Audiences in the Hopkins Center's Bentley Theater last weekend were treated to a triple bill of student-written theater, as the Hop played host to the winning plays from the 82nd Annual Eleanor Frost Contest and the 34th Annual Ruth and Loring Dodd Contest.
Taking the audience from tears to laughs, the Frost showcase began with the dramatic and deeply emotional "The Minute Hand" by Liz Ellison '09, which was followed by the hilarious, over-the-top "Tennessee Sabotage" by Danny Rangel '09.
In writing "The Minute Hand," Ellison, an English and theater double major, said she drew inspiration from unsolved missing person cases.
"It's the most terrifying experience I can imagine," Ellison said. "Someone is gone and you never know why."
While "The Minute Hand" may not answer the "why," it explores the "how." Revolving around a young woman whose husband vanished and never returned, the play explores how disappearances continue to impact lives and relationships after a person is gone.
Rangel, a 2007 winner of the Dodd Contest for his play "Federale," said that the inspiration for his winning play in this year's Frost Contest came from the time he spent living in London, which he saw as an opportunity to see American politics from the outside.
Rangel describes the one-act play, which he developed from an original 10-minute play, as a "farce" with an "absurdist political feel." It centers on three hillbilly misfits and their harebrained schemes to sabotage a local congressman.
The winning plays in the Frost Contest are performed as staged readings, meaning use have no props and have very little movement. It is the job of the actors, reading from scripts, to bring the action to life.
As Rachel Karpf '07, who directed "The Minute Hand" and "Tennessee Sabotage" said, "The question [with staged readings] becomes, What can you do with the format you have?'"
Ellison and Rangel said collaboration with Karpf was key they were very active in the process, from casting to rehearsal to the final performance.
"The role in this festival was to give the playwrights as full a production of the world in their heads as I possibly could," Karpf said.
The winning play in the Dodd Contest, on the other hand, was shown as a full production. This year's Dodd winner, Tabetha Xavier '10, won for the emotional "Fold the Close."
"Fold the Close" brings the audience into a world paradoxically removed, yet rooted in reality. Through the point of view of a young girl who uses her imagination as a coping mechanism, "Fold the Close" sheds light on the problem of domestic violence in a way that is both beautiful and vividly disturbing.
"Fold the Close' is a play about the murder of imagination," Xavier said.
Although Dodd plays have the benefit of a set and props, Xavier explained that there are still many difficulties associated with a full production. Xavier said that she faced many of these obstacles firsthand, as she was the first Dodd winner ever to design her own sets.
Despite these challenges, the final product was seamless. Through surreal design, lighting, music and even dance, "Fold the Close" leaves audience members constantly having to remind themselves that they are watching a play, and not looking into the inner psyche of an abused girl.
The last performance of "Fold the Close," on Saturday, was followed by a panel discussion moderated by theater professor Laura Edmondson. The panel included commentary from Xavier herself, as well as experts in the treatment of traumatized children, including Dartmouth Medical School adjunct psychiatry professors Elizabeth Tomlinson and Martha Robb, who put the play in a broader context where both art and reality meet.
While the festival may be over, the future seems to have much in store for these playwrights. Ellison will be attending Carnegie Mellon University to earn an MFA in dramatic writing. Xavier, with another year at Dartmouth ahead, is currently working on two new plays.
Rangel, meanwhile, said he plans to continue playwriting, wherever it may take him.
