AURORA | Thankfully, Stacey D’Angelo is not a lawyer. That’s not to say she doesn’t have the wit or wherewithal, it’s just that “precedent” doesn’t seem to be a word in her vocabulary.
Sure, every theater director will say they strive for innovation in their productions, but “Romeo and Juliet” where the Capulets are played by deaf actors and the Montagues by a group that can hear? That’s novel. Like, never-been-done-before novel.
“It had never been done in the country and now I have other theater companies coming to me and asking how I did it,” D’Angelo, theater director at the Community College of Aurora, said of the school’s fall 2010 production. “I’m always looking to give our students that opportunity to do something that’s never been done before.”
Now, five years after that groundbreaking interpretation of a literary classic, D’Angelo’s never-ending search for something unique has borne fruit in the form of CCA’s spring performance.
D’Angelo and her students are slated to open their spring season March 12 with “Moking Burd,” a just-published work adapted for the stage by Julie Jensen and based on the 2010 young adult novel by Kathryn Erskine. Originally commissioned by international arts organization VSA, a group that works to adapt arts for people with disabilities, the drama team at CCA will be the first in the country to produce the show following its world debut at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. on Jan. 17.
“It’s an honor,” D’Angelo said in CCA’s February newsletter. “You’re bringing a piece of theater to our community before it hits the mainstream.”
Not to be confused with the famed novel and stage show “To Kill A Mocking Bird,” “Moking Burd” follows Caitlin, a fifth-grader diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder, as she navigates life following the death of her older brother in a school shooting. The title is spawned from the protagonist’s fondness for the aforementioned Harper Lee story as well as grammar, vocabulary and phonetics — on the playbill the title appears with the circumflex symbol above the letter “u.”
The roughly 90-minute performance featuring exclusively CCA drama students is meant to mimic the world through Caitlin’s eyes by embellishing various sensations through the careful manipulation of light and sound.
“It’s a cacophony of stimuli,” D’Angelo said.
The constant balance of that sensory discord is something D’Angelo knows well, and a fundamental aspect of “Moking Burd” that drew her to the work. Both of D’Angelo’s paternal grandparents were deaf, which gave her an early experience in dealing with disability and the accompanying hardships.
“I saw a fair amount growing up of what it’s like to not be accepted and for quick judgments to be made,” she said. “So I find a connection in making sure we tell stories of people who’s behavior sometimes isn’t what it seems — there’s a reason for it.”
In recent years, D’Angelo has become well-versed in dealing not with a lack of sense, but too much of it.
D’Angelo’s daughter has sensory processing disorder, which results in a heightened sensitivity to a variety of stimuli related to all five senses. At first deemed a medical mystery due to her aversion to food, D’Angelo said that her daughter, now 4, has been instrumental in teaching her about different frames of mind.
“(My daughter) has connected me with a whole new community of people and ways to view the world from a very new perspective,” she said. “It’s helped me bring ‘Moking Burd’ to life.”
And D’Angelo has been cognizant to pass those experiences and transformations onto her students. In order to better understand many of the characters and complexities at play in “Moking Burd,” she invited many of the actors to her daughter’s occupational therapy clinic in Denver, Unique Prints, to help them better understand and interact with people diagnosed with various forms of autism.
“It’s really interesting seeing all of the different age ranges, the different levels on the spectrum and just seeing each and every single attribute about them,” Rachel Gawlikowski, who plays Caitlin in the show said. “Because there’s no general for autism (affliction) … it was really interesting trying to match up what my character does with someone who has a similar behaviors.”
A lifelong dancer, “Moking Burd” is Gawlikowski’s first theatrical acting experience. She said that while participating in the production has been rewarding, sculpting her role has proved challenging.
“It’s not only been a journey finding the actor’s process, but I actually had to flip the actor’s process in order to find Caitlin,” she said. “Because she’s quite literally emotionless, it’s really hard. So while learning how to act, I had to learn how to not act, too.”
“Moking Burd”
Runs at the Community College of Aurora through March 21.
Curtains at 7:30 p.m. March 12, 13, 19, 20. and at 1 p.m. March 14 & 21.
Larry D. Carter Theater, 16000 E. CentreTech Parkway. Located inside CCA’s Fine Arts Building.
Tickets start at $10, free for students. For more information, visit CCAurora.edu/Mockingbird.
Note that the March 21 show is a sensory-friendly perfromance with decreased light, sound and projections.
Extremely powerful! Well worth the effort and time spent to view this production. Don’t miss this one.
This was a truly moving production that was executed artfully and tastefully.