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Publication Date

2-2009

Language

English

City

Philadelphia

Keywords

The Masque

Disciplines

Theatre and Performance Studies

Comments

Director's Corner

September 11 and La Salle University are and will always be intertwined in my memory. Like the Kennedy assassination of the previous generation, everyone remembers where they were on September 11. I was teaching in Olney when the news broke. I stood in this very theatre watching the news on the big projector (he Administration had set it up so students could get information). I took the subway back home. Everyone was silent on board the train. You could see their collective woes and somberness on every passenger's face. I've never known such collective fear and paranoia in my life as I did those days after September 11. It was a strange, dark, morbid, tragic, heroic time .. .

Tom Reing


Producer's Corner

To talk about life-altering events for those of us currently in the collegiate setting, the discussion begins and ends with September 11th, 2001. It is said that every generation has a moment frozen in memory; remembering the location and surroundings with photographic precision. I recall walking into my history class, freshman year of high school, and thinking that my shocked friend was lying to me until the teacher rolled in the television. I can still see his face, straining to understand- it stood as a mirror unto my own.

It is the power of the attacks of 9/11 which tint the glasses through which we have viewed the world ever since. Gone are the rosy, worry-free days of American isolation and immunity-that fateful day was the point at which the previously shielded American youth felt brutally initiated into the global community. At times, I still find myself asking "Why?" Why us, why then? The Greek dramatist Euripides tells us that "You were a stranger to sorrow; therefore Fate has cursed you." It is that concept of fate which Craig Wright brings tastefully into the theatrical world as part of a group of playwrights who seek to bring understanding to these events through the stage. Tempered wisely with humor, Wright brings the seriousness of chance to the forefront, perhaps telling us that we shouldn't ask "Why," but rather seek to deal with a situation we cannot change.

For this show, we chose to recall veteran La Salle director Tom Reing. In his vast Masque repertoire, productions such as The Laramie Project (2004) assured us that he could handle heavier subject matter with dignity and an enlightened eye for detail. This cast and crew, talented and dedicated, also felt that this show, more than others, is a show in which our theatrical endeavors can rise above the confines of stages and seats and into the Lasallian mission of service. It is for this reason that all proceeds from our production will be going to the Twin Towers Orphan Fund, a charitable organization which, among other related good deeds, funds the higher education of those orphaned by the attacks.

I thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for attending The Masque of La Salle University's Winter Production of Craig Wright's Recent Tragic Events. Your support for both the arts and the Twin Towers Orphan Fund stands witness to the fact that La Salle seeks the understanding indicative of a University, with the compassion necessary to overcome any adversity.

Doug Phelan
Producer and President

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Recent Tragic Events

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