For Immediate Release: May 4, 2006
Media Contact: Mary Bashaw, The People's Light & Theatre Company, 610.647.1900 x103

What do you do when you wake up in the morning no longer believing everything you once held as true? Ken Carpenter has lived all his life in America’s heartland, but one day leaves his wife, his job and his church in search of a future he can’t even imagine. His journey leads him across the ocean and into new and dangerous territories in this thoughtful and resonant story of finding yourself and learning to have faith—again. This production contains adult language and content.

The Man from Nebraska runs May 24 through June 25, 2006 on the Steinbright Stage at People’s Light & Theatre Company. Directed by co-founder Ken Marini, the production features resident actors Kevin Bergen, Peter DeLaurier, Kathryn Petersen, Ceal Phelan and Marcia Saunders. Returning guest artists are Tom Byrn and Karen Peakes; rounding out the company, in their PLTC debuts, are Miriam Hyman and John Peakes. The production team includes set designer Art Rotch, lighting designer Dennis Parichy, costume designer Rosemarie E. McKelvey and sound designer Charles T. Brastow, who will also serve as production Stage Manager.

About the Play

TAMYRA: You need a narrative.
KEN: Right.
TAMYRA: A story.
KEN: Yes.
TAMYRA: Otherwise, how would you ever get from here to there?

Ken Carpenter has led a fairly routine life, an otherwise uneventful progression of the usual milestones: job, marriage, parenthood and grandparenthood. At fifty-seven, his days form a predictable routine of work and meals, newspapers and time in front of the TV, church on Sundays, the occasional meal out, and dutiful visits to his mother in the nursing home. Then he wakes one day to find that he no longer believes anything he used to believe. Tracy Letts’ play follows Ken’s story in a narrative as stark and expansive as the Nebraska landscape, the “here” Ken leaves without knowing what “there” he’s going to.

The People’s Light & Theatre Company is proud to present The Man from Nebraska, under the direction of co-founder Ken Marini. Letts’ play was a finalist for 2004's Pulitzer Prize for Drama and was named one of the top ten plays of 2004 by Time Magazine, which called it an “austere and moving portrait.”

Ken’s wife Nancy and daughter Ashley are at a loss in dealing with Ken’s sudden spiritual crisis, which he can no more explain than he can ignore. His declaration that he no longer believes in God calls for a visit from Reverend Todd, who looks at Ken’s loss of faith as a sort of midlife crisis and recommends a vacation, some time away on his own.

With no clearer path in sight, Ken sets out for a return visit to London, where he had spent some time while serving in the Air Force. He sees it as someplace both familiar and “foreign, but… not too foreign.”

There he flirts with—or is flirted with by—American career woman Pat and befriends savvy bartender Tamyra and her outspoken artist boyfriend Harry, who variously nudge him into exploring previously alien possibilities of sex and drugs, with sculpture substituting for the clichés of rock & roll. None of this is what Ken was looking for, but it’s what he finds.

TAMYRA: Because my friend Ken doesn’t like it too sweet. Because my friend Ken needs something a little savory. Or maybe even a little bitter.

KEN: Right…
TAMYRA: For his adventure. For his narrative.

“The things that have been constant in his life are all breaking apart,” said Marini. Things Ken thought he could rely on, beliefs he took for granted, aren’t feeling reliable anymore. One of the challenges Marini sees in The Man from Nebraska is that of keeping the play spiritual. Ken’s story “ is not just a midlife crisis thing,” he said, “it’s a spiritual crisis.”

The crisis also extends to Nancy and Ashley, as they try to come to terms with Ken’s actions. The people Ken meets on his journey each have their own spiritual searches as well. As the Chicago Sun-Times observed of the play’s premiere production at the Steppenwolf Theatre, “Letts has seized on a familiar theme only to craft a tremendously mature and multifaceted portrait of the American psyche at large in the world at the dawn of the 21st century.”

Although Ken’s story is a universal one, much of the play’s imagery is powerfully specific. Said Letts in an interview in American Theatre: “I was in London and I saw an older man, obviously from the American Midwest, wearing a sweater that was a little too bright, walking into this fish-and-chips shop, and something about it sparked my imagination. Around the same time, I was driving from California back to Chicago, and I stopped in a cafeteria in Lincoln, Nebraska, where I saw a couple sitting at a table, not speaking. We’ve all seen this before: a married couple sitting at a table, and they don’t exchange words. It got the wheels spinning. I thought, ‘Does everybody have a point at which they look in the mirror and ask themselves some of the bigger questions? Is it possible to go through life without ever doing that?’”

