UW News

October 19, 2011

Play based on life of Eugene Debs created by School of Drama artists

Drama Professor Jeffrey Fracé and an ensemble of emerging artists at the UW created a play from the ground up and will present it Oct. 26 through Nov. 6 in Meany Studio Theatre.

Harp Song for a Radical is loosely based on Marguerite Young’s biography of the same name, and inspired by the life of legendary labor activist Eugene V. Debs. The work explores how the “ordinary guy” makes the decision to act, and in so doing becomes a hero.  This collaboration with the History Department also examines heroism and labor and politics, past and present.

Previews begin Wednesday, Oct. 26, and the production runs through Sunday, Nov. 6.  The play features actors in their third year of the Professional Actor Training Program, as well as third year MFA designers.  The new PATP Class of 2014 will make its first appearance on the main stage at UW, while actors and dramaturgs from the BA program, and the MFA director serving as assistant to Fracé are all contributors to the ensemble.

Fracé has appeared as an actor or director in more than 80 professional productions at venues across the country, and has toured extensively with Anne Bogart’s SITI Company.  Seattle audiences recently saw him play Padraic in The Lieutenant of Inishmore at ACT Theatre.  At the UW he directed The Two Orphans and Untying My Cement Shoes.

Set designer for the show is Andrew Mannion, with costumes by Linnaea Boone Wilson, lighting by Marnie Cummings and sound by Kristina Winch.

Tickets are $10 for previews, $17 weekdays and matinees and $20 Friday and Saturday evenings. Students pay $10 for all shows and faculty and staff $15. Tickets are available at the Arts Ticket Office, 206-543-4880 or online.