Where to begin? Always the question to precede all others. Before we can even begin to find the answers we need to know what questions to ask.
I suppose a natural question may be - "Who is the person writing this blog, and what enables them to comment on the show?". Easy questions are usually best to get out of the way. My name is Cory O'Brien, and I have the fortunate opportunity to be in the room, and in the meetings for this production as assistant director to Eda Holmes. Perhaps it gives me a uniquely voyeuristic view of the process. Intimately involved, and yet with none of the pressures of being onstage or being responsible for decisions being made offstage.
So what exactly is The Madonna Painter about? It's a play set in a rural Quebec village in 1918 about a young priest who comes to town and commissions a fresco of the Madonna to be painted for the towns church. The play is steeped in imagery and metaphor with a backdrop of WWI going on and the Spanish flu spreading. It's a play about French Catholics and their relationships to God and their church. On the very first day we wondered aloud about this plays connection and relevance to the events of today. With fears of H1N1 and announcements by the Pope that the Catholic church was going to be accepting disenfranchised (and married) anglicans into its ranks we realized that there is great resonance between these people in their time and place and ourselves today.
Interestingly enough the play is laid out in 12 tableaus with a prologue and an epilogue. With writing laden by metaphor it is hard to shut out the echo of 14 individual episodes of this play to the 14 stations of the cross.
Station #1 - Jesus is condemned to death
... and the cast and creative team are given the task of taking on, dissecting, and presenting this play.
CO
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