{"id":19767,"date":"2021-07-21T08:22:03","date_gmt":"2021-07-21T12:22:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/?p=19767"},"modified":"2021-07-21T08:42:18","modified_gmt":"2021-07-21T12:42:18","slug":"double-edge-theatre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/2021\/07\/21\/double-edge-theatre\/","title":{"rendered":"Double Edge Theatre\u2019s \u2018Memories and Dreams\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cIs this the beginning?\u201d asks a man in a T-shirt who steps out of the audience of Double Edge Theatre\u2019s new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d<\/a> to take center stage at the outdoor pavilion on the company\u2019s farm in Ashfield. During the ensemble’s dress rehearsal the other night for the show, which runs from July 21 to Aug. 8, the man speaks of anxiety dreams about being an unprepared actor, about eating past full. \u201cWait, this has already happened. \u2026 This didn\u2019t really go as we thought it was going to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

A troupe of performers in black and white suddenly arrives and paints his face white and dresses him in a black coat. He speaks of eternity and grieving. They dance.<\/p>\n

We follow the performance as it roves through gardens and fields, indoors and out again. The order of events varies. It can feel a bit like drifting through glimpses of dreams, hints of visions. We stop along a creek, where (performers costumed as) a bird, a lama and other creatures emerge from the foliage. We walk to a garden, where people dressed in white dance, some characters seem to have boulders for heads, and a person in white flies overhead (on a wire). \u201cWe here were once stars propelled through immeasurable events.\u201d<\/p>\n

As we walk to the next scene, a chorus sings: \u201cEach of us is a thousand stories long.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cI think myth certainly informs this work. Both the adventure of myth and the personal in myth,\u201d co-director and co-designer Jeremy Louise Eaton tells me after the rehearsal. \u201c\u2026I think dreams yield myth. Maybe the dream is the super intimate personal experience and the myth is the universal outward expression of a human question or metaphor or struggle.\u201d The show interweaves dreams and myths, \u201cmaybe allowing people to feel that their dreams\u2014which can feel insignificant or small\u2014can be mythic.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the sun begins to set, a performer in black and white insists on the perfection of a summer tomato, he suggests a journey, he dashes off into the fields. When we follow, he magically appears next to us and leads us to a garden. \u201cThere are no limits to dreams,\u201d he says. \u201cJust don\u2019t wake me up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Inside a barn-theater, an actor asks, \u201cOf what is the colored artist capable?\u201d And announces a story from W.E.B. Du Bois of a Princess Steel (\u201cFor years, our home has been under attack by the White Lord\u201d), the White Lord, a knight in silver, a Smoke Queen. \u201cWe are celebrating moving forward together. Healing from the past to make a new future,\u201d the Princess says. The show heads back outside into the night. A man talks of towns flooded to create a reservoir. Women light torches, swing in trees, swim across a mirror-smooth pond, sing to followers of the ancient Greek god Bacchus.<\/p>\n

Du Bois\u2019s tale is \u201ca very simple story about oppression and taking back your own story,\u201d co-director and co-designer Stacy Klein tells me after the rehearsal. \u201cAll these stories are about taking back your own story. \u2026 In my mind, it\u2019s pretty evident that we need to reclaim our stories and we need to take back our rites and our rights.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

If this is the kind of coverage of arts, nature, cultures and activisms you appreciate, please support Wonderland by contributing to Wonderland on Patreon<\/a>. And sign up for our free, (hopefully) weekly newsletter<\/a> so that you don’t miss any of our reporting. (All content \u00a9Greg Cook 2021 or the respective creators.)<\/em><\/p>\n

\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Double<\/a>
Double Edge Theatre rehearses their new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d at the company\u2019s farm-theater in Ashfield, July 19, 2021. (\u00a9Greg Cook photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\n

If this is the kind of coverage of arts, nature, cultures and activisms you appreciate, please support Wonderland by contributing to Wonderland on Patreon<\/a>. And sign up for our free, (hopefully) weekly newsletter<\/a> so that you don’t miss any of our reporting. (All content \u00a9Greg Cook 2021 or the respective creators.)<\/em><\/p>\n

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\u201cIs this the beginning?\u201d asks a man in a T-shirt who steps out of the audience of Double Edge Theatre\u2019s new spectacle \u201cMemories and Dreams\u201d to take center stage at the outdoor pavilion on the company\u2019s farm in Ashfield. During the ensemble’s dress rehearsal the other night for the show, which runs from July 21 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19748,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[109,110],"tags":[466,465],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19767"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19767"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19767\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19780,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19767\/revisions\/19780"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregcookland.com\/wonderland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}