Don Wooten: Romeo & Juliet

Fri, 08 Apr 2022 18:56:11 GMT

Several years ago Genesius Guild founder Don Wooten recorded a number of long-form play introductions as a podcast. Two of those podcasts were about shows that we are producing this summer: Romeo & Juliet and Electra.

As a teaser for our upcoming season, we invite you to sit back, relax, and enjoy Don Wooten's introduction to Romeo & Juliet!

Credits:

• Prologue: Jim Loula (Sr.)
• Romeo: Kai Swanson
• Juliet: Chris Hicks

Special thanks to Mischa Hooker for cleaning up the audio recording

Direct MP3 link

Dell: King Arthur's Socks + Poetry

Tue, 01 Mar 2022 20:02:59 GMT

CREDITS

Floyd Dell, King Arthur's Socks

Gwen (Guenevere Robinson) - Chelsea Ward

Vivian (Vivian Smith) - Liz Sager

Mary - Anna Schneider

Lancelot (Lancelot Jones) - Mischa Hooker

Narrator - John Turner

Poetry Reading

John Turner read poems by Arthur Davison Ficke

Liz Sager read poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor: Mischa Hooker

Opening / closing music for King Arthur's Socks: Billy Murray, "I'll Do It All Over Again"

Background Music for poetry: Bach, Aria Variata in A Minor, BWV 989 (performed by Brendan Kinsella)

Theme music for program: Chopin, Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 69, no. 1 (performed by Olga Gurevich)

List of Poems Read:

· Ficke, Sonnets of a Portrait-Painter, Sonnet 2: "It needs no maxims drawn from Socrates"

· Millay, "The Dream"

· Ficke, Sonnet 13: "I am in love with high far-seeing places"

· Millay, Sonnets collected in Second April, Sonnet 1: "We talk of taxes, and I call you friend"

· Ficke, Sonnet 5: "Fate, with devoted and incessant care"

· Millay, Sonnet 2: "Into the golden vessel of great song"

· Ficke, Sonnet 16: "It was the night, the night of all my dreams"

· Millay, Sonnet 3: "Not with libations, but with shouts and laughter"

· Ficke, Six Lyrics, "Don Giovanni"

· Millay, Sonnet 4: "Only until this cigarette is ended"

· Ficke, Six Lyrics, "Like Him Whose Spirit"

· Millay, Sonnet 5: "Once more into my arid days like dew"

· Ficke, "In That Dim Monument Where Tybalt Lies"

· Millay, Sonnet 6: "No rose that in a garden ever grew"

· Ficke, Six Lyrics, "Snowtime"

· Millay, Sonnet 7: "When I too long have looked upon your face"

· Ficke, Sonnet 55: "They brought me tidings; and I did not hear"

· Millay, Sonnet 8: "And you as well must die, belovèd dust"

· Ficke, Six Lyrics, "The Birdcage"

· Millay, Sonnet 10: "Oh, my belovèd, have you thought of this"

· Ficke, Six Lyrics, "Meeting"

· Millay, Sonnet 11: "As to some lovely temple, tenantless"

· Ficke, Three Sonnets, "Old Wives' Tale"

· Millay, Sonnet 12: "Cherish you then the hope I shall forget"

· Ficke, Three Sonnets, "Holy Writ"

· Millay, "Ashes of Life"

· Ficke, Six Lyrics, "I Am Weary of Being Bitter"

· Millay, "The Penitent"

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Genesius Guild 2021 Christmas Special

Sat, 18 Dec 2021 17:49:05 GMT

Welcome to our second holiday special! We give you first a touching family Christmas story, "Christmas at Red Butte," by Lucy Maud Montgomery, the author of Anne of Green Gables. Next, a Christmas meditation by Charles Dickens, entitled "A Christmas Tree." In this piece, the author of "A Christmas Carol" offers, instead of a story, a set of reminiscences about the meaning of Christmas past as he contemplates life-long celebrations of presents and toys, books, and stories both silly and serious — including a long section on ghost stories — and of course, as "A Christmas Carol" itself reminds us, telling ghost stories was a major Christmas tradition in Victorian England, adding supernatural chills to the chills caused by the weather.

