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Old family feuds disrupt the efforts of Russian landowner Lomor (Kevin O’Boyle) to propose to his neighbor Natalya Stepanova (Allie Sunstrom) in Anton Chekhov’s one-act play “The Marriage Proposal.”
Connecting three one-act plays in the Vortex Theatre production “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” are their characters’ struggles to connect in love.
The second young directors production at the Vortex Theatre brings “new, relatively inexperienced directors from the community into our space, giving them an opportunity they might otherwise not have had,” says Marty Epstein, Vortex board member. “We’ve got three distinct pieces that we’ve connected to make it an enjoyable evening.”
Stephanie Grilo, who plans to graduate from the University of New Mexico this spring, says she was thrilled when she learned she had been selected.
Grilo is directing “Soft Dude,” by Joe Pintauro, a modern play about a young romantic man who is physically unable to have sex with Doll, a prostitute, whom he’s begun to love.
“It’s a story about two unlikely people in a situation where they want to love each other, but they don’t know how,” she explains. “Doll can’t allow herself to be vulnerable to want something or even dream about something she wants.
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‘I Wanna Hold Your Hand: An Evening of One-Acts’ WHEN: 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays from Jan. 4-20 WHERE: The Vortex Theatre, 2004 1/2 E. Central HOW MUCH: $18 general admission, pay what you will Sunday, Jan. 6. Visit www.vortexabq.org for reservations |
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“Doll can be open about sex, but not intimacy. Dude can be open about intimacy, but not sex. It’s this struggle of love and relationship that ties this festival together.”
Natalie Wilding, who is directing Tennessee Williams’ “The Lady of Larkspur Lotion,” says the play’s characters have intersecting realities, but separate fantasies that help them endure their lives’ challenges.
“The harsh reality they live in is based on lies. Why wouldn’t they chose to live in a fantasy if they could?” she says, adding that a speech in the play in defense of these fantasy lives convinced her that she wanted to direct it. “It seemed to justify my role in theater.”
This is Wilding’s first directing experience. She has been mostly a stage manager at the Vortex and other local theaters, she says.
Matthew McVey Lee, who plans to remain at UNM for graduate school, has directed student productions and been a stage manager on Tricklock Company productions.
Lee says he chose “The Marriage Proposal,” by Russian dramatist Anton Chekhov, “because it gives a different way to look at Chekhov. It’s unmistakably funny. The tone is clearly more humorous than his other work, but there is his incredible use of language – distinct and purposeful, clear and articulate.”
