Wild Art Group Presents
H&G, a public outcry
February 2016
at Paloma Street Studios, Los Angeles
H&G, a public outcry is a hyperbolic performance placing the audience in the shoes of Hansel & Gretel, to wander through America’s blooming new fear of extreme weather in a dreamlike, wild, and surprising journey. Poised in a poetic landscape, this powerful live-music performance is comprised of a distorted Suburbanite and other amplified characters, illuminated puppets, dark dancing shadows, and a lot of meat. Drawing from the third worst drought in US history and Hurricane Sandy, source material includes Hansel and Gretel, newspaper articles, American folk and rock songs, and text generated by John Michael Johnson.
H&G, a public outcry is an immersive unconventional theatrical experience where the audience and the performers occupy the same space. Audience members will be looked at, in the eye, by the actors. As an audience member, you should be prepared to do a little walking, a little stair climbing, and maybe some dancing if you'd like. But don't worry, you can also just sit in the corner and watch. Appropriate for mature children aged 12+. 60 minutes in length.
Creative Team:
A Wild Art Group Production
Produced and Created by Allison M Keating
Mother played by Lucille Duncan
Suburbanite played by Craig Gibson
Father played by Murphy Martin
Guide played by Lisa McNeely
Original Music Composition by Jonathan Becker
Puppet, Projection, and Poster Design by Hsuan-Kuang Hsieh
Set, Props and Light Design by Mark Kanieff
Musical Director and Sound Design by Jeronimo Rajchenberg
Costume Design by Jeremy Waters
Produced by Nora DeVeau-Rosen
H&G, a public outcry was supported through a residency at Los Feliz Charter School for the Arts and was originally created at the California Institute of the Arts, School of Theater in 2014. Click here for CalArts production credits.
Images by Hsuan-Kuang Hsieh
The Story of our Show
I suppose it all started with the drought in 2012. I remember reading New York Times articles about the food costs going up. Then, while over 60% of our country (California included) was still roasting, Hurricane Sandy ravaged the East Coast. My former work place and subway station were underwater. What suffering comes from the extremes of water: too little and too much. At that moment in 2012, I came to a frightening realization that Climate Change has happened. It’s no longer a possible future. Extreme weather is now our current condition. So yeah, that’s how I started this play and that is why it’s called “a public outcry.”
Hansel & Gretel is all about water. It’s about a family of farmers in a drought. The Mother says, “Early tomorrow take the two children, lead them into the thickest part of the woods, and leave them there, for we can no longer feed them. If you don't do it, all of us will starve together." After Hansel and Gretel escape the cannibal witch; “They arrived at a large flooded body of water. ‘We cannot get across,’ said Hansel. ‘There is a white duck swimming. If I ask it, it will help us across.” And that’s how they get home, by a helpful duck.
As an audience member, you will assume the role of Hansel and Gretel, discovering the forest, the witch, the flood, and through that experience America’s blooming new fear of extreme weather.
