The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Friday, March 1, 2019 — 5
COMMUNITY CULTURE NOTEBOOK
DISNEY CHANNEL
They were doing “High School
Musical,” of all things. Of course
I would come back to support
my sister and my old theatre
department, but “High School
Musical?” The movie is iconic and
an essential part of my childhood.
The stage musical is an awkward
embarrassment to theatre and
Troy Bolton himself. So the
fact that it was the show I was
returning to my worst nightmare
to see somehow made an already
unfortunate occasion worse.
I have done theatre pretty much
all my life, to the point where it
pretty much is my life (yes, I’m
one of those kids). I love theatre,
it’s my passion. But my experience
with high school theatre often
made me forget that love and lose
my passion. Throughout my four
years of high school, I had a lot of
damaging experiences that really
impacted me, even to this day. All
those memories came flooding
back as I filed into the alumni row
of the auditorium I knew so well.
Since leaving my high school
theatre behind, a lot has changed
in my life. I was a lead in a summer
show at a respected community
theatre, I started school at the
University, I made great friends
and new memories. Not only had
my life changed, but I changed.
I was no longer that little high
school girl who was damaged
by disloyal friends and hateful
directors. So why did I still feel
so small being put back in that
environment?
The problem was, I didn’t feel
like I had overcome my past yet.
My demons from high school
were still haunting me. I had
applied to the School of Music,
Theatre & Dance but hadn’t heard
back yet; I hadn’t been able to do
a show. I didn’t feel like I was any
more successful in theatre than
when I was shoved into chorus
parts and berated by directors.
I still heard the taunts ringing
in my ear. I still felt like I wasn’t
good enough.
Luckily enough, I did end up
where I wanted to be. At the time
I went back, I had no idea all the
good things in store. I didn’t
know that two days after seeing
the show, I would get cast in my
first college show. I didn’t know
that four days after seeing the
show, I would be accepted into
the School of Music, Theatre
& Dance Bachelor of Theatre
Arts program. I didn’t have that
knowledge of success shielding
me from the insecurities I felt
when I was back where success
seemed impossible.
The thing is, sometimes you
have to face your demons without
knowledge
of
your
current
successes shielding you from
your past failures. I had to find
that strength in myself, not what
I had accomplished or how far I’d
gotten since leaving high school
behind. Instead of allowing not
only my high school experience
to be ruined, but also my post-
high school experience. I tried to
remember the little things that
made me happy there and all
the happy emotions I felt being
back. I still loved theatre. I still
was immensely proud of all my
kids up onstage. I still hugged
my sister and congratulated my
friends. Of course, I avoided my
old director like the plague and
practically sprinted to the other
side of the lobby when I saw my
ex-best-friend — that pain isn’t
leaving anytime soon. But I didn’t
let that stop me from enjoying the
— albeit questionable show — and
I certainly didn’t let it haunt me
when I returned to school Sunday
afternoon.
Sitting in the alumni row of my
old high school auditorium, seeing
my past up on the stage in front of
me, I realized that I will never be
able to forget my experiences in
that theatre program. Maybe I
hadn’t completely overcome my
past. Maybe I wasn’t necessarily
where I wanted to be. Maybe I
would never get to either of those
points. But I could take comfort
in knowing how far I’ve come,
and that I’ll never be back where
I was again. I found the strength
in myself to face my demons, and
they were a lot less scary when
they looked like Troy Bolton.
Facing your demons, who
look a lot like Troy Bolton
DANA PIERANGELI
Daily Arts Wrtier
Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen’s “The Exonerated” is dedicated to
“the exonerated” and “those who are still waiting.” The piece follows
six wrongfully convicted prisoners from the time of their arrest
until the time of their release. This past weekend, it was presented
in the Arthur Miller Theater by the Department of Musical Theatre
under the direction of Geoff Packard, LSA Lecturer of Drama.
