Plays
The Songs of Robert
About the Play
The full-length version of The Songs of Robert runs about 80 minutes, though the play can be compressed to as short as a 20 minute one-act version. The play might be called a lyric drama, and includes choreography original live music. Through a series of dramatic monologues and songs, the play tells the story of Robert, an American high-school boy growing up in rural Southern Appalachia. The plot is fairly simple and immediately comprehensible to audiences: Robert is in love with a girl who doesn’t know of his existence. To complicate matters, the high school Senior Prom is approaching, and soon will come graduation, when Robert will leave his hometown and go away to art school—if his parents let him.
The style of the play is essentially expressionistic: the audience sees the world—Robert’s family and friends as well as his teachers—through Robert’s own eyes, and experiences it the way he does. Though the language of the play is poetic, and largely composed in local Southern Appalachian dialect, the style of presentation and simplicity of plot combine to support the audience’s understanding— even where English is not a first language.
The set requirements for the show are minimal. The guiding principle for design is that the language itself should provide the springboard for the audience’s imagination, with a minimum reliance on set and lighting effects.
According to The Asheville Citizen Times, the play evokes “images ranging from Willie Nelson to James Joyce” (Sunday, December 12, 2004).
Production History
The Songs of Robert began as a collection of original dramatic monologues in verse, written as part of my Masters Thesis in Poetry at Cornell University in 1998. It was my childhood friend Eric Johnson, now Artistic Director of the Honolulu Theatre for Youth, who first convinced me that what I had was in fact a verse play. At the time (the summer of 2000) , Eric was teaching Drama at the North Carolina Governor’s School East in Laurinburg, NC. He brought me in as an Artist in Residence, and one of the projects we worked on was a first stage version of the play, which ran about 20 minutes and included an ensemble cast of Governor’s School students plus me in the role of “Ol’ Preacha’.” It was the authenticity and courage with which the students, especially Quentin Bunch, who played “Robert,” connected to the play, as well as the audience response, which first convinced me that The Songs of Robert had the potential to become a powerful dramatic work. It also convinced me that my experience and training as a poet could actually serve me in the theatre.
The first full theatrical production of the play occurred that fall as a collaboration between Blue Shift Theatre Ensemble, X Factor Dance Company, and Lees-McRae College, at the short-lived High Country Performing Arts Festival. In the winter of 2002, Blue Shift produced a short film version of the play, shot by cinematographer Adam Larsen, which has unfortunately never been released.
In 2003, while I was Artist-in-Residence at the Pädagogische Hochschule in Karlsruhe, Germany, I re-built the play from the ground up as a two-actor performance, with new poems, new songs, and a (new to me) steel-body resonator guitar. This new version premiered as part of the English Literary Festival, and went on to performances at the American Library and the Landesmedienzentrum Baden-Wüttemberg. I directed and performed all the male roles. Andrea Koch, a student of mine at the PH, performed the female roles.
When I returned to the States in the fall of 2004, I developed the two-actor version further with actor Julia Horn, and performed it in a variety of venues, expanding and contracting the play as needed. While ensemble versions of the play have continued to be performed, the latest "authorized version" is again a two-actor show, this time much more presentational and vaudevillian in style, which I've developed in collaboration with actor / designer Katie Fuller, formerly of The Rebelles.
Performances
1998: One-Act student ensemble version: The North Carolina Governor’s School East, (Laurinburg, NC)
1998: Full-length ensemble version: High Country Performing Arts Festival (Lees McRae College, Banner Elk, NC), co-produced by Blue Shift Theatre Ensemble
2004: One-Act, two-actor version: English Literary Festival (Pädagogische Hochschule Karlsruhe, Germany); Amerikanische Bibliothek; Landesmedienzentrum Baden-Wüttemberg (Karlsruhe, Germany)
2004: Full-length two-actor version: Watauga Hugh School (Boone, NC); Saint Luke’s Episcopal Church (Boone, NC)
2004: One-Act solo version: Men’s Dance Festival (Asheville, NC)
2005: Full-length two-actor version: Asheville Fringe Festival (Asheville, NC)
2005: Expanded full-length two-actor version: Blowing Rock Stage Company (Blowing Rock, NC), co-produced by Jynormous Theatre Company
2006: Full-length ensemble version: Lenoir-Rhyne College (Hickory, NC), directed by Joseph Sturgeon.
2008: Full-length two-actor version: NC Stage Catalyst Series (Asheville, NC); produced by Corpus Theatre Collective (upcoming)