CREDITS

Montgomery, "Christmas at Red Butte": read by Dee Canfield

* Axletree, "Clothe the Fields with Plenty"; "Drops of Melting Snow"; "The Silent Grove" [https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Axletree/music-from-a-hampshire-farm]

Dickens, "A Christmas Tree": read by Mischa Hooker

* Borrtex, "Buying Presents"; "Happy Holidays"; "Christmas Eve"; "Love & Generosity" [https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Borrtex/Christmas_Time]

* Jon Sayles [http://www.jsayles.com/familypages/EarlyMusic.htm; http://www.jsayles.com/familypages/holidaymusic.htm]: Couperin, "Les barricades mistérieuses"; Ravel, Piano Concerto in G, Adagio (2nd movement); Fauré, Requiem: "Kyrie," "Libera me," "Pie Jesu"; Obrecht, "Pace Domine"; Dufay, "Proles de caelo," "Ce mois de May"; Senfl, "Gottes Gewalt Kraft"; Pevernage, "Secoure moy, madame"; Carols: "Deck the Halls," "Angels We Have Heard on High," "Es ist ein Ros entsprungen"

Theme music for program:

* Chopin, Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 69, no. 1 and Waltz in B minor, Op. 69, no. 2 (performed by Olga Gurevich)

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor: Mischa Hooker

INFORMATION ON STORIES AND PLAYS REFERENCED BY DICKENS

Dickens refers to many children's stories and plays in the course of his meditation, some still very familiar to young readers, others less familiar. Alphabet rhymes ("A Was an Archer") are still popular in easy readers; "Jack and the Beanstalk" and "Little Red Riding-Hood" are also very commonly read. Far less well known today are some of the plays Dickens mentions, such as "The Forest of Bondy, or Dog of Montargis"; or "The Tragedy of Jane Shore"; or "The History of George Barnwell." The internet provides immediate access to many of these historic works of children's literature, and it can especially be quite fun to see the old illustrations in the earlier editions even of familiar works. Apart from massive collections of scanned facsimiles offered by Google Books or the Internet Archive, one initiative to digitize and make available scans of numerous 18th- and 19th-century chapbooks is also worth pointing out: https://digital.library.mcgill.ca/chapbooks/index.php. We have gathered together a goodly collection of these old books mentioned by Dickens from these sources, in order to offer them for your interest in one spot. Warning! Looking into what another century considered good or appropriate is sometimes surprising or shocking — especially, adults should look over any such material before handing it over to children to read! Our repository of downloadable material is here: http://www.tinyurl.com/DickensChristmasTreeReferences

Direct MP3 link

Stephen Leacock - Oroastus: A Greek Tragedy

Fri, 29 Oct 2021 18:13:57 GMT

Stephen Leacock's "Oroastus: A Greek Tragedy" is a satirical essay by the early 20th-century Canadian humorist (who lived 1869-1944) on contemporary perceptions and performances of Greek tragedy in a college setting. "Oroastus" was published in 1923, and included in Leacock's collection of pieces on the theatre, "Over the Footlights." Performed by Patti Flaherty.

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Tennyson: The Cup

Sat, 02 Oct 2021 01:15:04 GMT

Alfred, Lord Tennyson, is best known as one of the most popular 19th century British poets, the author of famous pieces such as "Ulysses," "Crossing the Bar," and his multi-part treatment of Arthurian legend, "The Idylls of the King." Like many poets before and after, however, he also turned his hand to poetic drama, somewhat in the vein of Shakespeare. Although some works of this kind by poets like Byron, Shelley, and Keats, were closet dramas, not meant to be staged, the majority of Tennyson's were indeed staged, and staged quite successfully. One of his shorter verse dramas, The Cup, retells an ancient story from the times of the rise of Rome as the supreme power in the ancient Mediterranean world: in this story, the Galatians (a Celtic people akin to the Gauls, but living in the interior of Asia Minor – the area now known as Turkey) are coming to terms with Rome's rise – by way of resistance or accomodation. The proud heroine Camma resists Roman encroachment in the person of the turncoat Galatian leader Synorix, but in the end her fate, and the fate of her people, is tragic.

