New England Premiere of Anonymous Ensemble's "Liebe Love Amour!" at Wesleyan University's Center for the Arts September 22
Wesleyan University's Center for the Arts
and Theater Department present
Anonymous Ensemble
Saturday, September 22 performance to feature
New England premiere of the work "Liebe Love Amour!" (2012)
Middletown, Conn., September 6, 2012 - The 13th annual Outside the Box Theater Series presented by Wesleyan University's Center for the Arts and Theater Department opens with an interactive performance by the Brooklyn-based group Anonymous Ensemble, featuring the New England premiere of the work "Liebe Love Amour!" on Saturday, September 22 at 8pm in the CFA Theater, located at 271 Washington Terrace on the Wesleyan campus in Middletown. In "Liebe Love Amour!" the audience¹s stories become part of the fabric of the piece as they help guide the spontaneous "choose-your-own-adventure" narrative, which is told by Jessica Weinstein Œ02, Eamonn Farrell, and Liz Davito, along with music composed by William Antoniou.
Circus Sideshow Magazine has said of Anonymous Ensemble that "behind all the frenetic and seemingly spontaneous activity is a very cleverly constructed 'performance script,' with the audience expertly managed to suit the show's needs."
"Liebe Love Amour!" is a theatricalized 'live film' of an epic search for love. In this latest work of interactive theater, Anonymous Ensemble creates Hollywood magic using cameras, a green-screen, live video processing software, and the opulent imagery of silent film director Erich von Stroheim. The show unveils a panoply of love affairs between Tall Hilda and a string of paramours including a fictionalized Erich von Stroheim, a devout Gloria Swanson, and the audience in the theater. Throughout the narrative, the audience is drawn into and onto the silver screen as their own stories become part of the fabric of the piece. The show is a tryst between cinema and live performance that invites the audience to voyeuristically participate in the artifice of cinema and the magic of theater simultaneously. With its lush, cinematic orchestration and rapid, real-time editing, "Liebe Love Amour!" spins layers of romance and reality as it reels towards its inevitable Hollywood finish.
Admission for the performance of "Liebe Love Amour!" by Anonymous Ensemble is $23 for the general public; $19 for senior citizens, Wesleyan faculty/staff, and non-Wesleyan students; and $6 for Wesleyan students. Tickets are available online at http://www.wesleyan.edu/cfa, by phone at (860) 685-3355, or in person at the Wesleyan University Box Office, located in the Usdan University Center, 45 Wyllys Avenue, Middletown. Tickets may also be purchased at the door beginning one hour prior to the performance, subject to availability. The Center for the Arts accepts cash, checks written to ³Wesleyan University², and all major credit cards. Groups of ten or more may receive a discount please call (860) 685-3355 for details. No refunds, cancellations, or exchanges.
About Anonymous Ensemble
Anonymous Ensemble, formed in 2003, makes audience-focused, spectacle-based work and is best known as creators of "TheBest," a long-form, multimedia, rock theater extravaganza in multiple episodes/mediums and based on the ancient Greek Theban plays. Over a period of five years, Anonymous Ensemble presented installments of ³TheBest² at various venues in New York City including performances at The Chocolate Factory, The Ice Factory Festival, the Above Ground Zero Festival, OfficeOps, Galapagos and many rock venues. In 2006, two episodes of ³TheBest² were presented at the Brisbane International Festival in Australia, and an interactive video installation was presented in the Neuropolis Festival in Berlin.
Since then, Anonymous Ensemble has created an interactive, narrative dance party, ³Wanderlust,² which premiered at the Ice Factory Festival in 2007, and was nominated for a Total Theatre Award in Experiment and Innovation at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2008. ³Wanderlust² then booked a U.K. tour including the Latitude Festival and a London premiere at Jackson¹s Lane. Anonymous Ensemble¹s ³a Wonderland² premiered at the Ice Factory Festival in 2009 and was Anonymous Ensemble¹s first collaboration with Athens-based composer William Antoniou, who later composed the music for ³Liebe Love Amour!²
For more information about Anonymous Ensemble, please visit http://anonymousensemble.org/.
About the Outside the Box Theater Series
The Outside the Box Theater Series, presented by the Wesleyan Theater Department and Center for the Arts, brings groundbreaking theater performances and discussions to Wesleyan University. This season¹s performances include the Connecticut premiere of Lee Breuer¹s ³Glass Guignol² (February 16, 2013), which will feature Obie Award-winners Maude Mitchell and Greg Merhten, as well as Jessica Weinstein ¹02 and Eamonn Farrell from Anonymous Ensemble.
Past Outside the Box Theater Series performances and speakers have included Amiri Baraka and Blue Ark, Ang Gey Pin, Anne Bogart, Awaji Puppet Theater Company, Bill Irwin, Bill Rauch of Cornerstone Theater Company, Bintang Bali, Biro, Builder¹s Association, Catherine Filloux, Charles Mee, The Civilians, Coco Fusco, DAH Theatre, Dan Hurlin, Dario Fo & Franca Rame, David Henry Hwang, Dewey Dell, Ellen Stewart, Great Small Works, Javon Johnson, Lee Breuer, Marco Baliani, Moises Kaufman, The Neo-Futurists, Peter Brook's ³The Grand Inquisitor², Peter Schumann, Pig Iron Theatre Company, Reno¹s ³Rebel Without a Pause², Rhodessa Jones, Rinde Eckert, Roger Guenever Smith, Sarah Jones, Sarah Ruhl, Shosha Goren, SITI Company, Spalding Gray,Tommy Derrah & Johan Padan, Tony Kushner, The Wooster Group, and Young Jean Lee.
About the Theater Department
The Theater Department embraces a broad definition of theater, and considers the critical and creative study of the stage to be essential components of a liberal arts education. Courses and productions reflect the interdisciplinary interests of faculty and majors. The department's diverse faculty conducts research and creative endeavors in every continent. Recent Visiting Artists include Pulitzer Prize winner Quiara Alegria Hudes, Doris Duke Performing Artist Award winner Rinde Eckert, and OBIE award recipient Leah Gardiner.
English Professor and pioneer American designer Ralph Pendleton created Wesleyan's Theater program in the mid 1930s. Mr. Pendleton served as the department's first chair until his retirement in 1974 and was an important contributor to the opening of the Center for the Arts.
Wesleyan's Theater Department alumni are notably active in the professional metier: they appear on international and and national stages, on and off Broadway, and many are the recipients of prestigious awards: "Bessie" Award designers Chloe Brown and Roderk Murray, Emmy Award recipients Dana Delany and Bradley Whitford, and Tony Award winners Frank Wood and Lin-Manuel Miranda are a few examples. Several have joined renowned American companies, while others are the founding members of cutting-edge collarobative ensembles, acclaimed solo performers, and community activists.
For more information about the Theater Department, please visit http://www.wesleyan.edu/theater/.