, but all of the other characters are played by women too, and the male characters are played in drag. It turns the Greek all-male performances of Lysistrata on its head, in a really exhilarating way that makes both Aristophanes’ story and the hardboiled mystery feel contemporary and immediate.

A lot depends on who’s in the saddle. Sarah Cameron Sunde, who’s directing this workshop, got the eight members of the acting ensemble—as well as the rest of the creative team—up on our feet and playing around from the moment we walked in the door for our first rehearsal last night. We’re off to the races and looking forward to a wild ride.

The ladies of the cast…

and the gentlemen…

Hank Hilbert as Muratake                    John B. Leen as The Mayor & Citizen A
                   
            Miguel Nunez as Hakoyama                      Scott Shimizu as The Man
                                   
Dwight Sora as Torii & The Announcer        Jamie Vann as Oba
                   

The production team…(instead of pretty faces, we have trivia to share about them)
• Craig Choma - Scenic Designer - Craig is an Associate Professor of Theatre at Knox College.
• Ethan Deppe - Music Director - Ethan is the Musical Coordinator for the currently running production of Million Dollar Quartet at the Apollo Theatre.
• Kathleen Dickinson - Stage Manager - This is Kathleen‘s 10th production in Chicago and this summer she’ll be working with The Right Brain Project.
• Helen H. Drysdale - Director of Marketing & Public Relations - Helen also serves as the Marketing Coordinator for Chicago Shakespeare Theater on Navy Pier!
• Lee Fiskness - Lighting Designer - You can view Lee’s online design portfolio here!
• Abigail Harms - Marketing & PR Associate & House Manager - Originally from Kansas, Abigail has worked on several productions in Chicago with Goat Song Theatre.
• Jaclynn Jutting - Director & Associate Artistic Director - Last year, Jaclynn directed Animals Out of Paper in the Steppenwolf’s Next Up series.
• Eli King - Assistant Technical Director - In fall 2011, Eli was the TD for The Strange Tree Group’s production of The Spirit Play at DCA Storefront Theater.
• Adam McDowell - Assistant Director - Last year, Adam served as Assistant Director on another U.S. premiere with Vitalist - the Jeff-Recommended production of Willamstown Theatre Festival in Massachusetts.
• Robin Metz - Co-Founder & Executive Producer - You can listen to Robin reading his poetry online here.
• Gregor Mortis - Sound Designer - In 1991, Gregor performed in Achilles: A Kabuki Play, directed by Shozo Sato, which toured Japan and was the first time in Japan’s history where a group of Americans performed in the Kabuki theaters.
• Samantha Newport - Strike Manager & Set Crew - Samantha has a wide range of stage craft skills including scenic art, electrics, and welding!
• Kevin O’Donnell - Composer - You can listen to more of Kevin’s music online here!
• Liz Picurro - Properties Mistress - Liz currently serves as the Production Manager for Knox College Studio Theatre.
• Kat Reiser - Assistant Stage Manager - Kat recently worked on The Trestle at Pope Lick Creek produced by Eclipse Theatre.
• J. Keegan Siebken - Webmaster - You might run into J. Keegan at Morgan Street Cafe where he works as a barista!
• Michael C. Smith - Master Electrician - Michael is the resident lighting designer for Brain Surgeon Theater
• Rachel M. Sypniewski - Costume Designer - Return to DCA Storefront Theater in April & May to see her costumes in The Improv Play by InFusion Theatre Company.

10 cast members + 19 production team members = 29 people

When you add the DCA Theater team, nearly 50 people are involved in bringing you this production!

Artistic Director of Prologue Theatre Company, Margo Gray, welcomes everyone and introduces her company and the play.

For a month, Prologue has been working hard in the DCA Studio Theater and giving us windows into their process via our blog. Then, in last night’s public staged reading, they shared this piece with the world… and got the chance to talk with the audience to hear their reactions afterward.

Playwright Georgette Kelly and Director Margo Gray review their notes on questions they’ve prepared that they would like to ask the audience.

In case you missed it, here were some of the audience reactions mentioned during the post-show Q&A with the audience.  We loved how involved the audience became, turning the evening into a discussion instead of just a feedback session.

What feeling were you left with at the end of the play? - “Optimism.” “Hope.” “Closure.” “Connection.”
What was the most important thing about the play? - “Memory.” “Grief.” “Conflict between mother and daughter.”
How would you describe this play to a friend? - “Moving.” “The Crash of organ donation.” “Twisty.” “Human face behind checking the box (for organ donation).”
What do you think the play was about? - “How do you really know somebody.” “Beauty of having no control over who receives your organs.” “Who & how you love and how it affects/changes your life.” “Personal connections.”

