MOUNT VERNON — “The Laramie Project,” a play about the murder of a gay college student in Wyoming, is coming to eastern Iowa in a production featuring Cornell College students and professional actors from Riverside Theatre in Iowa City.
Performances in Cornell’s Kimmel Theatre are March 13 at 7 p.m. and March 14 and 15 at 8 p.m. Tickets are $8 for adults and $5 for students and senior citizens. For reservations, call 895-4293.
The play moves to Riverside Theatre, 213 N. Gilbert St., March 28-30, April 3-6 and 9-13. Performances are at 7 p.m. Wednesday and Thursdays, 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays. For ticket prices and reservations, call (319) 338-7672.
“The Laramie Project,” which became a movie for HBO and another for network television, was the second-most produced play of the 2001-02 season, according to American Theater magazine. The production was sparked by a 1998 hate crime, when Matthew Shepard, 21, was beaten, tied to a fence and left to die by two local men his age whom he met in a Laramie bar. The reaction by local residents was captured in interviews with more than 200 people conducted by members of the Tectonic Theatre Project of New York. The play, edited from transcripts of the interviews, features more than 80 characters. They will be portrayed by 10 actors in the Cornell-Riverside version.
“The play intrigued us because of the issues it explores and the form in which it explores them — as a theatrical documentary,” said director Jody Hovland, Cornell artist-in-residence. “And it’s an actor’s dream with over 80 characters of diverse ages and types. Having a company of both more mature professional actors and young artists makes it possible to bring real variety to this landscape of characters.
“The material has great beauty and courage. It’s sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes wry, sometimes funny, too. So it’s a wonderfully human experience for the actors to share with each other,” she said.
Nearly 500 productions of “The Laramie Project” are taking place worldwide this year, Hovland said.
“It’s providing an opportunity for communities to really engage in the ideas of the play, particularly how we respond to difference in our culture and what it means to fit into a community,” she said. A post-performance discussion is scheduled March 15.