Students Get "Familiar" In Advance

In February, Episcopal students had a rare opportunity to experience a play — “Familiar” — in its evolution from page to the stage at Woolly Mammoth Theater in D.C.
The new elective class, “Theater from Page to Stage,” taught by Director of Theatre Arts Bill Patti and English teacher Mitch Pinkowski, was able to coordinate with the theatre's literary director to provide their class advance copies of the script, which they read in the week prior to attending a first-run performance on Valentine’s Day.

The team at Woolly Mammoth was kind enough to even supply the class a “study packet” of materials for them to discuss and debrief following the performance, Patti noted.

“The show was wonderful, and they treated us so well,” he said. “It was my first time there, and what an educational experience. The lobby was constructed to bring out the themes of the production with interactive exercises. The audience was young, diverse and energetic… and incredible group for our students to engage with.”

“Familiar” centers around a Zimbabwean family living in Minnesota as they prepare for the wedding of their eldest daughter and has already received rave reviews for its Tony-nominated playwright and its cast.

Seniors Matt Berendsen, Charlie Tarbutton, and Bradley Kelly returned to their Hoxton dormitory still revved up from the experience.

“The whole thing felt really special because others in the audience hadn’t seen the script in advance,” Kelly said. “It felt like we had this backstage pass.”

They especially appreciated recognizing several instances where the actions and dialogue in the performance had been altered from the version they had read, something not at all uncommon in the early stages of a first-run production.

Pinkowski and Patti envisioned the “Page to Stage” class as an experiential-based elective.

“We’re striving to offer exposure to theater through a comprehensive immersion in it,” Pinkowski said. “We read and analyze plays, then role-play or enact scenes from them, attend professional productions of these plays, and ultimately write reviews on them.

“Unlike with Shakespeare, Beckett, or most plays we read where we are familiar with narrative from prior study, we decided to be intentionally (and ironically) unfamiliar with ‘Familiar’ and thereby place ourselves along with our students in the study of it.”
 
“It was easily one of my favorite theatre-going experiences in D.C.,” Patti added.

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