For Marine, one of the strong images informing the PLTC production is the vast sameness of the landscape in the Midwest. “The landscape seems to go on forever,” he said. “Often the road ahead of you just keeps going straight as far as you can see – you can be driving along and it feels like if you got to the horizon you’d drop of the edge of the earth.”

Indeed, the picture of Ken and Nancy in their car, the road stretching out ahead and behind, is the image that opens the show. Another aspect of that road, though, is certainty. You feel you know where you’re going, you know what’s ahead of you, what’s expected of you, and you’re sure about things. “What’s happened for Ken is that road is crumbling,” said Marini, “it’s going to pieces under him and he’s not sure about anything anymore.”

With its many locations, as the play divides its attention between Ken on his journey and Nancy at home, The Man from Nebraska presents a distinct challenge in staging. Marini is “looking for ways to isolate [Ken] in the early scenes,” then let things open up more as the play goes on. As he is also greatly concerned with the show’s flow, the sheer number of scenes makes the question of transitions a pressing one.

Letts paces the play with a sort of musicality to its structure, dividing it not into Acts but into Movements. Marini and the design team set out to structure things accordingly, with fluid transitions from one scene into the next and small pauses or “rests” on transitions from movement to movement.

“It’s a chance to do something I like,” said Marini, “which is overlap scenes in transitions, using some element in one scene to lead into a similar element in the next.”

About the Physical Production

The dominant feature of Art Rotch’s open set is a series of sliding panels, rendered in deep wood tones. The two downstage panels are solid, at times serving as a sort of act curtain, but also moving independently of each other to carve the stage space, while the upstage panels are open and, when closed, act like a mullioned window onto the projection screen behind them. Rotch arrived at the idea to use projections fairly early in the design concept. “There’s a good deal of media in the play itself – they listen to radio, they watch a lot of TV—so it seemed like the use of projected background would feel at home here.” The projections themselves help establish the play’s many locations, so the images include both exteriors and interiors, ranging from Nebraska landscapes to London skylines to kitchens and nursing home hallways. The variable elements in the set also include a sliding sheer curtain that travels between the upstage panels and the projection screen.

There is, however, fairly little furniture. In keeping with the driving priority that the show should move as smoothly as possible, furniture and other specific scenic items have been kept to a minimum. “The places are so specific,” said director Ken Marini, “the environments matter.” So the production is using select specific pieces to evoke place where appropriate or necessary. The idea is for the pieces to diminish in number as the play goes along. Rotch said, “We’re using as little as we think we need” as they began rehearsals. “We might end up with less by the time we’re done,” added Marini.

In a reflection of the show’s musical structure, the solid downstage panels only close together at the shift from one Movement into the next, creating a sort of visual “rest” in the otherwise fluid action. The idea of structuring the show this way, even though there’s no actual musical score involved, was comfortable for Rotch.

“I’ve recently done a lot of design for opera,” he explained, “and there you really can’t work against the music. You can’t just go from one scene to another like you’re simply going from this picture on stage to another picture, without thinking of how you get from one to the other. You have to consider the flow of things, how this fits with pacing and the show as a whole, and make the transitions fluid, if that’s how they need to fit as part of the show. The shape of the transitions is very similar here.”

The same sort of unification and understatement are key to Charles Brastow’s approach to the production’s subtle sound design. Brastow said the sounds need to “carry the transitions without intruding or making things seem to be jumping from one place to the next.”

One of the consistent images throughout is the set’s subtle evocation of a sacred space. “There’s the church window [projection] when Ken and Nancy are in church,” said Rotch, “but I wanted to suggest a sort of sacred space with the set as a whole. I was thinking of the simpler lines and shapes of more modern church designs.” The reference resonates Ken’s crisis of faith and also reflects Rotch’s own feeling that the theatre is a sort of secular spiritual space in the relationship the audience forms with the performance. “I’ve always felt that a set should have a sense of expectation about it,” Rotch explained. “From the moment you first see it, it should draw you into what’s about to happen here.”

