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The Enlightened Theater Arts program at Maharishi University of Management is offering its very first production this fall--Oedipus at Colonus.
According to Kent Sugg, director of the Theater Arts program as well as director of the play, Oedipus at Colonus is a far cry from its more infamous predecessor Oedipus the King--the story Freud made famous about a son who unknowingly kills his father and marries his mother.
"Oedipus at Colonus is a Greek tragedy, but it just doesn't fit into the tragedy genre--it violates all the rules," says Sugg. "Usually in a tragedy the main character has a flaw, dies, or is involved in some other tragedy, but in Oedipus at Colonus the main character overcomes his weakness."
The Oedipus plays were written by Sophocles, who was perhaps Greece's most prolific playwright. He wrote over 120 plays circa 500-400 B.C., of which only seven have survived. Oedipus at Colonus was Sophocles' last play, written when when he was 90. (He died when he was 92.)
"Sophocles must have been highly evolved," says Sugg. "By the end of his life he saw very deeply into the human condition. This play is packed with symbolism about the transcendent and about the nature of collective consciousness--about ignorance and enlightenment."
Sugg, who moved to Fairfield from Denver with a B.A. in acting and ten years of professional acting experience, says that he has been reading extensively, looking for a play to produce. "The students here have a quality I just didn't see at other high schools or colleges. They have such highly developed consciousness that I wanted to find a play that could reflect this, one that was uplifting and profound."
Sugg found that play in Oedipus at Colonus. "This play is about a man who overcomes his own ignorance and also overcomes the ignorance of the people around him. He rises to a very high state of consciousness to the extent that in the end he is assumed into the heavens by the gods."
The play, cast with Maharishi University of Management undergraduate students, is the first production from the Enlightened Theater Arts program since it began last year. Sugg credits Rodney Franz, director of the Iowa Theater Company and teacher of theater arts at Maharishi School for the Age of Enlightenment, for creating talented and eager high school graduates who literally demanded a Theater Arts program at Maharishi University of Management.
"The students are extremely inspired by this play as well as the university's theater program because they are different from anything produced in this community before," says Sugg. "The Enlightened Theater Arts program at Maharishi University of Management is unique in that it gives the students complete knowledge. It offers the full range of human consciousness, which is what actors, directors and playwrights deal with. The students have the opportunity to express different levels of consciousness in their characters and in themselves, and they also have a technique to experience the transcendental values of their own selves."
Celeste Riegel, an Enlightened Theater Arts student and Maharishi School graduate, plays the part of Antigone, Oedipus' devoted daughter. "I've been involved in theater since I was 14 and I've never had such beautiful experiences," she says. "Working with Mr. Sugg is very nourishing, and he has a very beautiful way of teaching acting. In Enlightened Theater Arts we start from the deepest levels and build up from there. It is an incredibly enriching program."
The play's cast members include Noah Siemsen as Oedipus, Celeste Riegel as Antigone, Heather Miller as Ismene, George Kelley as Theseus, and Josh Ellinghaus as Creon, and Richard Incorvia as Polyneices. The Chorus includes Gwen Cannon, Nina Walker, Casi Sims, Patrick Kennedy, and Peter Roesler.
Opening weekend for Oedipus at Colonus is Friday and Saturday, October 16 and 17, with shows following the next two consecutive weekends--October 22-24, and 30-31.
Tickets are available at Somebody Cares on the square, and are $5 for Maharishi University of Management faculty, students and staff, $8 for all others. Reserved seating is available for $15.
For more information about the Enlightened Theater Arts Department, please call Kent Sugg at (515) 469-5861.
