[ This Just In! ]
For Immediate Release
Date: September 22, 2005
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DAN DIETZ EXPLORES AMERICA’S ADDICTION TO REVOLUTION IN AMERICAMISFIT
AUSTIN, TX- It was a simple moment: a sweltering Austin afternoon, sitting in MoJo’s coffee shop, reading Paul Wellman’s Spawn of Evil (a book about America’s first serial killers), when the music playing in the background switched from the stereotypical mellow coffee shop instrumental to a rockabilly tune. Other people might not have noted the change in ambience as being significant, but playwright Dan Dietz did.
“The collision of the backwoods bad boys I was reading about with this lowdown, hillbilly rock 'n roll was both really weird and really perfect,” says Dietz. “I scribbled a note in my notebook about it and before long, Rockabilly Boy was born.”
Thus is the simple beginning for Dietz’s new complex play Americamisfit.
Rockabilly Boy is our guide and musical companion in Americamisfit. With the drop of a record needle, he introduces us to Big and Little Harpe, two brothers raised during the thick of the American Revolution and hell bent on defeating the democracy- a democracy that not only ended monarchic rule, but the life of their Tory father as well. Fueled by the thumping beats of Rockabilly Boy’s narrative, Americamisfit recounts the bloody trail of the Harpe brothers and conjures up other American rebels and revolutionaries including George Washington, J. Robert Oppenheimer, Henry Ford and Ronald Reagan.
“The more I study American History, the more I begin to wonder if we aren't in some way addicted to revolution--that is, to using sudden, massive (and sometimes violent) change as a means of dealing with problems, rather than building on our successes and learning from our failures,” says Dietz. “I did my best to assemble people who were instrumental in bringing radical change to this country, and explored their ambitions in these terms.”
“I love Dan's work. I think he's a brilliant writer,” says SVT’s Artistic Director Jason Neulander, who directed Dietz’s Dirgible, Tilt Angel, tempOdyssey and the upcoming production of Americamisfit. “It’s going to be a spectacle: swing dancers, pyrotechnics, live music. I’m so psyched to be a part of it,” he adds.
“First off, I want people to have fun, to enjoy themselves, the characters, the music,” says Dietz. “Beyond that, my hope is that people will reconsider certain widely-held ideas about this country, particularly that there was ever a period when America wasn't deeply divided in some way. Above all, I want them to question the way Americans romanticize sudden, violent change. Is revolution an answer or an affliction?”
Americamisfit will begin October 28th and run through November 19th at The Off Center (2211-A Hidalgo). Featuring Salvage Vanguard Theater’s resident company member Jenny Larson, Elizabeth Doss, Jason Newman, Garry Peters, Robert Pierson, Andrea Skola and Brent Werzner and Travis York as Big and Little Harpe, this production will be the first for Americamisfit. Joining in the process is SVT’s resident designer Chase Staggs, lights by Diana Deucker, costumes by Laura Cannon and music by Phillip Owen.
For more information or ticket requests, please visit http://www.salvagevanguard.org or call 474-SVt-6.
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