From the start, director Marini and lighting designer Dennis Parichy were in agreement about one element of the show’s fluid transitions: blackouts between scenes would not be a part of this production’s vocabulary. “No blackouts,” both said.

Parichy described his vision of the lighting as “plain, almost stark. There’s nothing heightened, it’s mostly like real life.” Parichy’s plan is to use a very restrained palette, with no deep colors or harsh contrasts. “There’s the dance club in London,” he said, “where there might be more color, just because that’s what it would be like, but otherwise it’s all pretty simple.”

Parichy wants the lighting to establish environments but not draw attention to itself, so as to make those environments seem atmospheric. “The story’s all about inner things,” he said. “The outside world isn’t all that influential. Nothing in Ken’s outer world causes him to lose his faith.”

If the lighting is expressing anything thematic, it’s the conditions of Ken’s inner life. Parichy’s lighting will work to establish Marini’s idea to place Ken in constrained spaces in early scenes, opening up as the play goes on. At the start things should feel a little confined, Parichy explained, “then once we get to London the world gets bigger for him, so the spaces we define are less confining than in the scenes at home.”

The same restrained color palette carries over into Rosemarie McKelvey’s costume design. She envisions things “in simple colors, mostly within a Fall palette. Maybe some subtle pattern early on, moving into stronger solids in broader strokes in later scenes. But, basically, these are everyday clothes.” To the extent that costumes identify with characters at all, she said, it’s in “simple shapes, with subtle variations.

“There may be some boosted colors when we get to London,” she suggested, “that might be appropriate.” But for the most part nothing in costuming is going to make too strong a statement, in keeping with the idea that the drama here is taking place beneath the surface. “These are people you’d see on the street and not look at twice.”

What The Man from Nebraska believes, though, is that there’s much to see if you let your gaze linger.

About the Playwright
Tracy Letts is the son of actor Dennis Letts and best selling author Billie Letts, of Where The Heart Is and The Honk And Holler Opening Soon fame. A member of their famed ensemble, Mr. Letts first appeared on the Steppenwolf stage in the Arts Exchange production of The Glass Menagerie. Some of his performances at Steppenwolf include a middle-management stooge in Glengarry Glen Ross, a seedy British diplomat in Homebody/Kabul and the title role in The Dresser. As a playwright, Tracy's work includes Killer Joe, Bug and Man From Nebraska, which was named a finalist for the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and was named as one of Time's "Best of 2003." His first play, Killer Joe, premiered in Chicago, on August 3rd, 1993. After several successful American productions, the original Chicago production transferred to the Traverse Theatre at Edinburgh’s Fringe Festival (where it won a Fringe First Award), London’s Bush Theatre, and the Vaudeville Theatre in the West End. As an actor, Mr. Letts has appeared in over forty theatrical productions in the U.S. and abroad. On film, he can be seen in Guinevere, US Marshall and Chicago Cab. His television appearances include The District, Profiler, The Drew Carey Show, Seinfeld and Home Improvement. Born and raised in Oklahoma, Mr. Letts currently resides somewhere in America

About the Cast

Kevin Bergen (Harry Brown) was last seen here in Fabulation and recently appeared as Dick Powell/Tarzan in Shakespeare In Hollywood and as Doug/John/Ziggy Fluss/et.al. in I Am My Own Wife at the Wilma Theatre. A member of the Resident Ensemble of Artists since 2002, Kevin’s previous PLTC credits include The Miser, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, As You Like It, The Skin of Our Teeth, The Merchant of Venice and Midons: or The Object of Desire.

Tom Byrn (Reverend Todd) was previously seen here in The O’Connor Girls and Julius Caesar. Other Philadelphia credits include work with Interact Theatre and the Philadelphia Shakespeare Festival. He has also worked with Mad River Theatre Works in Ohio and the Cider Mill Playhouse in upstate New York. Tom was a member of the Bloomsburg Theatre Ensemble in Bloomsburg, Pa for eleven years, and was a collaborator on BTE’s original play, Letters to the Editor, and co-editor of the nonfiction book of the same title.