Rather than following one story through to its conclusion, the
work constantly fluctuates between different stories. The play
starts soon after each prisoner’s arrest for a crime they did not
commit. Though the audience may not see the connections between
each prisoner at first,
the police’s conduct
soon
makes
this
connection
clear;
in every instance,
some mix of racism,
police
bias
and
faulty prosecutorial
practices
lead
the
inmates
to
be
wrongfully
convicted.
From
the
beginning, the play
was held together
by the simple beauty
of
its
production.
The set was simple:
three
black
boxes
organized in steps
and
twelve
black,
armless desk chairs.
The
lighting
was
similarly elegant and
minimal: purple lights highlighting the concrete wall in the back
of theater, frequent blackouts and spotlights accompanying the
changes in scene.
Between scenes, the cast would hum and wordlessly sing brief
melodic passages, accompanied by simple recordings of a guitar
at some points and a piano at others. While melodically and
harmonically simple, these brief interludes did much to punctuate
the otherwise heavy subject matter.
As the School of Music, Theatre & Dance had advised, the
production contained multiple instances of strong language. In
one instance in particular, a prisoner’s false arrest and conviction
is accompanied by clear racial bias
on the part of the police — they are
depicted using the n-word casually
and repeatedly to refer to this prisoner.
While this callous use of the n-word
was perhaps realistic, it was hard to
palette.
This set the tone for the next half
hour of the play, as it moved between
various failures of the criminal justice
system. One
prisoner was
convicted on
questionable
forensic
evidence,
another
on
the
false
testimony of
a murderer
who
immediately
reached
a
plea
deal
with the police. And in every instance,
these prisoners’ lives were torn apart as
they were convicted of a crime that they
did not commit.
From there, the play focused on their
collective experiences in prison, some
more pleasant than others. The play also
began to focus on the death penalty and
the morality of the prisoners being put
on death row. “Why do we do that?” one
prisoner asked.
In one particularly jarring instance, as a prisoner on stage spoke
about execution by electric chair, the lights over the audience
flashed bright white three times. All around me, audience members
muttered in fright and surprise — lighting designer Emily Miu more
than succeeded in shocking her audience, assuming this was her
goal.
As the play moved past these false convictions and lengthy
imprisonments, however, it began to lose steam. The exoneration
prior to execution of every prisoner (save one prisoner’s husband),
for example, felt a little unrealistic. Up until this point, the play
had
succeeded
in
its
suspension
of
disbelief.
But
the
sudden change from
extremely dark subject
matter
to
inspiring
legal
challenges
made me question the
plot, particularly the
selection of these six
specific cases and the
degree to which they
are representative of
the larger American
criminal
justice
system.
The
play’s
depiction of women,
furthermore,
was
lacking. Most of the
women were wives of
wrongfully convicted
prisoners; throughout
the play, they existed
on stage solely through the wrongful convictions of their husbands.
The play featured one female prisoner, a woman convicted of
murder and sentenced to death row along with her husband. Though
she made it out of prison, her husband was executed. And in the end,
she framed the remainder of her life largely through her husband’s
wrongful execution and the time that she had lost with him. The
women in the play lacked autonomy — a feature of the mid-20th-
century setting of the play that nevertheless felt like a slight moral
failing.
On the whole, the play was a poignant reminder of the pressure
that many police forces feel to arrest a suspect for violent crimes,
and thus the frequent wrongful convictions that permeate the
criminal justice system. It was a dark, serious narrative that was
troubling and hard to watch at times. And yet I left convinced of the
failures of our criminal justice system and committed to working
to fix this problem. It was something that I will not soon forget –
something that I will no doubt be thinking about for a long time.
‘The Exonerated’ exposes injustices of justice system
SAMMY SUSSMAN
Daily Arts Writer
COMMUNITY CULTURE REVIEW
Between scenes, the cast would hum
and wordlessly sing brief melodic
passages, accompanied by simple
recordings of a guitar at some points
and a piano at others
In one particularly jarring instance,
as a prisoner on stage spoke about
execution by electric chair, the lights
over the audience flashed bright white
three times
The opening track on the
new Lily & Madeleine record,
Canterbury Girls, is called “Self
Care” — a reference, surely, to
the lately revitalized cultural
priority
of
self
care.
