Fringe 2012: The Ladies of the Camellias
Boston, MA – For 16 years the Boston University College of Fine Arts (CFA)’s annual Fringe Festival has continued to be a popular fixture in the CFA’s fall event schedule. A collaboration between the School of Music Opera Institute and the School of Theatre, this year’s festival, running October 6-26 at the Boston University Theatre, will celebrate Alexandre Dumas’ novel La Dame aux Camélias featuring works by Giuseppe Verdi and Pam Gems, as well as an offering by Jules Massenet.
Directed by Guest Stage Director David Gately, and CFA’s Judy Braha, Allison Voth, and Nathan Troup, this year’s festival kicks off with Jules Massenet’s opera Le Portrait de Manon, a one-act continuation to his popular opera Manon. The lineup continues with the full-length play Camille by Pam Gems, a modern adaptation of Dumas’ novel La Dame aux Camélias, the tale of a doomed love affair between a Parisian courtesan and a country nobleman. The festival concludes with a unique presentation featuring extensive portions of Verdi’s La Traviata combined with excerpts from Gems’ Camille.
The BU Fall Fringe Festival was founded in 1997 with the goal of cultivating a broader audience for opera. A collaborative effort between designers, directors, singers, and actors from BU’s School of Music Opera Institute and School of Theatre, the Festival was built around the desire to present an unconventional repertoire within a distinguished performance experience.
“This year’s Fringe Festival explores the richly iconic character of Camille in iterations of Dumas’ Marguerite and his contemporary adaptor Pam Gems alongside Verdi’s enduring rendition of the character in his Violetta,” says James Petosa, Director of School of Theater at Boston University College of Fine Arts. “Additionally, through the exploration of Massenet’s Manon, our artists and audiences receive a rare opportunity to discover her anew and in depth.”
All performances will tie into CFA’s Keyword Initiative, commencing its second year, which focuses on the theme of resilience. Performances, lectures, collaborations, and discussion will explore the buoyancy of the human spirit in times of war, tragedy, hardship, suffering, and oppression – including the longitudinal vitality of Camille in the face of a doomed love affair, a presentation of Vik Muniz’s photographic portraits made from trash and captured in the Academy Award-nominated documentary, Waste Land (10/5,) and a BU Symphony Orchestra and Symphonic Chorus concert depicting the tenacious fortitude and patriotism displayed by Americans through wartime and political turmoil (11/19.)
Learn more about the 16th Annual Fringe Festival at www.bu.edu/cfa/fringe.
FULL FESTIVAL SCHEDULE
Le Portrait de Manon
Jules Massenet, composer
Georges Bayer, librettist
Allison Voth, music director and pianist
David Gately, guest stage director
A decade after the success of his opera Manon, Jules Massenet returns to the story of the Chevalier Des Grieux and the lost love of his youth, Manon. Now an aging and solitary man, well-versed in the power of love, he refuses to grant his nephew permission to marry, and finds himself at risk of repeating mistakes of the past. Sung in French with English supertitles; performed with piano.
BU Theatre, Lane-Comley Studio 210
Saturday, October 6, 2:00pm
Saturday, October 6, 8:00pm (includes post-show discussion with the director, cast, and design team)
Sunday, October 7, 2:00pm
Sunday, October 7, 7:00pm
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Camille*
Pam Gems, playwright
Based on the novel La Dame aux Camélias by Alexandre Dumas
Judy Braha, director
A modern translation of Alexandre Dumas’ popular novella, La Dame aux Camélias, detailing the doomed love affair of Marguerite, a Parisian courtesan, and Armand, a country nobleman.
BU Theatre, Lane-Comley Studio 210
Saturday, October 13, 2:00pm (includes post-show discussion with the director, cast, and design team)
Saturday, October 13, 8:00pm
Sunday, October 14, 2:00pm (includes post-show discussion with the director, cast, and design team)
Wednesday, October 17, 7:30pm
Thursday, October 18, 7:30pm
Friday, October 19, 8:00pm
Saturday, October 20, 2:00pm
Saturday, October 20, 8:00pm
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La Traviata
Giuseppe Verdi, composer
Francesco Maria Piave, librettist
William Lumpkin, conductor
Judy Braha and Nathan Troup, stage directors
A unique presentation featuring extensive portions of Verdi’s opera La Traviata (all scenes except Act II, Scene 1) combined with excerpts from Pam Gems’ play Camille. Featuring singers, actors, and instrumentalists from the College of Fine Arts School of Music, Opera Institute, School of Theatre, BU Chamber Orchestra, and BU Chamber Chorus. Sung in Italian with English supertitles, and performed with orchestra. A portion of the proceeds from this event will benefit the Greater Boston Food Bank.
Boston University Theatre
Friday, October 26, 8:00pm
(Pre-show discussion at 6:30pm with special guest Philip Gossett to discuss the two versions of La Traviata that Verdi composed between 1853 and 1854.)
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* = Production included in School of Theatre and BCAP subscription package.
All artists and programs are subject to change; please visit www.bu.edu/cfa for the most up to date schedules and program information.
TICKETS
Tickets now on sale: $7 General Admission.
BU community: One free ticket with BU ID at the door, day of performance, subject to availability.
Box Office: www.BostonTheatreScene.com or 617.933.8600.
VENUE
Boston University Theatre
264 Huntington Avenue, Boston
Getting There:
T Green Line, E line, Symphony stop
T Orange Line, Mass Ave stop
BOSTON UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF FINE ARTS
Founded in 1839, Boston University is an internationally recognized private research university with more than 30,000 students participating in undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs. BU consists of 17 colleges and schools along with a number of multi-disciplinary centers and institutes which are central to the school’s research and teaching mission. The Boston University College of Fine Arts was created in 1954 to bring together the School of Music, the School of Theatre, and the School of Visual Arts. The University’s vision was to create a community of artists in a conservatory-style school offering professional training in the arts to both undergraduate and graduate students, complemented by a liberal arts curriculum for undergraduate students. Since those early days, education at the College of Fine Arts has begun on the BU campus and extended into the city of Boston, a rich center of cultural, artistic and intellectual activity.
The Opera Institute at the College of Fine Arts School of Music is an intensive, highly selective two-year performance-based training program for emerging operatic artists. A professional faculty and renowned guest artists provide personal support and training in all areas pertinent to a career in opera — voice, acting, languages, movement styles, and business strategies. In addition, the Opera Institute also selects singers from the School of Music who demonstrate true operatic potential and have mastered an intermediate integration of acting, vocal, and movement skills for the Opera Theater and Opera Workshop programs.
The School of Theatre at the College of Fine Arts was established in 1954 as one of the country’s leading institutions for the study of acting, stage management, design and production, and all aspects of the theatrical profession. Since 1982, the School of Theatre has enjoyed an educational and artistic collaboration with Huntington Theatre Company, the professional theatre-in-residence at Boston University. The School of Theatre is a conservatory-style training program within the larger liberal arts programs at Boston University, and values collaboration, a rigorous curriculum, artistic growth, and the exploration of new possibilities for theatre.
To receive e-mail updates about concerts, operas, plays, art exhibitions, and visiting artist lectures, sign up for the Boston University College of Fine Arts E-Calendar at www.bu.edu/cfa/events or text BUARTS to 22828.
MEDIA ONLY
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Brooke MacKinnon at 617.353.3349 or brookelm@bu.edu
Laurel Homer at 617.353.8783 or lhomer@bu.edu