Peter DeLaurier (Ken Carpenter), who was recently seen in The Crucible, Jason and the Golden Fleece, 30FEST and A Midsummer Night’s Dream, is an Artistic Associate at PLTC and has been with the Theatre since 1981. Other PLTC productions include Around the World in 80 Days, The Forgiving Harvest, Holes, Camping With Henry & Tom, A Delicate Balance, In the Blood, Once in a Lifetime and The Secret Garden. Peter has played at most of the area’s major theatres, as well as Off and Off-Off Broadway, and on national tour with the Tony Award-winning production of Equus.

Miriam Hyman (Tamrya) is thrilled to be making her debut with People’s Light. Since earning a BFA from UArts in 2003, she’s worked with several area theatres, including the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, The Philadelphia Theatre Company, The Wilma, Bristol Riverside, Black Theatre Festival, Azuka Theatre Collective, Freedom Theatre and countless productions with PYPF/ Philadelphia and Delaware Young Playwrights Festivals. TV and film credits include Law & Order, the HBO feature film Angel and Big Picture Alliance’s Music City. Miriam, a teaching artist for PYPF, also served as resident choreographer for the Rainbow Co. at the Prince Music Theatre.

John Peakes (Bud Todd) was Founding Artistic Director (1966-2003) of The BoarsHead Theater in Lansing, Michigan. He has acted lots of roles and directed many, many plays, and will perform the role of Francis Biddle in Trying at BoarsHead this fall. At The Walnut, he played Officer Krupke in West Side Story and will essay Abner Dillon in 42nd St. for them next Fall/Winter. He’s performed in NYC, Boston, Detroit, Missouri, Wisconsin and New Hampshire. Locally, John has appeared at ACT II, Lenape Regional PAC, Bristol Riverside, Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival and Philadelphia Shakespeare Festival

Karen Peakes (Ashley Kohl) previously appeared at PLTC in Born Yesterday, The Secret Garden and Once in a Lifetime. Karen lives and works in Philadelphia, and has been seen at the Lenape Performing Arts Center in Noises Off, at The Arden in Boxcar Children and Twelfth Night; as well as with The Philadelphia Theatre Company in Wit. She has worked with several area theatres; her credits include Equus at MumPuppet Theatre and appearances at Act II Playhouse in Inventing van Gogh, Lonesome West and Taking Sides.

Kathryn Petersen (Pat Monday), a member of the acting company since 1986, most recently appeared in The Member of the Wedding and three 30FEST plays—The Yellow Line, July 7th, 1994 and Iron Kisses. Other PLTC appearances include String of Pearls, Julius Caesar, Holes and Midons. People’s Light has also produced three of her plays: The Icarus Box (1998), Through the Glass Looking (1999) and Arthur’s Stone, Merlin’s Fire (2003). In 2004, People’s Light produced Sleeping Beauty: A Comic Panto in the British Style, which Kathryn adapted. She authored this year’s panto, Jack and the Beanstalk and is currently working on next season’s offering.

Ceal Phelan (Cammi Carpenter) is a long-time member of the People’s Light resident company, who was most recently seen in The Crucible. Other PLTC roles include 30FEST, Jungalbook, A Higher Place in Heaven and Holes. She’s been doing a lot of teaching lately, most notably comedy improv for teens and adults. She’s married to fellow actor Peter DeLaurier and is a five-time Barrymore Award Loser.

Marcia Saunders (Nancy Carpenter), a member of the PLTC acting company for 30 years, Marcia was seen recently in The Crucible, The O’Connor Girls and A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Previous PLTC credits include Midons-or the Object of Desire, Born Yesterday, A Delicate Balance, The Memory of Water, Macbeth and Once in a Lifetime. Seen most recently as Louella Parsons in the Wilma’s Shakespeare in Hollywood, Marcia has worked with The Arden, The Philadelphia Theatre Company, the Lantern Theatre Company, The Walnut Street Theatre and the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival.

About the Production Team

Charles T. Brastow (Sound Designer/Stage Manager) is the resident Sound Designer and Production Stage manager for People’s Light and most recently designed sound for The Crucible, The Member of the Wedding, The O’Conner Girls, A Higher Place in Heaven and Around the World in 80 Days. His work on The Miser marked his 100th design for PLTC. In addition, he has served as stage manager for over 60 PLTC productions—mostly on the Mainstage—since 1990. Recently Chaz stage-managed The Crucible, The Member of the Wedding 30FEST, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and our remounting of Holes at the Academy of Music.

