Blog Entry #6

In all honesty the popularity of this play comes as a surprise to me as it touches on a very controversial topic but El Guindi does a fantastic job of making every character look like a bad guy. The main theme or the play itself is the situation. El Guindi uses the situation to illustrate the various feelings that were in the air around the time the attacks had taken place. Feelings that incriminated a whole race and made it seem as if those who accused them were horrible bigots. But are the same time those were doing the blaming showed a great sense of patriotism those being blamed almost felt that they indirectly played a role in the incident that took place on that day. One of the underlying motifs that Yussef addresses is the fact that the freedom that is enjoyed in America is seen as a luxury around the world but the populace does not realize.

In the drama Carl states, “Believe it or not, safeguarding the innocent is as important apprehending the bad guys.”(pg 174) As if to say for the safety of the community’s freedom some must lose theirs. El Guindi uses this as a theme that the audience must realize as the watch Khaled be subject to physical abuse without any substantial evidence of his involvement in the attacks. But he also makes it apparent that it is not just people who look like Khaled that have been subject to such treatment through Bartlett’s statement, “Yesterday the Irish and the Poles, today it’s you (Khaled). Tomorrow it might be the Dutch.” El Guindi’s way of saying for society to keeps it balance someone must receive the blame/hate for crimes/hardships faced by the greater population.

Blog Entry #5

Clifford Odets drama could be reconstructed to fit modern days by addressing the issues concerning the economic downturn of the past six years. Only the year of 2011 provided the best scenario do modernize Waiting for Lefty through the different groups that came to existent during the Occupy Wall Street movement. By using the same structure of the play by having different scenarios and short stories the drama could address the different groups advocating their cause during the gatherings. Really the age group that Odets aimed for was the young adults of the 1930’s. This is the same age demographic that made up the many factions of Occupy Wall Street. The best setting would probably having it in take place in New York where the movement began and having the different short stories represent the various groups that came to existent throughout the country. I think each story Odets used in his original wouldn’t need much tweaking because the main issue his play addressed was social class and inequality. Even though the play is set around “the Great Depression”, Occupy Wall Street was trying to address the issues with their main slogan “We are the 99%.” This new retooled drama would probably not have the same effect Waiting for Lefty had during its time but it would still be effective in persuading its audience on the issues it addressed. Simply because of the fact that the concept is still very powerful in the way it involves the different groups involved with the movement or the subject matter.

Blog Entry #4

After seeing the magnificent performance by TCU Theatre of Promerance’s The Elephant Man I was left with almost the same emotional sentiment towards Merrick. I first thought that watching the play would skew the way I had originally visualized the drama but the show was very similar to the way I had imagined it. One might say that you are limited to the director’s vision of the play when watching it as a show but never do we considered the fact that our imagination can limit the way we view things. It is through seeing it in someone else’s mind that we really open the possibilities of interpretation. For example the pinheads in the play were portrayed to be mentally ill but I originally just imagined them with actual deformed cone shaped heads. The director opened my mind to the fact that Promerance was addressing another societal issue within his play. The live performance allows for the stage craft to add emotional effect to the performance as they do not have to fit the realistic barriers present in the movie. The rotating stage added considerable effect to the show and this would not have been possible in the film. But at the same time the film is able to depict more realistically what John Merrick, the elephant man, might have gone through during the time period the play is set in. The film is able to capture this period with more accuracy than the play because through the many actors and sets involved there is a real sense of attention to detail.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJKdahwqC98