Published July 09, 2008 11:30 pm - Two Norman High graduates will be producing, directing and acting in two one-act plays this Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the Duck Pond.
The plays will be free to the public, although donations to benefit both Norman high schools will be accepted at the performances.
Norman High grads to direct plays at Duck Pond
By Andrew Knittle
Two Norman High graduates will be producing, directing and acting in two one-act plays this Friday, Saturday and Sunday at the Duck Pond.
The plays will be free to the public, although donations to benefit both Norman high schools will be accepted at the performances.
David Weiss and Reynolds Whalen, who graduated from Norman High in 2005 and 2004, respectively, said the two plays are both site-specific, meaning they were written with a park as a setting, and should only last about an hour apiece.
"This is sort of our first official collaboration, our first time putting on a show together," Weiss said. "We've been in shows and acted together many times before, though."
The two plays, "Small World" and "The C-Word," will begin respectively at 7 and 8 p.m. during the weekend run.
"Site-specific plays are not something a lot of people in Norman have been exposed to," Whalen said. "David and I did a lot in college and it's something we wanted to share with our hometown."
Weiss agreed the location was an important visceral component of the overall impression the plays are meant to leave on the audience.
"The Duck Pond is a nice, accessible location. It's comfortable and there's plenty of room to move around," Weiss said. "It's a great immersive experience to go see a play in the actual setting it's written for."
"Small World," which Whalen and Weiss paid $100 for the rights to perform, is about three couples -- all of whom are on blind dates -- whose conversations during the play link them together in some way. Whalen will direct "Small World," which was written by Tracey Scott Wilson.
Weiss will call the shots for the production of "The C-Word," a play the two men said was written by their friend Jonathan Baude at Washington University in St. Louis, the school both attended last year. Unlike "Small World," this play -- about a break-up -- does contain some adult language and more serious subject matter.
"Both plays are pretty much all ages, but they are both definitely targeted at high school and college-aged people," Whalen said. "They'll probably identify most with the characters and what they're dealing with in the plays."
The pair said six of the seven actors appearing in the plays are graduates of Norman high schools and that four of them are majoring in drama in college.
Getting all of them together for pre-production work hasn't been easy, Weiss said.
"Finding actors and coordinating schedules this time of year is really challenging, but we've been able to get it done," Weiss said.
Both men, who studied drama at Norman High, said the school's drama instructor Dr. Betsy Ballard was one of their biggest influences as far as acting is concerned.