"Nebraska," an original one-act play by Washington University graduate Alan Griswold and winner of the University's 1997 A.E. Hotchner Playwriting Competition, will debut in the A.E. Hotchner Studio Theatre April 23-26.
The Performing Arts Department in Arts and Sciences will present Griswold's work at 8 p.m. April 23, 24 and 25 and at 2 p.m. April 26.
"Nebraska" follows two strangers, Harold and Bethany, through a series of encounters at an isolated train station in Kearney, Neb. Though they first meet by chance, over a period of weeks and months the couple returns to the station again and again, becoming more familiar with one another and gradually revealing what drives them to such a desolate spot.
"They're looking for something they need -- comfort, friendship, a diversion, maybe love," explained Andrea Urice, artist in residence, who directs the play. "Harold is privately and quietly dealing with a rather tragic past while Bethany, in many respects his polar opposite, is playful and gregarious and eager to have her world opened up by someone new."
The set design, by Melissa Mitchell, a graduate student in the School of Architecture, is a spare evocation of a train station platform. "We reduced the set to a few essential elements -- a light pole, a bench, telephone wires receding into the distance," said Urice. "We wanted to create a sense of open space and perspective -- a sense that the characters are meeting on this little island surrounded by a vast Nebraska prairie."
Griswold, a native of Knoxville, Tenn., graduated from the University in 1996 with a bachelor of fine arts degree in sculpture from the School of Art and a bachelor's degree in English literature from the College of Arts and Sciences. He currently works at the Gersh Agency in Beverly Hills, Calif. "Nebraska" is his first play.
The annual A.E. Hotchner Playwriting Competition is open to all Washington University students and graduates of one year. Hotchner, a 1940 graduate of the University, is the author of many screenplays, novels and plays, including the 1966 memoir "Papa Hemingway," which recounts his long friendship with the famous writer. His recent historical novel "Louisiana Purchase," based on the founding of St. Louis, is currently published in paperback by St. Louis' Virginia Publishing Company.
Tickets are $10 for the general public and $7 for senior citizens and University faculty, staff and students. They are available at the Edison Theatre Box Office at 935-6543, and all MetroTix outlets, 534-1111. For more information, call 935-5858.
--Liam Otten
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