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Wednesday, November 3,1999 Page 9
‘Maiden’ kicks off the Theatrix season
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SANDY UEMEM, who plays Paulina Salas, holds a gun up to Jay Ryan, who plays Roberto Miranda, in “Death and the Maiden,” a production that ispart
of UNL’s Theatrix program.
Actors find
challenge in
portrayal of
human rights
abuses, atrocities
By Jason Hardy
Senior staff writer
It’s the thrill of responsibility cou
pled with the desire to create. It’s a
right of passage. It’s an opportunity to
shine. '
It’sTheatrix.
Theatrix is the student-produced
organization of the University of
Nebraska-Lincoln theater department.
Tomorrow, it opens its fall season with
a production of Ariel Dorfman’s
“Death and the Maiden.”
Gregory Peters, a senior theater
performance major who is directing
the play, said because of Theatrix’s
limited budget, any production is dif
ficult, let alone one as demanding as
“Death and the Maiden.”
But Peters’ love for the script far
outweighed his reservations.
“I’ve been wanting to do it for two
years,” Peters said. “The script is very
challenging, especially with a low
budget, but it’s such a good play. It has
a lot of things to say.”
The play’s plot centers on the
effects of human rights abuses in a
country emerging from a totalitarian
dictatorship, not entirely unlike author
Dorfman’s native country, Chile.
The play’s main character,
Paulina, was tortured while doing time
in prison. Paulina is married to
Gerardo, played by Michael Dragen,
who is investigating past human rights
abuses.
Along the way, Paulina encounters
her former abuser and is forced to deal
with what happened to her years ago.
For Sandy Lemen, the theater per
formance major playing Paulina, the
experience has offered her lessons she
said she has yet to obtain from being in
main stage productions.
“It pulls everybody together,
because it’s all for us,” Lemen said.
“Greg is the first director I’ve had that
pulled a lot from me. He pointed out a
lot of things that I didn’t know I did.
“I’ve been acting since I was 3,
and no one ever said anything like
that.”
Peters said the play incorporated a
number of universal themes and that
Dorfman was an excellent storyteller.
“He has a really nice way of com
bining the message, or asking a lot of
questions, while making it still very
exciting,” Peters said.
Lemen was faced with the chal
lenge of accurately portraying
Dorfman’s lead character, a person
who encountered atrocities hard for
anyone to fathom, let alone recreate.
“It’s very difficult because I’m
Theater Preview
The Facts
What: “Death and the Maiden*
Where: Studio Theatre, third Floor, Temple
Building
When:^7:30 p.m. tomorrow through Saturday
The sidnny: Play explores the after effects of
human rights abuses committed during a
totalitarian regime.
playing someone who’s been raped
and tortured,” Lemen said. “A lot of
people who were abducted and raped
still have feelings for their abductor.
“Finding things I liked about him
was challenging, but it added a lot of
depth to the character.”
That’s the kind of exploration and
experimentation that Theatrix hopes
to foster.
Blue Barn finds historical hotel for setting
■ ‘The Hot L Baltimore9
explores the societal decline that
followed the decline of railroads.
By Danell McCoy
Staff writer
In the 1800s, the United States witnessed an
economic boom. With railroads crisscrossing
America, cities began popping up all over to
cater to those who would be traveling through to
reach their destinations.
“There were decades of opulence and
money,” said Kevin Lawler, artistic director at
the Blue Bam Theatre. “ITie railroads made
these cities, including Omaha and Lincoln, and
built extraordinarily lavish hotels in them for
the guests.”
One of the hotels, The Paxton Manor, 14th
Mid Famam streets, was built in Omaha in the
late 1800s during the boom. This weekend, the
hotel will become the setting-of the Blue Barn’s
production of Lanford Wilson’s play “The Hot L
Baltimore.”
Around the 1960s, the railroad economy
began to die.
“There was a decline of railroads,” Lawler
said. “The economy declined as well, and these
hotels just dried up and died.”
Some of these hotels became boarding
houses. Others were tom down.
“The Hot L Baltimore” tells the story of one
such hotel: the Hotel Baltimore. After the eco
nomic boom, this once-luxurious hotel became
a boarding house.
The story revolves around the characters
who live in die once-lavish building and what
happens when they learn it is condemned and to
be destroyed. The entire story is set in the lobby
of tiie doomed hotel .
‘“The Hot L’ is the story of these people and
their lives and the friendships they forge,”
Lawler said. “It is them dealing with losing their
home and doing what they can to survive.”
What is so amazing and different about this
performance of “The Hot L,” Lawler said, is the
place it is being performed.
After a fire last May destroyed parts of the
building housing the Blue Bam, Lawler began
looking for new spaces to perform until the
damage could be repaired. - /
Originally, “The Hot L” was to open five
days after the fire, but Lawler said he had to can
cel the show and begin looking for other spaces.
Lawler said he decided he would first find a
space and then choose a play that would work in
Theater Preview
nw Facts
What: “The Hot L Baltimore”
Where: The Paxton Manor, 14th & Famam
streets in Omaha
When: Nov. 4-6,12-14 and 19-20 at 8 p.m.
Coet: $12 for adults, $10 for students anaseniors
The Skinny: Bittersweet look at the history of
one of America's former hotels.
that space. 1
“Someone mentioned the ballroom in the
Paxton hotel,” he said.
“I wait there to look at it and immediately
realized that die play had to be done there. The ,
history of the Paxton exactly mirrors what is
going on in the play.”
The 14-member cast, which consists of all '
local actors, was rounded up to begin prepar
ing for the show’s opening tomorrow.
The show is scheduled for nine perfor- xvm
mances, tomorrow through Saturday,
Nov. 12-14 and 19-20. All shows will Y^
begin at 8 p.m. in the second floor ball- MM ,
room of the Paxton Manor.
For reservations and information, call 11!
die Blue Bam at (402) 345-1576 or visit 1
their web site at www.bluebarn.org.