Live theatre is back at Siena!
The Creative Arts Department is staging Oscar Wilde's irreverent comedy The Importance of Being Earnest at the Beaudoin Theatre in Foy Hall. The play opens the evening of Thursday, Nov. 11 with performances through November 20.
“We are so excited to welcome the Siena community and the public back into our theatre,” said Krysta Dennis, Ph.D., creative arts producer. “The pandemic has been a very trying time for the performing arts, and we have all missed the wonderful shared experience of live theatre. We decided to stage this classic comedy because we wanted to come back together to see a piece of theatre that would make us laugh and feel joy.”
Guest director Sam Buti said on the surface, the play is simple. To break into polite society, the “born-and-bred-in-a-handbag hero,” Jack, assumes the fake name of Ernest. What he finds, however, is that polite society is rather impolite and more (and less) “earnest” than he is himself.
“To quote the character of Lady Bracknell, ‘We live...in an age of surfaces.’ Much like today, those surfaces, while sometimes hidden, have grave weight.”
Buti shared that when The Importance of Being Earnest debuted in London toward the end of the Victorian era it was a blockbuster success. Subtitled A Trivial Comedy for Serious People,
“this play is both a joke about the conventions of social order and the significance of being, to quote Elvis, ‘caught in a trap.’ Wilde seems to be saying that all the world’s a handbag and each of us is born into one kind or another. The silver lining, should we choose to see it, is that by seeing the leather straps, perhaps we can choose to do something with them. It’s a joke, yes, but by seeing the joke we can decide when, where, and how to take it seriously.”
Dennis said Siena’s theatre classes just returned from a trip to New York City to see the Broadway play Caroline, or Change.
“The delight of the New York audiences that Broadway is back is palpable. We can't wait to have that same feeling in our theatre here at Siena. Our production is truly a celebration of the return of live theatre to the stage.”
Admission for The Importance of Being Earnest is $5 for students; $12 for Siena FSA, seniors, and veterans; and $15 for the general public. Tickets are available at siena.edu/creativeartstickets. Siena’s theatre will follow the same rules as Broadway and Proctor's Theatre, asking that audience members provide proof of vaccination and remain masked at all times during the performances.
“The play is such a fun and absurd look at class and social status that I think audiences today will find really interesting. Even if it is set in the Victorian era, it’s still so relevant. I hope people find it as wild and funny as we do. We cannot wait to show off our work in front of a live audience again; it has been way too long!”
Megan Stuart ’22 (plays the character of Cecily)
“The last time I got to perform live was my sophomore year,. There is something magical about getting to perform live for real people. What you bring to the stage when you go out is the final product, which raises the stakes of acting and brings out a very unique energy.”
Fiona Hoye ’22 (plays the character Miss Prism)
"The play offers genius commentary on class dynamics and the absurdity of our power structure by presenting the triviality of the lives of the upper classes.”
Michael Anderton ’22 (stage manager)
“The Importance of Being Earnest is a critique of our system of agreements and the social games we play.”
Jack Ellis ’24 (plays the character Algernon Moncrieff)