As the story centered on organ donation, Prologue wanted to remind everyone to take a look at Illinois’ organ donation registry, Gift of Hope. They encouraged you to learn more about organ donation and consider becoming a donor.

With Director Margo Gray hailing from Iowa, playwright Georgette Kelly from New York, actor Jovan King from Ohio, actor Johanna Middleton from LA, this cast represented a nation of expertise in one room, in Chicago, for one great night of theatre. You can read all about the cast and crew of last night’s piece
For DCA Theater, it was a also a night filled with familiar faces. Playwright Georgette Kelly’s adaptation of Jeanette Winterson’s novel Lighthousekeeping was produced by New Leaf Theatre company in DCA Storefront Theater in June/July of 2011. The audience also included several members from the Lighthousekeeping cast and crew. The Artistic Director of Halcyon Theatre, Tony Adams, was also present. Halcyon participated in the DCA Incubator Series in September 2011. Prologue’s Production Manager, Carrie Hardin, was also in attendance. Carrie appeared on the DCA Storefront Theater stage in November/December 2011 in Polarity Ensemble Theatre’s production of Peer Gynt. If you were there Monday night, let us know in the Comments below!

We wish Prologue well with this piece and hope it will get a full production eventually - to continue DCA Theater Incubator Series’ unbroken streak of developed works going on to receive a full production in Chicago. No pressure!

In the meantime, be sure to catch Prologue’s upcoming Landmark Festival 2012 in March! And mark your calendars now to return to DCA Studio Theater to see the next Incubator Showcase by Vintage Theater Collective, Lion on the Cheesgrater - February 27th!

Art can provide a way to think through an idea that one isn’t ready to consciously process. In I Carry Your Heart, a character who is a poet says, “When I have stuff to process, I write.” As we’ve rehearsed the show, we’ve used poetry to share ideas about the “stuff” in the script that might be difficult to talk about. Loss and loneliness are felt by each character in I Carry Your Heart. Here are excerpts from some poems that have helped us explore the roads these characters travel:

Long Distance II
by Tony Harrison

Though my mother was already two years dead
Dad kept her slippers warming by the gas.

What Came to Me
by Jane Kenyon

I took the last
dusty piece of china
out of the barrel.

Director Margo Gray pages through the script during rehearsal. (photo by Paul Chakrin)

How It Will Happen, When
by Dorianne Laux

There you are, exhausted from a night of crying, curled up on the couch,
the floor, at the foot of the bed, anywhere you fall you fall down crying,
half amazed at what the body is capable of, not believing you can cry
anymore.

I am Not I
by Juan Ramon Jimenez

I am not I.
            I am this one
walking beside me whom I do not see.

One Art
by Elizabeth Bishop

The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lydia (Johanna Middleton), Josh (Conor Burke) and Tess (Lara Janson) make the most of an awkward family dinner while Debra (Pat Christenson) looks on. (photo by Paul Chakrin)

If I keep talking about poetry, you know it’s because it’s shaped the making of I Carry Your Heart. The poems we read to start rehearsal each day are not random, but are chosen to start all of us thinking about the themes of the play, the ideas we’ll be working on that day, and the world in which the characters live. Here are excerpts from some of the poems I’ve chosen for us to hear. If you had to guess, from reading these, what would you say I Carry Your Heart is about?

How It Adds Up
by Tony Hoagland

Happiness, Joe says, is a wild red flower
                plucked from a river of lava
and held aloft on a tightrope
              strung between two scrawny trees
above a canyon
            in a manic-depressive windstorm.

After Making Love
by Stephen Dunn

No one should ask the other
“What were you thinking?”

Torch Song For You
by Daphne Gottlieb

Since you’ve gone, all I can do is sit at home and sing the great
love songs.
I don’t want to set the world on fire.

For the Sleepwalkers
by Edward Hirsch

Tonight I want to say something wonderful
for the sleepwalkers who have so much faith
in their legs, so much faith in the invisible

Wild Geese
by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

The script of I Carry Your Heart lies open at rehearsal.(photo by Paul Chakrin)

Do you know any poems by heart? I knew a few when I was younger, and memorized some for school over the years, but there are few I could recite in their entirety. However, as we have characters in I Carry Your Heart who read and recite poetry, I’ve been reminded of how powerful words can feel when they have a rhythm to them that you can feel: something that goes beyond the literal meaning. An excerpt from one of recent poems of the day (we read one at the beginning of each rehearsal), articulates very well the joy that poetry can bring:

Prof of Profs
by Geoffrey Block

The prof, with the air of a priest at Latin mass,
told us that we could “make great poetry personal,”
could own it, since poetry we memorize sings
inside us always.

