Playing it up in Carmie

Carmichael Hall might be better known for its fine dining than its fine drama, but this weekend, the Bare Bodkin Theater Company will transform its inner sanctuary from a residential lounge to a theater hall.

The organization's spring show, which consists of three student-produced one act plays -- "A Light So Dim," "Boise, Idaho," and "Pic Nic" -- premieres tonight at 8 p.m. in the Carmichael lounge, and will be performed again on Saturday at 6:30 p.m. and 9 p.m.

The one acts being performed don't necessarily have a lot in common, aside from a consistent theme of dark comedy. Though all three deal with questions about reality and the manipulation of perception, they range in subject manner and genre, making for a wide-ranging night that Bare Bodkin members hope will contain something for everyone.

"A Light So Dim" was written and directed by Tufts freshman Brendan Shea. It creates what the playwright calls "a portrait of the human condition" through a series of short vignettes, which function as abstract games of paper-rock-scissors as two characters at a time interact with each other and one inevitably trumps the other.

Shea adapted a short story into a production at his high school, but "A Light So Dim" represents the first time he's produced his own original work. He wrote the script in two nights over this past winter break.

"Bare Bodkin is really cool, very involved, and encourages student-directed and student-written theater," Shea said. "I got in contact with them and asked if they were going to accept any proposals, and they asked me to send in the script and they accepted it."

The second play, "Boise, Idaho," is an exercise in surreal storytelling. Directed by sophomore Gabriela Jirasek, it relates the story of a couple in a French caf‚ who embark on a passionate love affair when another character begins narrating their story. The production plays with the concept of storytelling as the audience is left to watch what happens

"Pic Nic" was originally written by Spanish playwright Fernando Alba, but it was adapted for the Bare Bodkin production by director Benjamin Gomberg. The play involves a picnic that takes place on a battlefield, and Gomberg hopes that his production will leave viewers questioning what they saw.

"I expect the audience to walk away with a sense of discomfort," Gomberg said. "The play is intended to lull the audience into a false sense of security and then destroy that."

Gomberg, an International Letters and Visual Studies major, is using the play as his senior thesis. He translated the original script from Spanish, is currently directing the staged version, and will write an analysis of the playwright and his contribution to Spanish theater.

One of the challenges in "Pic Nic" was determining a way to produce the play in such a manner that it would remain as wide-ranging as possible. "[The script] is something that could be very specific or very general," Gomberg said. "The play has a lot of references to war as a very general cause, so I tried to get the play to apply to a very general audience, including people who don't know a lot about historical references. I think it was a challenge to get it to be widely accepted."

Bare Bodkin decided early on to put on a night of three short one-act plays instead of one major spring production and issued an open call for scripts earlier this semester. Five were submitted, including one other student-written play, and the membership of the organization voted to select the three that are currently being performed.

Auditions for the various plays were held at the end of January. The casts and crews then had five weeks during February and March to pull the productions together, and their efforts will culminate in the final performances this weekend.

"We've been rehearsing in whatever space we could find and luckily now we have the Carmichael lounge," Shea said. "We've been working pretty hard on each of the plays, and I hope [the show] is a success."

In the future, members Bare Bodkin wants to focus more on student-written plays in an effort to give undergraduates an opportunity to put on their own productions. They are currently working on organizing a series of workshops that will allow student playwrights to come to them and ask for help in developing plays.