MELANCHOLY PLAY
By Sarah Ruhl
Mid-Valley Performing Arts Center
March 2023
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Directed by Morag shepherd
Stage Managed by Jacob Watts
Graphic Design by Mitchell Shepherd
Set Design - Jonah Kirkhart Ericson
Lighting Design - Riley Merrill
Photos by Eric Geels
Sound Design by Morag Shepherd
Performed by Ariana Farber, Amona Fataau, Barrett Ogden, Sam Torres, and Ashley Wilkinson
Cellist - Alexandra Call
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Director Morag Shepherd took to heart Sarah Ruhl’s instructions for Melancholy Play: A Contemporary Farce: “Melancholy in this play is Bold, Outward, Sassy, Sexy and Unashamed. It is not introverted. It uses, instead, the language of Jacobean direct address.”
In a very smart, gratifying interpretation, the cast for this production valorized this rich, soul-inspired ode to melancholy. Kudos to a first-rate cast of actors who finely shaped the comedic and melancholic contours of their characters: Ariana Farber (Tilly), Amona Faatau (Frank), Ashley Wilkinson (Joan), Sam Torres (Frances), Barrett Ogden (Lorenzo) and Cellist (Alexandra Call).
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Shepherd’s direction teases out the best takeaways from Ruhl’s script. (The Utah Review)
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Morag Shepherd‘s directing prowess is on full display as the cast opines, strikes poses, climbs on aerial silks, joins in musical numbers, brawls, addresses the audience, and seduces one another. Plot is nonsensical in the best of ways, and so isn’t really worth trying to explain further. LET WASATCH THEATRE’S MELANCHOLY PLAY PUT A SMILE ON YOUR FACE (Utah Theatre Bloggers)
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The little details, a movement here, a look across the shoulder, through the frame, a frown, a turn–all of it meant something. Everything was chosen to express a specific feeling. Morag Shepherd’s direction was purposeful and playful.
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The play is about a feeling. Instead of judging our melancholy, the words honor melancholy. I felt like my moodiness, my madness, my magenta moments were being honored and revered. I felt proud of my melancholy moments and my dark days. I left the theater practically skipping with pride at all the times I reveled in my melancholy. It’s a little strange that I would leave a play about melancholy so happy, but it’s true. There are only a couple more chances to see this strangely magnificent play. Fall in Love with Wasatch Theatre’s The Melancholy Play (Front Row Reviewers)
Playwright Sarah Ruhl is known for creating avant-garde works about emotion and transformation, often using aspects of fantasy and magic. This is demonstrated by her work in How to Transcend a Happy Marriage and Eurydice. Director Morag Shepherd understands this and completely embraces it, which is evident in the character direction, use of aerial silks and the artful framing of every moment. A PORTRAIT OF HUMOR AND SADNESS IN THE MELANCHOLY PLAY (SLUG Magazine)​
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The success of the show really depends on the ability of both the director (Morag Shepherd) and the performers to seamlessly navigate the sometimes quite abrupt twists and turns that take us from realism to melodrama and back again. The key here is that by the time the play slips and slides more and more into surrealism (one of the characters turns into an almond) we have become sufficiently invested in these characters that we are eager to take this weird and wild journey with them. In this production, this worked beautifully.
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You can really tell that the actors were encouraged to play and create freely in rehearsals; the movement has a quirky, weird, whimsical quality to it that seems absolutely spontaneous, almost improvised in the moment. Shepherd uses various visually lovely stage pictures such as having one of the characters climb high above the stage on an aerial silk, while others place themselves inside the empty picture frames that are both hanging above and laying on the stage. She also has characters snap open umbrellas at various points, suddenly and without obvious meaning. Review: Wasatch Theatre Company’s ‘Melancholy Play’ oddly uplifting (Gephardt Daily)
