Orestes 2.0 by Charles Mee Jr.
(based on the Euripides)

Potiker Theater at UCSD, 2020.

Director - Joseph Hendel
Scenic - Miranda Friels
Costumes - Natalie Barshow
Lighting - Mextly Couzin
Sound - Stephen Jensen
Projections - Elizabeth Barrett
PSM - Rebekah Fagan
Movement Training - Eric Geiger

photos by Jim Carmody, Manny Rotenberg, Mextly Couzin, Natalie Barshow, Miranda Friels

My thesis production at UCSD was Charles Mee’s Orestes 2.0, which was presented at the Potiker Theater, February 29-March 6, 2020. The production was set in a nightmare “Hotel California” of institutional corruption and psychic violence served with a big, broad Southern Californian smile.

The philosophical core of the production aesthetic came from my study of Tadeusz Kantor’s theater, particularly his “Reality of the Lowest Rank” and the reflections on Dadaism in the Milano Lessons. Our movement vocabulary was derived from descriptions of PTSD in the book “Achilles in Vietnam” by psychologist Jonathan Shay as well as contemporary movement practices in paradoxical movement and the phrase “come closer, don’t touch me.” In addition to directing the production, I also voiced the role of Farley the astronomical advisor, which I performed live from the balcony where the sound designer and I had set up a little electronic music band to livescore the show.

The Times of San Diego called the production “a circus of philosophical and political ideas, conveyed through intense theatricality and physicality that is breathtaking in its inventive ferocity…” and a “tempestuous fever-dream of a production” “teeming with refreshing, youthful energy.”

If you would like to see the archival video of the production or read my pre-production document or written thesis about the production and my time at grad school, shoot me an email!