Ripon College Days

Issue date: 2/20/08 Section: Entertainment

Media Credit: George Infantado Practice. Dress rehearsals begin this weekend for the cast.

Media Credit: George Infantado Waiting. Junior Preston Nelson and senior Amy Dorman wait for a fellow player to enter before the next scene.

Mathematics, English literature and sex might not seem to go together, but those elements are exactly what Tom Stoppard's Arcadia brings together.

Opening next Wednesday, Feb. 27 and running through Saturday, March 1, Arcadia will amuse audiences with a witty script and a talented cast at 7:30 p.m. each night.

"[Arcadia is] set simultaneously in 1809 and the present day," says junior Megan Captaine. "The play introduces two generations that never knew each other living in the same room. In 1809, Thomasina is the young mathematical genius tutored by the respectable Septimus."

The piece moves back and forth from past to present.

"All of the action and intrigue takes place in 1809 and in the present where they're trying to piece together what happened in the past," says senior Amy Dorman.

While putting together the production, some members of the cast have found issues with preparing their roles.

"It's taken me forever to figure out my character," says Dorman. "I would say my lines, but I wouldn't really know why I was saying them until I sat down one day and really just hammered out who my character was and where she was coming from. Since I've done that, she's becoming more alive and like a real person."

As Dorman struggled with finding her character's personality, most struggled with the topics being discussed in the play.

"[The play's premise] can be difficult to understand [for] someone who hasn't focused their studies in the areas [discussed] in the play," says Captaine. "However, once you understand it, there is a lot of humor within Arcadia."

The complex script creates a lot of interpretation for the actors to deal with, which can be challenging for them to work around or turn to their advantage.

"Every moment I discover something new in the script or a new way to say something," says sophomore Cady Cummings. "Even though I've said the same lines over and over again for the last two months, I love discovering new elements."

While work needed to be done for the actors to understand their roles well and to understand the topics covered in Arcadia, the cast was able to have fun with the production as well.

"As with any production, you spend a great deal of time with the same few people and you make some wonderful friends from the experience," says Captaine.

To bond even closer with each other, the cast was blindfolded for a rehearsal in an attempt to create trust within the group.

"We had to do the show without being able to see where we were going or where the other characters were on stage," says Dorman. "So you had to rely on instinct to know where you were and it also forced us to really listen to what we were saying and what the other person was saying. It helped a lot to develop the relationships as well as my own character."

While the cast developed favorite parts of rehearsal, they also found their favorite moments within the script.

"My favorite part is the last scene, where the two worlds take place at the same time and everything is revealed," says Dorman. "All the mounds of information come together and make sense."

The cast and crew encourage students to see the production for themselves.

"There is so much to this show," says Dorman. "It's a comedy that entertains you, but it also makes you think about the world, about science, about whether you believe in free will or determinism."

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