But
Indiana
sisters
Lily
and
Madeleine
Jurkiewicz
are a package
deal, and even
a song that
nominally
seems
to
look
inward
ultimately
functions as
a
dialogue
between
them.
The
lines
from
the
chorus
— “I’m sure
you
don’t
understand
/
Who
the
hell I think
I am / Your
beautiful
eyes are sad
and
scared
/ But I can’t
make myself care” — hint at a
relationship of tough love and
honest conversation, making
it a strong characterization of
what is to come from the rest of
the album.
Canterbury
Girls
marks
the fifth full-length album
for Lily & Madeleine, who
first attracted listeners with
the melodic, complementary
synchrony
of
their
voices
and
harmonies
featured
in
homemade
high
school
YouTube videos. Their ouevre
is one marked by a careful
consistency, primarily working
in the realm of folk pop and
constantly making use of the
natural ways in which their
soft vocals join one another and
intertwine.
This
newest
addition
is
named after Canterbury Park
in Indianapolis, where the
sisters would sometimes go to
play while growing up. While
the sisters have relocated to
New York City, it’s clear from
their sound that they still hold
the roots of their music very
close
to
heart.
Canterbury
Girls finds them continuing to
make use of their trademark
hypnotic harmonies, while also
diving deeper into the pop-
informed atmosphere that has
distinguished Keep It Together
and some of their other recent
releases.
Nowhere
do
they
abandon the sounds of the
Midwest entirely, but they do
explore more geographically
on tracks like “Pachinko Song,”
which tracks Lily on a journey
through Tokyo: “I ran through
Tokyo hoping to find the place
/ Where only I could be, but
I never found it / But I never
found it.”
“Soaked
in
sunshine,
don’t know where to be,” the
Jurkiewicz sisters sing on the
titular
track,
“Canterbury
Girls.” Yet the album itself, as
a whole, feels like it exists in a
somewhat more liminal space
— hinted at by the album cover,
which depicts the two of them,
inclined toward each other and
toward us, standing in front
of a vast lake under a haze
of purplish clouds. Purples,
oranges and yellows converge
on this cover in the visages of
Lily and Madeleine, evoking
a
soft
space
that
could
be
either a sunrise
or
a
sunset,
depending
on
your
interpretation.
In a musical
sense,
the
explorations
and
preoccupations
of
the
album
do
indeed
maneuver
around
the
edges
of
a
liminal
softness. Songs
like
“Bruises,”
“Circles”
and
“Analog
Love” dip into
a
reflective
and
at
times
melancholy
sensibility.
On
the other hand,
“Supernatural
Sadness,”
“Pachinko Song” and “Can’t
Help the Way I Feel” are all
somewhat jauntier melodies
that feel like they’ve drawn
inspiration from the fringe pop
hits of earlier ages.
Canterbury
Girls
delves
into melancholy, love, sadness
and sisterhood. It’s a trim
ten songs, some of which are
more pop-inspired and seem
to beckon reawakening and
rejuvenation, while others feel
more like dreamy incantations
or even sore laments. Lily and
Madeleine sound as magical
together as ever, and even
though they haven’t forged
paths into remarkably new
territory, they do continue to
deliver quality songs that strike
a fine balance between peace
and despair, beauty and pain,
harmony and solitude.
Lily & Madeleine’s dreamy
folk-pop on their stunning
release, ‘Canterbury Girls’
ALBUM REVIEW
Canterbury Girls
Lily & Madeleine
New West Records
Cost
LAURA DZUBAY
Daily Arts Wrtier
Since leaving
my high school
theatre behind,
a lot has
changed in my
life