‘Making Advances’ a staged revolution
Arts Collective tackles politics, sexuality, gender and more in stellar show
Mature audiences attending the Arts Collective’s performance of “Making Advances: Revealing Stories of Gender and Sexual Identity” at Howard Community College may find themselves spellbound.
The theme of the Horowitz Performing Arts Center’s 2017-2018 season is “Revolution,” providing a platform for artists and patrons to reflect on societal shifts in technology, art and politics. In keeping with the critically acclaimed Arts Collective’s aim to serve as a creative cauldron, “Making Advances” melds a variety of visual and performance styles in a bold and wonderfully imaginative journey.
Directed by producing artistic director S. G.
Kramer, the show was developed through improv, music and movement by the cast — Jamie Barrios, Douglas Beatty, Makayla Beckles, Chania Hudson, Daniel Johnston, Kelli Jones, Maia Krapcho, Sarah Luckadoo, Michael Makar and Allie Press.
The creative team pulling it all together includes Kramer, Andrew M. Haag Jr. doing light design, Emma K. McDonnell assisted by Hudson on set design, Jessica Welch as costume designer, Bruce F. Press doing video production, and Emma K. McDonnell and Chris Sisson on sound design.
Others include concept consultant Brichard Foley, stage manager Ashe Frost and production assistant Michael Schreibstein.
At curtain, ethereal lights rise on a shadowy cosmos represented by stage fog, evocative costumes, music and freestyle dance movement — one cast member twirls a spinning globe — as a prelude to video clips from interviews with real people.
This universe, juxtaposed and paired with the realism of the video clips, surfaces at strategic moments, threaded between storytelling scenes and again at play’s end.
In an opening clip, a young girl, Caroline Broderick, explains the main difference between boys and girls. Boys, she says, put things in their pockets; girls don’t have them.
Sweet moments like these, and there are many, lend innocence to an honest and tasteful production that fosters acceptance and forgiveness as it focuses on sensitive topics.
Actors Hudson and Beatty start the storytelling rolling with a childlike, freeflowing scene that explores the physicality of gender. In the upbeat vignette that follows, Johnston and Press portray animated doll makers.
Another scene brings a twist to the classic tale of “Cinderella” narrated by Barrios and delightfully enacted by Beckles, Krapcho, Makar, Jones, Press and Johnston.
Beckles and Krapcho portray friends with diametrically opposed tastes followed by Johnston and Luckadoo in a touching father/daughter scene. A girl’s first experience with menstruation comes in a believable scene, featuring Krapcho as the mom, Press astheadolescentandMakaras herobnoxious brother, that follows.
Beatty and Makar are equally convincing as worlds-apart father and son. Then Jones, as a single mom of a transgender daughter portrayed by Hudson is brutally honest about her difficulty finding acceptance.
Next, a group of young friends — Beatty, Beckles, Luckadoo, and Jones — meet at a movie theater and engage in laughter and gossip, and two young women fall in love.
The stellar quality of the directing, design, acting and tech in “Making Advances” never falters from start to finish; all deserve mention as standouts. In the program, McConnell writes on their behalf that the cast and creatives hope to leave audiences “with something that feels bright, cosmic and expansive.”
And they do.
“Making Advances” will be performed at 3 p.m. Sunday with an after-show discussion, at Howard Community College, 10901 Little Patuxent Pkwy, Columbia. General admission is $15. Students/seniors pay $10. Buy tickets at howardcc.edu or call 443-518-1500.
The theme of the Horowitz Performing Arts Center’s 2017-2018 season is “Revolution,” providing a platform for artists and patrons to reflect on societal shifts in technology, art and politics. In keeping with the critically acclaimed Arts Collective’s aim to serve as a creative cauldron, “Making Advances” melds a variety of visual and performance styles in a bold and wonderfully imaginative journey.
Directed by producing artistic director S. G.
Kramer, the show was developed through improv, music and movement by the cast — Jamie Barrios, Douglas Beatty, Makayla Beckles, Chania Hudson, Daniel Johnston, Kelli Jones, Maia Krapcho, Sarah Luckadoo, Michael Makar and Allie Press.
The creative team pulling it all together includes Kramer, Andrew M. Haag Jr. doing light design, Emma K. McDonnell assisted by Hudson on set design, Jessica Welch as costume designer, Bruce F. Press doing video production, and Emma K. McDonnell and Chris Sisson on sound design.
Others include concept consultant Brichard Foley, stage manager Ashe Frost and production assistant Michael Schreibstein.
At curtain, ethereal lights rise on a shadowy cosmos represented by stage fog, evocative costumes, music and freestyle dance movement — one cast member twirls a spinning globe — as a prelude to video clips from interviews with real people.
This universe, juxtaposed and paired with the realism of the video clips, surfaces at strategic moments, threaded between storytelling scenes and again at play’s end.
In an opening clip, a young girl, Caroline Broderick, explains the main difference between boys and girls. Boys, she says, put things in their pockets; girls don’t have them.
Sweet moments like these, and there are many, lend innocence to an honest and tasteful production that fosters acceptance and forgiveness as it focuses on sensitive topics.
Actors Hudson and Beatty start the storytelling rolling with a childlike, freeflowing scene that explores the physicality of gender. In the upbeat vignette that follows, Johnston and Press portray animated doll makers.
Another scene brings a twist to the classic tale of “Cinderella” narrated by Barrios and delightfully enacted by Beckles, Krapcho, Makar, Jones, Press and Johnston.
Beckles and Krapcho portray friends with diametrically opposed tastes followed by Johnston and Luckadoo in a touching father/daughter scene. A girl’s first experience with menstruation comes in a believable scene, featuring Krapcho as the mom, Press astheadolescentandMakaras herobnoxious brother, that follows.
Beatty and Makar are equally convincing as worlds-apart father and son. Then Jones, as a single mom of a transgender daughter portrayed by Hudson is brutally honest about her difficulty finding acceptance.
Next, a group of young friends — Beatty, Beckles, Luckadoo, and Jones — meet at a movie theater and engage in laughter and gossip, and two young women fall in love.
The stellar quality of the directing, design, acting and tech in “Making Advances” never falters from start to finish; all deserve mention as standouts. In the program, McConnell writes on their behalf that the cast and creatives hope to leave audiences “with something that feels bright, cosmic and expansive.”
And they do.
“Making Advances” will be performed at 3 p.m. Sunday with an after-show discussion, at Howard Community College, 10901 Little Patuxent Pkwy, Columbia. General admission is $15. Students/seniors pay $10. Buy tickets at howardcc.edu or call 443-518-1500.
PREVIOUS ARTICLE