Tess (Lara Janson) struggles with her physical limitations while her son Josh (Conor Burke) and partner (Johanna Middleton) try to help. (photo by Paul Chakrin).

The playwright of I Carry Your Heart, Georgette Kelly, splits her time between New York and Chicago. She’s been attending most rehearsals via Skype, which means we’re all used to having Georgette present in electronic form. I think some of us were beginning to believe she was a tiny person who lived inside my iPad. However, she braved the snow to fly to Chicago last weekend, and we had the joy of having her attend rehearsal in person. As the actors walked in one by one, they each exclaimed, “Georgette!” and gave her a hug. Thanks to Skype, we were able to start rehearsals together as old friends. We look forward to having her back with us for the performance on January 30th.

PHOTO: Georgette Kelly watches Lara Janson, Johanna Middleton, and Conor Burke rehearse a scene from I Carry Your Heart (photo by Paul Chakrin).

This black & white film was originally released in 1962 and we presented it in Japanese with English subtitles. It covered a variety of themes including identity, labor conditions, unions, corruption, greed, and the uncertainty of the future. Referred to as a “documentary fantasy,” the film centers on miners and included some documentary footage of worker conditions in then, present-day Japan. Involving dead men who walk & talk again, a mysterious man in a white suit, a candy store owner, and a poker-faced little boy, the film travels down a path of traps and leaves the characters and audience alike mulling over major existential questions.

After the film, several panelists helped the audience digest the film with insight about the historical context, Abe’s other work and film collaborations, and Japanese language and literature. J.R. Jones, Film Editor for the Chicago Reader, who shared his reactions to the film and mentioned the other films on which this director (Hiroshi Teshigahara), writer (Kōbō Abe), and music director (Toru Takemitsu) collaborated.
Historian Michael Schneider offered 4 main insights regarding the historical context for the film. Japanese Studies scholar Mat Matsuda described the similarities between the film and Noh theater. Orna Shaughnessy detailed notable elements of Abe’s work and the language in the film. The discussion was moderated by Vitalist Theatre Co-Founder, Robin Metz.

If you liked last night’s film (or missed it), you might check it out or the other films by the trio of Abe, Teshigahara, and Takemitsu including: Woman in the Dunes (1964), The Face of Another (1966), and Man Without a Map (1968).

As part of its mission, DCA Theater creates and presents free events to accompany each of their productions, as a way to expand the reach of the programming and enrich the patron experience and entice additional audiences

Keep checking DCATheater.org for details on upcoming events and follow us on Facebook, facebook.com/dcatheater.

Be sure to catch The Ghost is Here at DCA Storefront Theater before it disappears into thin air!

The power and beauty of language figures prominently in I Carry Your Heart. Characters struggle with finding the right words to express their ideas, and several characters find comfort in writing. One of the characters, Phoebe Wilder, is a poet. To help us transition from the rush of the day into the proper mindset, we begin each rehearsal by reading a poem.

Of course, we had to start with e.e. cumming’s i carry your heart, from which the title of our play comes, but after that, we started in on poems that spoke to some of the play’s themes. I’ve been keeping a running list. Here are the poems we’ve read so far, along with short excerpts from each.

A Poet’s Poem by Brenda Shaughnessy
If it takes me all day,
I will get the word freshened out of this poem.

Relax by Ellen Bass
Bad things are going to happen.
Your tomatoes will grow a fungus
and your cat will get run over.

Pocket Poem by Ted Kooser
Midnight says
the little gifts of loneliness come wrapped
by nervous fingers.

Decorum by Stephen Dunn
There was silence. The class turned
to me, their teacher, who they hoped
could clarify, perhaps ease things.

First Fig by Edna St. Vincent Millay
My candle burns at both ends
It will not last the night.

Post-Publication Blues by Ron Padgett
My first book of poems
has just been published.
It is over there on the table
lying there on the table, where
it is lying.

If these sound intriguing, I recommend looking them up. They’re all excellent reads. Do you have any favorite poems that remind you of plays you’ve worked on?

Remember to catch Prologue Theatre Company’s Incubator Showcase of I Carry Your Heart on Monday, January 30th at 7:30pm!