Play Reading Featured in May First Sunday Prose; Opium and Art in the Early XXth Century

Sunday, May 6, brings two out of the ordinary items.  The first of these was the Bloomington Writers Guild’s “First Sunday Prose Reading & Open Mic” (see April 1, et al.) in the Monroe County Library auditorium which, first off, had no “Open Mic,” the entire time being taken up by a reading performance of a play by Antonia Matthew, HOMEFRONT, a powerful memoir of her childhood in England during World War II, culminating in her father’s having fallen in action.  Its heart consisting of an exchange of letters between daughter and father, this was only the play’s second performance (it had also received a staged reading in 2000) and there’s talk of performing it again as a radio play with sound effects added.  This one was also recorded for Community Access TV, and was followed by a workshop-style question and answer session, with playwright Matthew joining the principal actors on stage.

My part in this was somewhat of a last minute nature, having been asked last Monday if I could stand in for an actor who had had to bow out, reading the parts of the Undersecretary of State for War and the Secretary of State for War, these consisting of only one short paragraph each.  Whether this will lead to my being in the radio play remains to be seen.

[image error]

Max Ernst – Castor and Pollution, 1923

Then, of things off the beaten track, serendipity during the hour before the play and a brief pre-play setup and partial rehearsal, using the upstairs library computer, brought me to an interesting article I hadn’t run across before, “The Complicated Relationship Between Opium and Art in the 20th Century” by Jeff Goldberg on ARTSY.NET.  It’s a period I’m interested in, in early 20th century France, as well as its subject, for more on which one may press here.