Ken Marini (Director) is a co-founder of PLTC and has directed over 30 productions, including The Problem and How We Talk in South Boston for 30FEST, Around the World in 80 Days, Born Yesterday, A Delicate Balance, Dimly Perceived Threats to the System, Sacco and Vanzetti: A Vaudeville and Sign of the Lizard. Other PLTC credits include The Life of Galileo and an internationally acclaimed production of Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie. He was the Artistic Director of the Cheltenham Center for the Arts for six seasons, directing Kindertransport, The Glass Menagerie and many others. Other credits include How His Bride Came To Abraham at Playwrights’ Theatre of New Jersey, When Real Life Begins at Chain Lightning Theatre, Richard III for the National Shakespeare Company, Amadeus, Lion in Winter, Sleuth and Romeo & Juliet for Hedgerow Theatre, Pete ‘n Keely at Act II Playhouse and All’s Well That Ends Well for the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival. He has directed A View from the Bridge in Russia and Psycho Drama in Edinburgh.

Rosemarie E. McKelvey (Costume Designer) is a member of the resident ensemble of artists. Her most recent designs were for Fabulation, Jack & the Beanstalk, Jungalbook, A Higher Place in Heaven and Around the World in 80 Days. When not designing, she is employed by PLTC in the Costume Shop. Previous costume designs here include The Forgiving Harvest, Arthur’s Stone, Merlin’s Fire, In the Blood and A Delicate Balance. Other theatre companies she has worked with include the Minneapolis Children’s Theatre, The Arden Theatre Company, The Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, New Paradise Laboratories, Pig Iron Theatre, 1812 Productions, Theatre Exile and the Azuka Theatre Collective.

Dennis Parichy (Lighting Designer) has designed Fabulation, Jason and the Golden Fleece, The Member of the Wedding, A Higher Place in Heaven, Sleeping Beauty: A Comic Panto in the British Style, The Miser, String of Pearls, Arthur’s Stone, Merlin’s Fire, The Little Red Riding Hood Show, The Little Prince and In the Blood. Other credits here include He Held Me Grand, Book of Days, The Memory of Water and More Grimm Tales for PLTC. He has worked throughout the United States in stock, regional theatre, Off-Broadway, Broadway and internationally since 1959. He was Resident Lighting Designer for Circle Repertory Company and designed the premieres of many of Lanford Wilson’s plays. He designed the American premieres of Athol Fugard’s recent plays and his Broadway credits include Talley’s Folly, Burn This, Redwood Curtain, The Water Engine and Penn & Teller.

Art Rotch (Set Designer) spent 14 seasons at Perseverance Theatre in Juneau, Alaska and designed dozens of productions with directors Molly Smith, Peter DuBois and others—including world premieres by Darrah Cloud, Paula Vogel and Debora Brevoort. Recent work: The Crucible (Perseverance), Riders to the Sea (Manhattan School of Music), The Pelican (Bard College), Pennsyltucky (Epiphany Theatre, New York) and The Women of Lockerbie (Bloomsburg Theater Ensemble). Art’s upcoming projects include Women and the Sea and As You Like It for Opera House Arts. He has designed sets and/or lighting for Lake Tahoe Shakespeare Festival, Foothill Theatre Company, M Gorky Drama Theatre of Vladivostok, Russia and co-productions with ActorsExpress and Trinity Repertory Company. Art has an MFA in design from NYU.

Post-Show Discussions
Audiences are cordially invited to join the artists after each Thursday night performance to discuss the making of this production.

Ticket Information DATES: THE MAN FROM NEBRASKA runs from May 24 to June 25, 2006 on the Steinbright Stage at People’s Light in Malvern. Tickets range from $27.00 to $46.00. Please contact the Box Office at 610-644-3500 for more information. You can also order tickets anytime at www.peopleslight.org.

People's Light is a professional, non-profit theatre operating under an agreement between the League of Resident Theatres and Actors' Equity Association, the union of professional actors and stage managers. The Theatre is located on Route 401 between Routes 30 and 202, 40 minutes from Center City Philadelphia.

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