Westport Community Theatre's ETC Presents Staged Reading of Collected Stories
By: Gabrielle Sierra Dec. 17, 2010
Westport Community Theatre's staged-readings series, ETC (Experimental Theatre Company), presents Donald Margulies' Collected Stories Friday, December 17, at 8:00 PM. Directed by R.A. Baumgartner. With Jessica Denes and Mary Jane Schaefer.
Teachers dream of nurturing students who will one day go beyond them, become greater than they--at least, that's what teachers claim they dream of. But sometimes such success is more bitter than sweet. Such a relationship between teacher and prize student is the subject of Donald Margulies' Collected Stories, to be performed as a staged reading in Westport Community Theatre's ETC staged-readings series on December 17 at 8:00 PMFollowing the shifting relationship between a prominent fiction writer and one of her graduate students over the course of six years, Collected Stories is a study of two strong characters, as the protégée becomes the rival. The two characters are not only teacher and student; they are also idol and fan. In both these kinds of relationships, the one cannot exist without the other.But the interdependency can change the dynamics of the relationship, and the play uses its six scenes as a kind of time-exposure picture of that process. The dialogue is witty, incisive, eloquent, moving, as well befits two individuals who create fiction from real emotions and the magic of language. Set in the writer's apartment in Greenwich Village, the play explores the nature of fiction, its relation to life, the morality of art and artists, and the costs of honesty and trust. It is a script rich in ideas and moods, engrossing and lively.Videos