CREDITS

Narrator: Alaina Pascarella

Synorix:  Aaron E. Sullivan

Synnatus: James J. Loula

Camma: Denise Yoder

Phoebe: Joie Stoefen

Priestess: Zoe Grabow

Chorus of Priestesses: Denise Yoder, Joie Stoefen, Alaina Pascarella, Zoe Grabow

Attendant: Nathan Elgatian

Boy: Josef Bodenbender

Maid: Katie Phillips

Antonius: Bryan Woods

Publius: Steve Trainor

Nobleman: Michael Callahan

Messenger: Jacob Lund

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor: Mischa Hooker

Sound Effects: Mike Koenig, Dominic Treis, BBC, and Mischa Hooker

Music for Tennyson: Brahms, Tragic Overture, opus 81 (performed by Czech National Symphony Orchestra)

Theme music for program: Chopin, Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 69, no. 1 (performed by Olga Gurevich)

Original Music: Denise Yoder, Mischa Hooker

Direct MP3 link

FOG (O'Neill) and ENEMIES (Hapgood / Boyce)

Thu, 19 Aug 2021 19:22:13 GMT

In 1915, two Davenport, Iowa, natives, Susan Glaspell and George Cram Cook, started a theater group in Provincetown on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, which turned out to have a profound influence on American drama forever. This visionary new company, the “Provincetown Players,” had humble beginnings in the private home of some sympathetic friends: Neith Boyce and Hutchins Hapgood. Many of the Provincetown shows featured a number of short scripts presented together in a single night of performance, and this program follows that tradition.

First on the bill today is a script by Eugene O'Neill, first produced in January 1917. This script, unjustly neglected beside some of the playwrights more well known works, combines O'Neill's recurring fascination with the sea, including a setting especially reminiscent of the dangerous Atlantic crossing that had proved disastrous for the Titanic less than five years before the play was performed — with a lively debate on practical life and poetry, and a supernatural eeriness.

The second play on today’s bill is a shorter script entitled "Enemies" — it was first staged in the summer of 1916. It was written by those hospitable friends of Jig and Susan, Hutchins Hapgood and Neith Boyce, whose house was the first Provincetown Players' performance space, and who were Midwesterners just like Jig and Susan — Hutchins from Illinois and Neith from Indiana. Each of them reportedly wrote the lines for one of the two speaking parts, He and She respectively, in this collaborative, argumentative exploration of the meaning of love, marriage, and fidelity in the modern world.

CREDITS

(FOG)

Narrator: Susan Perrin-Sallak

A Poet: Merlin Nelson

A Man of Business: Marc Nelson

Third Officer of a Steamer: Philip Tunnicliff

Sound Effects: BBC, LG (freesound.org), oldestmillenial (freesound.org)

(ENEMIES)

Narrator: Mischa Hooker

He: Mike Braddy

She: Andrea Braddy

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor: Mischa Hooker

Opening and closing music: Borodin, String Quartet No. 2 in D Major, 1st and 4thmovements (performed by Musopen String Quartet)

Theme music for program: Chopin, Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 69, no. 1 (performed by Olga Gurevich)

Direct MP3 link

How He Lied to Her Husband (Shaw)

Tue, 25 May 2021 15:20:53 GMT

George Bernard Shaw is a universally acknowledged classic playwright in the modern British theatre, known equally for his great wit and his theatrical influence. Genesius Guild has repeatedly staged two favorites over the years, "The Dark Lady of the Sonnets" (most recently in 2001), and "Don Juan in Hell" (most recently in 2012). The little play "How He Lied to Her Husband" was a parody-version of a longer play of Shaw's that had caused a sensation and a scandal: "Candida." Just as the guardians of morals suspected might happen in real life, in Shaw's short piece he imagines a love affair prompted, even licensed in the minds of the participants by the love triangle at the focus of "Candida." As in the longer play, a young poet in love disrupts the domestic stability of the married couple; as in the longer play, the woman stays with her husband in the end. But Shaw has of course put his own characteristic witty spin on this sillier version of his own ideas.

Credits:

Narrator - Mollie Schmelzer

She (Aurora Bompas) - Sarah Willie

He (Henry Apjohn) - Jack Bevans

Her Husband (Teddy Bompas) - John Wright

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor - Mischa Hooker

Sound effects by BBC

Tim_Y, "Tangled Tango"

Chopin, Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 69, no. 1 and Waltz in B minor, Op. 69, no. 2 (performed by Olga Gurevich)

Direct MP3 link

Hamlet Prince of Denmark (Shakespeare & Lamb)

Mon, 19 Apr 2021 17:37:39 GMT

Hamlet, prince of Denmark. Shakespeare's play was last presented on the Genesius Guild stage in Lincoln Park in the summer of 2019. For today's presentation, you will hear the story of the play along with excerpts from the play.

