By Hanna Day-Woodruff
This Valentine's Day, the Bourbon Theatre hosts the Red Theater for the first time as it explores the theme of love in all its agonies and ecstasies. With performances starting at 8 and 10 p.m., Red Theater will perform thirty plays in sixty minutes, all composed exclusively for this event.
Covering as much terrain as possible from 30 different perspectives, the show will have something for everyone who has loved and lost. Aaron Sawyer, Red Theater's director, and Theron Seckington, producer, frame the event in terms of showcasing love's roses as well as its thorns, and of course, the chocolates that come along with it.
Red Theater is a troupe comprised of twelve to sixteen people who write and perform the thirty-piece set. Red Theater began as a show written by and for UNL theatre students and was performed right before dead week (the week before finals). It was conceived as a fast-paced, high-energy show that reflected back on the previous semester and allowed the students to let off steam before the pressures of the subsequent weeks.
Covering as much terrain as possible from 30 different perspectives, the show will have something for everyone who has loved and lost. Aaron Sawyer, Red Theater's director, and Theron Seckington, producer, frame the event in terms of showcasing love's roses as well as its thorns, and of course, the chocolates that come along with it.
Red Theater is a troupe comprised of twelve to sixteen people who write and perform the thirty-piece set. Red Theater began as a show written by and for UNL theatre students and was performed right before dead week (the week before finals). It was conceived as a fast-paced, high-energy show that reflected back on the previous semester and allowed the students to let off steam before the pressures of the subsequent weeks.
With those humble beginnings, Sawyer and Seckington have been rewarded with, in Sawyer's words, “wild success,” packed audiences and an expanding vision. Theatre students began bringing their non-theatre friends and the consequent buzz about the events brought in strangers.
Responding to a broader audience, Red Theater began writing more “universal” material. As Seckington sees it, the plays became more personal and “the more personal a feeling is, the more people have experienced it.” In that spirit, the February shows at the Bourbon Theatre will be the first time Red Theater will perform off-campus and for the Lincoln community at-large.
Seckington and Sawyer are avid believers in what can be achieved in a well-crafted and delivered 2-minute piece. According to Seckington, the troupe writes and develops pieces that are “theatrical, metaphorical and personal.” Although most of the cast are theatre students, (Seckington and Sawyer are both working on their MFAs), Red Theater held open auditions and filled two spaces in their roster from members of the Lincoln community. Work began on the “Love” show in January and by the time the show is released, the group will have written 30 plays in essentially, 30 days.
Aesthetically, Red Theater is inspired by the Futurist movement in theatre that arose and died in Italy around the time that film became popular, and that has been reinvigorated by a Chicago troupe called the Neo-Futurists. Sawyer describes the Futurist movement as seeking to “streamline theatre--make performances shorter, faster, more intense, make it pop and do something else.”
“Just because it's short, doesn't mean it's light. You can tell a very specific truth and really hit something in that amount of time,” Sawyer said.
“You can break someone's heart in two minutes,” Seckington added.
But breaking hearts is not the only goal--the format allows for many diverse performances, featuring low-brow comedy and deeply personal vignettes back to back. The upcoming show will also incorporate singer-songwriter and video elements in addition to the theatrical pieces. The format almost dares the audience to be bored.
Seckington and Sawyer are doing their level best to present the public with an event that’s “not your normal theatre”--a theatre experience that blows away the fourth wall, the invisible barrier between the audience and the actors. They aim for a show that is more like a rock concert, and consider the Bourbon Theater the perfect place to carry that lively spirit forward.
Beyond this Valentine's Day performances, Seckington and Sawyer are planning a First Friday performance in April. They are also working on turning the film of previous and upcoming Red Theater performances into a documentary-style television pilot. Both have been active in theatre and film in Lincoln and will continue to do so. Sawyer co-starred in last summer's production of True West by the Angels Theatre Company and has directed several short films. Seckington took on the sound designs for Reviving Ophelia at the Loft at the Mill and the 2nd Annual Theatrix New Artist Festival, and is currently “juggling” several film and theatre projects. Without a doubt, both are hopelessly passionate about their craft.
“Conan O'Brien's last few days kind of felt like Red Theater, where you didn't know what would happen and you knew that they were gonna be honest because they had nothing to lose,” Sawyer said. “We try to preserve that--we have nothing to gain and not much to lose, so why not do a good job and really mean it?”
When: February 14th, 8 p.m. and 10 p.m.
Where: Bourbon Theatre, 1415 O St.
How much: $5 per seat; those who pre-purchase tickets will receive a free piece of cake
To purchase tickets, click here.
To follow Red Theater on Facebook, click here.
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