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OBIE Winner, 2007

HOME MOVIES
an excerpt of the
1964 Obie award winning musical
by Rosalyn Drexler 
music by Reverend Al Carmines          

 

Part of 
OFF STAGE:
THE WEST VILLAGE FRAGMENTS

Peculiar Works Project

"One of the most wonderful downtown theater events of 2006 was [PWP]s' site-specific tour and staging of excerpts from 17 ground-breaking Off-Off-Broadway plays.  Utilizing 14 directors and 80 performers, the pieces were performed outdoors at various West Village addresses, close to where the '60s plays were originally performed." 
~ Paper Magazine   
           

     

A crowd outside Provincetown Playhouse / ENLARGE          VIVIENNE: "You know I want to cast out virginity with one fell swoop of the moopem. Why do you always say don't? In the light of the final end we must all pay with our lives." / ENLARGE          MRS. VERDUN: "You’re jumbling. You have a dribbling, indistinct palate, and I will not tolerate that in my house no matter where else it occurs. Understand?" / ENLARGE          PETER visits the MRS. - although really lookin for MR. Verdun. MRS VERDUN: "I believe in the hereafter. I believe in a vast wooly tomb shaded from without, by huge striped awnings flapping in the wind like wings. I believe my husband's soul is a lost crow frightened forever by the motion of those awnings." / ENLARGE
     
“…a long, wacky excerpt from Home Movies, complete with accordion accompaniment, swelled the crowd outside the Provincetown Playhouse.  ...the commitment and inventiveness were real.”  Michael Feingold, VILLAGE VOICE
     
"At the Home Movies stop, a young kid begged his big brother to stop so he could watch — he was so transfixed that I’m sure this helped create a new fan of live theater." Jonathan Warman, THE NEW YORK BLADE
        
Home Movies mentioned in both huge preview pieces in the New York Times and the New York Post (Home Movies pictured as at top, right)
     
MRS. VERDUN: "Who’s an aristocrat these days?" (She sighs.) PETER: "I am. Watch me metamorph into a mannered and pompous queen. Discount my suit and call me Caladonia. Then ask me, 'Caladonia, Caladonia, what makes your big head so hard?' ” / ENLARGE          Amazingly, Peter begins a strip tease and a transformation... / ENLARGE          ...sweetly and innocently he takes it all off, revealing "a mannered and pompas queen" - and then does a few kicks - just for kicks / ENLARGE          Singing: VIVIENNE: "You look like me. If I had a brother, he would look like you. Would you like to come and live with me?" PETER: "You look the way I’d have looked If I had been a girl. You are my female counterpane." ... / ENLARGE
     
“…warmhearted… a treat for anyone with an interest in the origins of downtown theatre…” Jason Zinoman, NY TIMES
     
"It is a thrilling, vibrant, and inspirational piece of theatre that is unlike anything I have ever seen before... And, when another young actress rips open her shirt during a scene from Rosalyn Drexler's Home Movies to reveal a brassiere made out of flowers, every head on the street turns... Truth be told, though, the entire cast is spectacular, and all the directors do a splendid job... My hat is off to Peculiar Works Project for pulling off something this gutsy and no-holds-barred. OFF Stage: the West Village Fragments is entertaining, vital theatre that I can't recommend highly enough. " 
 Michael Criscuolo NYTHEATRE.COM

                                                                                                                                                                                                    Other sights on the walking tour (below)
The audience had to cross 6th ave no matter the traffic          All pieces were right outside landmark buildings          "Monuments: Freddies Monologue" was stunning          Some street players that helped round out the night
     

CAST

PRODUCTION TEAM

CATHERINE PORTER*

STACY PARKER*

TOM JOHNSON

PAUL FITENI*

BENJAMIN ICKIES

MATTHEW (MAX) FASS

SPENCER KATZMAN

    

HEAD HONCHOS

RALPH LEWIS

CATHERINE PORTER

BARRY ROWELL

Mrs. Verdun
Vivienne
Peter
Peter (swing)

Accordionist

Accordionist (swing)

Folk guitarist/activist

   

Peculiar Works Project

Co-Artistic Director

Co-Artistic Director
Co-Artistic Director

JULIE HAMBERG

ROSALYN DREXLER

REV. AL CARMINES

BENJAMIN ICKIES

SUSAN LANGE

TARA HILL & J HAMBERG

RALPH LEWIS

CATHERINE PORTER

BARRY ROWELL

 

Director

Book & Lyrics

Music

Music Director

Production Mgr

Costumes

Producer

Producer

Producer


         

THE SKINNY on HOME MOVIES

Originally presented by the Judson Poets Theatre in 1964, directed by Lawrence Kornfeld, the bizarrely funny musical HOME MOVIES was one of the first pieces to transfer from the fledgling OOB movement to Off-Broadway.  This OBIE winner moved to the Provincetown Playhouse in May of 1964.  The play was VERY daring for its time - what Feingold later called "among the bright, mordant, saucy, socially outraged, and sexually outrageous Carmines-scored events to emerge from Judson into the commercial arena."  No one is spared the skewer, and yet the play is somehow kind-hearted and brave.  Apparently, no one wrote down the original score but we did have a recording of the music to work from that came from Rosalyn Drexler, the only known recording as far as Peculiar Works knew.  Information seems scarce on HOME MOVIES, but I did find another great obituary about the multi-talented and prolific Reverend Al Carmines in The Villager by Jerry Tallmer in which the play is mentioned.  As of this production, Ms. Drexler is still very much with us and being quite creative, as usual.  There's a wonderful wide-ranging interview with her from 2004, including a quickie discussion of Drexler's brief period as "a lady wrestler" (at right) and examples of her paintings.  I fell in love with this piece and hope to stage the whole thing one day...if I can but find an outrageous producer to match it.

           

Carmines in the original

photo:  Fred W. McDarrah

 

 

 

 

WEST VILLAGE FRAGMENTS... DIRECTORS & CHOREOGRAPHERS

TIM CUSACK . MARK FINLEY . JULIE HAMBERG . JILLIAN HARRIS . JEFF JANISHESKI . ANNA McHUGH . 
CASEY McLAIN . CHRIS MIRTO . KAY MITCHELL . ELAINE MOLINARO . RENEE PHILIPPI . GABRIEL SHANKS .
DAVID VINING . MIRIAM WEINER

photos credits:
 Stefan Hagen

Barry Rowell

Rich Press (NY Post, top R)

          

SPECIAL THANKS

We did a minimally staged reading of this musical before the walking tour excerpt that was FABULOUS.  These actors helped bring HOME MOVIES to life again . TOM BOZELL . JULIAN ELFER . CRAIG FITZPATRICK . JOE O’BRIEN . STACY PARKER . CATHERINE PORTER . JENNIFIER STEWART . DAX VALDEZ . NATASHA WILLIAMS

     

     

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