Curio Theatre Company Continues Season with THE BALD SOPRANO Tonight

By: Dec. 02, 2015
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Curio Theatre Company continues its 11th Season with an updated take on Eugene Ionesco's, The Bald Soprano. This adaptation is by Tina Howe. Charlotte Northeast directs. This absurdist classic runs tonight, December 2, through December 19. Opening night is Friday, December 4 at 8 p.m. Curio shows typically run on a Thursday, Friday, Saturday at 8 p.m. schedule. The first preview is on a Wednesday. Tickets cost $15-$25 per person. Tickets and more information are available online at www.curiotheartre.org.

Ionesco wrote that he didn't intend to parody anything, but if he did, he would parody everything. The Bald Soprano takes audiences to an evening with the Smiths and the Martins where conversations go from normal to nonsense. This classic hilarious play is about the absurdity of manners and small talk.

Ionesco wrote this play as a way of commenting on the absurdity of language -- all the 'noise' and small talk we make in our daily lives, thinking it's important or relevant. Director Charlotte Northeast set out to modernize the play. She didn't think just doing the Bald Soprano as set (in 1950's England) completely provided a modern audience with an entry point, so she decided to add a layer of humankind's latest and arguably greatest modern communication tool - the internet. She said, "Every day we are trapped in the web (pardon the pun) and we argue, sell, cajole, entertain and most of all, cross our wires on the internet. This show has pieces of that layered in to illustrate that whether we are speaking in the 1950's or today, we haven't mastered this whole talking and REALLY communicating thing."

The cast includes Rachel Gluck as Mrs. Smith and CJ Keller as Mr. Smith. Ken Opdenaker plays Mr. Martin and Maria Konstantinidis plays Mrs. Martin. Aetna Gallagher is Mary, the maid and Brandon Pierce is The Fire Captain.

Charlotte Northeast directs. Curio Theatre Company Artistic Director Paul Kuhn is the Set Designer. Aetna Gallagher is the Costume Designer. Steve Carpenter is the Lighting Designer. Chris Sannino designed the sound and projections.

"We have discovered an absurd logic to the piece -- even when you are saying the strangest things, as long as you wish to be heard, the sense can be found. Put another way, 'sense' isn't always what you hear or say but how and why you are saying it," said Northeast. "(Audiences) should know that we have approached this much as we would a devised piece, -- this is a new world and we've created our own rules for it. Some of the rules will make sense, others will not. The important thing is to listen, observe, and have an open mind for all the absurd truth."


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