Victoria’s Intrepid Theatre, well known for featuring experimental theater, is offering an entertaining way to spend your evenings this month.
Two one-act comedies will be featured in a clever play involving dynamics between professors and students. Even the names set the tone for the academic-related proceedings: the comedies are entitled Essay and The Lesson.
Essay, a product of Canadian playwright Hannah Moscovitch, is a dynamic satire that’s sure to be an engaging experience. Director Julian Cervello describes the plot as “the story of a status struggle between a professor, a TA, and an undergraduate student named Pixy.”
Cervello elaborates on the underlying concepts, which are certainly relatable to any student.
“Well-formulated arguments and appropriate language are used in support of a central thesis in essay writing, and that makes essayists socially argumentative,” says Cervello. “Making your point, putting it up against other academics, means that history is always being rewritten by generation upon generation, like layers of wallpaper.”
As most students realize, disagreements are most common in any academic setting, according to Cervello.
“The particular history department in which our play takes place is at war,” he says. “It’s an intellectual war, but there are serious consequences.”
The Lesson, written by playwright Eugene Ionesco and first performed in 1951, features an unfortunate professor struggling to teach a young student. Award-winning actress Melissa Blank plays the luckless pupil in this production of catastrophic ends.
Essay and The Lesson
8 pm, March 20–23 and 28–30; 2 pm, March 30
Intrepid Theatre (1609 Blanshard)
$15-$20, ticketrocket.org