Tales from Shakespeare:

In the early 19thcentury, the Romantic poet Charles Lamb and his sister Mary embarked on an enterprise to retell the stories of Shakespeare's best-loved plays for a children's audience. Charles took the tragedies, and Mary took the comedies, and together they produced a best-selling reinterpretation of the Bard's works, Tales from Shakespeare, that achieved the status of classics in their own right. They were meant to be introductions to the study of the plays themselves: As the Lambs wrote in a preface on the subject of the benefits their own retelling, but much more so the plays themselves, would provide: "What these Tales shall have been to the young readers, that and much more it is the writers' wish that the true Plays of Shakespeare may prove to them in older years—enrichers of the fancy, strengtheners of virtue, a withdrawing from all selfish and mercenary thoughts, a lesson of all sweet and honorable thoughts and actions, to teach courtesy, benignity, generosity, humanity: for of examples, teaching these virtues, his pages are full."

Now, here's a challenge: Given the Lambs' intention to retell the stories for an audience of children, can you detect any ways this has possibly affected the storyline of the play or the presentation of the characters?

Today we present to you "Hamlet, Prince of Denmark," in the Lambs' retelling, narrated by Dee Canfield; and interspersed with the Lambs' text, excerpts from Shakespeare's original play, performed by actors from the Genesius Guild's 2019 production of Hamlet.

Credits:

Narrator (reader of Lamb) - Dee Canfield

Hamlet - Andrew Bruning

Ghost - Mischa Hooker

Ophelia - Sarah Willie

Claudius - Phillip Dunbridge

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor - Mischa Hooker

Transition music: John Dowland, "Flow, My Tears," performed by Jon Sayles [jsayles.com]

Theme music: Chopin, Waltz in A flat Major, Opus 69, number 1, performed by Olga Gurevich.

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"Hamlet and His Problems" - T.S. Eliot

Mon, 05 Apr 2021 19:05:12 GMT

Join us for a reading of T.S. Eliot's classic essay "Hamlet and His Problems" from The Sacred Wood: Essays on Poetry and Criticism.

Read by Mischa Hooker.

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Suppressed Desires and The Game

Mon, 15 Mar 2021 17:16:40 GMT

Suppressed Desires by Susan Glaspell and George Cram Cook

Cast
Narrator: Kitty Israel
Henrietta: Mattie Gelaude
Stephen: Andrew Bruning
Mabel: Jo Vasquez

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor: Mischa Hooker

Sound effects: Mischa Hooker and Caroline Ford

Intro / outro music: Joseph C. Smith’s Orchestra, “Smiles”

Theme music: Chopin, Waltz in A flat Major, Opus 69, number 1, performed by Olga Gurevich.

The Game by Louise Bryant

Cast
Narrator: Kathy Calder
Death: Mike Carron
Life: Angela Rathman
Youth: Andrew Calder
The Girl: Brianna Gray

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor: Mischa Hooker

Sound effects by Mike Koenig

Background Music by Royalty Free Music

Theme music: Chopin, Waltz in A flat Major, Opus 69, number 1, performed by Olga Gurevich.

Background

In 1915, two Davenport, Iowa, natives, Susan Glaspell and George Cram Cook, started a theater group in Provincetown on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, which turned out to have a profound influence on American drama forever. Many of the Provincetown shows featured a number of short scripts presented together in a single night of performance, and this program follows that tradition. For more information about the Provincetown Players, Glaspell, Cook, and their connection to the Quad Cities, visit www.genesius.org/provincetown-players.php

First on the bill today is that first play written by Susan and Jig, “Suppressed Desires.” In our performance, the role of Henrietta is played by Mattie Gelaude, her husband Stephen is played by Andrew Bruning, her sister Mabel by Jo Vasquez; the narrator is Kitty Israel.

