Jonno Marlton Blog 11: Sitayana and WMT's Objectives

As a college production Sitayana is going to be evaluated on a few typical, but not always apparent criteria.  The William and Mary Theatre (WMT) has a fair number of stake holders, and it (probably) attempts to satisfy all of them.  But, with a season of four mainstage shows a year, it is a given that it is the big picture that is designed to achieve those objectives, not necessarily the smaller parts that make up a larger whole.  The point I am getting to is that the educational and business objectives at WMT do not always line up as well as they could.  For example, the theatre majors be frustrated that they didn’t get a chance to do an Irish play this go around, the public may have preferred to see the Lion King because Broadway’s just too darn far away and William and Mary only charges five bucks, or the professors could be frustrated that their acting students are not getting to focus on a certain aspect of the performance craft.

I look forward to seeing the box office results of Sitayana.  I went Thursday night, and there was a good sized crowd there for opening night.  As I watched the show, I realized how lucky we all were.  The performers were lucky because the majority of them will never get an opportunity to do something like that again.  The audience members were lucky because the show was entertaining, and there were opportunities for the spectators to become involved.  The professors were lucky because they can prove to everyone else that William and Mary truly does care about diversity (or at the select few that worked their bums off to put on that massive production.) 

As a built-piece outside of the Western tradition, Sitayana was not like anything else I’ve seen.  The acrobatics and strong physical movements, coupled with the fun and involving music, seemed to say that it is alright to be on stage and have fun.  It’s ok to show up to the theatre and feel moved to shout or “ohm,” or clap during a scene.  As far as I can tell, the show upheld its end of the bargain as an educational effort.  Students (some enrolled in the course for credit and others not—I think) were able to learn an art form not typically taught in a liberal arts theatre program.  Not only were the students exploring a new craft, but they were dealing with content that is thought provocative.  Arguably, because the words were either spoken in languages other than English or projected in English behind action that pulled the reader’s focus, some of the plot or content was missed for the spectacle of the event.  For the theatre, spectacle seems appropriate, especially if it sells tickets and allows both the participants and the audience to learn something.  Sitayana has the potential to ignite conversations about the place of woman, acting technique, Hinduism, Antonin Artaud, and what-have-you.  The list goes on.  We can pull a lot for the play, but we really have to jump into and think critically.  I left feeling both delighted at what I had seen and thinking that I ought to have read book or two on Rama, Sita, and the theatre in Bali.