'Insect Comedy' Crawls onto SB Stage
Nineteen student actors and the same creative team behind the national award-winning 2013 production of “The Pirates of Penzance,” stages “The Insect Comedy or The World We Live In” Feb. 27 and March 6 at 8:30 p.m., Feb. 28 and March 5 at 8 p.m., and March 7 at 2 p.m., all in Westmont’s Porter Theatre. Tickets are $10 for students, seniors and children, $15 for adults, and can be purchased online at www.westmont.edu/boxoffice. For more information, please call (805) 565-7140.
The early 20th century European classic, written by Czech brothers Karel and Josef Capek in 1921, tackles themes such as threats of consumerism, nationalism and totalitarianism as told through the lives of insects.
“Today the play seems downright prophetic considering the time of its writing and the madness that was to grip Europe still 15 or so years in the future,” says John Blondell, who directs the play. “Though written in a decidedly different time and place, the play appears completely timely, pertinent and relevant — by turns, the play depicts scenes about the perils and pitfalls of romantic love; the desire for security and safety in a perilous, hectic modern world; and the larger global threats to personal and communal living.
“Though all this sounds very serious, the play is indeed a comedy, and we are working hard for it to be at once fantastic, human and funny.”
The production crew includes Danila Korogdsky (scenography), Miller James (costumes), Jonathan Hicks (lighting), and Victoria Finlayson (choreography). Last year Blondell was honored by the Kennedy Center for his direction of “Pirates” and he received Westmont’s Teacher of the Year Award in the Humanities. While on sabbatical last semester, he traveled to Beijing to direct plays at the National Theatre of China’s International Shakespeare Festival. In addition to “Hamlet,” John directed the Bitola National Theatre (from Macedonia) in their performance of Shakespeare's “Henry VI, Part 3.”
“The Insect Comedy,” although relatively obscure in this country, is famous in the Czech Republic and is performed throughout Europe and on many of the world’s great stages.
“The play has been at times exciting, harrowing, confusing and thrilling to stage,” Blondell says. “The trick is to find the humanity in the situations, to create moments that feel and seem potent and recognizable, all the while hanging onto the notion that the Capeks read human life through that of the lives of insects.”
Blondell says at its deepest levels, the play asks the audience to consider what it means to be a person. “What does it mean to live,” Blondell asks. “And what does one do with this wild, precious life, once it has been given? These are good questions to consider, and they have formed the personal, imaginative and theatrical context to this play.”
**On Saturday, March 7, “The Insect Comedy” plays back-to-back with Lit Moon Theatre’s production of Anton Chekhov’s “The Cherry Orchard” in an afternoon and evening of two fascinating European plays.