The second play on today’s bill is a shorter script entitled “The Game: A Morality Play,” a highly stylized, symbolic meditation on the human condition by Louise Bryant, a journalist and feminist activist who arrived on the scene fresh from Portland, Oregon, brought out to the East Coast by a burgeoning love affair with Oregon native John Reed. He described her as “an artist, a rampant, joyous individualist, a poet and a revolutionary.” This script was written and first staged in the 1916, with World War I raging in Europe. The horror and ravages of war looming on the horizon, along with the personal dramas of romantic relationships such as that of Louise Bryant and John Reed themselves, were the large-scale and small-scale backdrops for the piece, which features a personified Life and Death, playing their game with the lives and deaths of human beings, such as the poet and the dancer who meet under their supervision. In today’s program, Life is played by Angela Rathman, Death by Mike Carron, Youth (the poet) by Andrew Calder, and the Girl by Brianna Gray; the narrator is Kathy Calder.

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Don Wooten discusses Antigone

Thu, 18 Feb 2021 17:08:06 GMT

Join us as we listen to Don Wooten discuss the first play ever performed by the Genesius Guild: Sophocles' Antigone. Wooten discusses the show, describes the plot, and explores the play's themes - including questions of the separation of religion and government and the battle between following an unjust law and following one's conscience.

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Philoctetes (by Sophocles)

Fri, 05 Feb 2021 20:06:33 GMT

Sophocles’ Philoctetes. Although less well known than his Oedipus Rex and Antigone, this play has especially received notice lately in Seamus Heaney’s adaptation entitled “The Cure at Troy” – with the evocative words spoken by the chorus: “History says, don't hope / On this side of the grave. / But then, once in a lifetime / The longed-for tidal wave / Of justice can rise up, / And hope and history rhyme.” The story takes place near the end of the Trojan War – the Greeks have found out that they need to retrieve a warrior who had been wounded and left behind on the island of Lemnos. Only he – Philoctetes – and the bow he had as a gift from the dying Heracles – would allow them to finally defeat Troy. We begin as Odysseus has arrived on the island, bringing Neoptolemus, the son of the now dead Achilles, to help him. Neoptolemus will soon be forced to test his own integrity against the deception planned by Odysseus.

Credits:

Narrator - Kathy Calder

Odysseus - Matt Walsh

Neoptolemus - Tyler Henning

Philoctetes - Andy Curtiss

Chorus (1) - Guy Cabell

Chorus (2) - Jason Dlouhy

Chorus (3) - Marc Nelson

Merchant / Spy - T. J. Green

Heracles - Phillip Dunbridge

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor - Mischa Hooker

Translated by Ian Johnston, adapted by Mischa Hooker

Sound effects: Daniel Simion and Mike Koenig

Background music: Royalty Free Music

Theme music: Chopin, Waltz in A flat Major, Opus 69, number 1, performed by Olga Gurevich.

Direct MP3 link

A Christmas Carol

Fri, 05 Feb 2021 19:43:20 GMT

Enjoy this radio theater production of A Christmas Carol by the Genesius Guild in Rock Island, IL!

Credits

Narrator - Susan Perrin-Sallak

Scrooge - Mike Carron

Fred (Scrooge's Nephew) - Phil Tunnicliff

Gentleman - Scott Tunnicliff

Bob Cratchit (Scrooge's Clerk) - Jake Walker

Marley's Ghost - Phillip Dunbridge

Ghost of Christmas Past - Arc Simmons-Curtis

Fezziwig - John Donald O'Shea

Girl (Belle) - Anna Tunnicliff

Ghost of Christmas Present - T.J. Green

Mrs. Cratchit - Stephanie Moeller

Cratchit children and Boy - Leo Braddy

Peter Cratchit / Cratchit children - Josef Bodenbender

Tiny Tim / Cratchit children - Rosie Bodenbender

Martha Cratchit - Sophia Kilburg

Scrooge's niece - Mallory Park

Scrooge's niece's sister - Elena Vallejo

Businessman 1 - Don Faust

Businessman 2 - Jim Strauss

Red-faced gentleman - Jack Bevans

Char-woman - Melita Tunnicliff

Old Joe - Bob Hanske

Mrs. Dilber - Heather Nobiling

Girl - Kaylee Gundling

Director / Organizer / Sound Editor - Mischa Hooker

Musicians and Music Recording - Michael Callahan, Amie Callahan, Bailey Callahan, Bryn Callahan

Direct MP3 link