The Blue Cake Theatre Company presents "Theremin" in the 2007 NYC Fringe Festival at The Village Theatre on Bleeker at Thompson.
Saturday 8/11 @ 4:30 pm, Sunday 8/12 @ 7:00 pm, Thursday 8/16 @ 2:30 pm, Thursday 8/23 @ 9:15 pm, Saturday 8/25 @ 6:45 pm
A fantasy inspired by the lives of Leon Theremin, Clara Rockmore and Brian Wilson as seen through the eyes of an unstable rock legend.
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"Electricity will take the place of God. Let the peasant pray to electricity. He's going to feel the power of the central authorities more than that of heaven." -Vladimir Lenin 1914
Leon Theremin, "the Russian Edison", created the worlds first electronic musical instrument; a machine so far ahead of it's time that you didn't even have to touch it to play. Arriving on American soil Theremin became an overnight celebrity. Then, on the eve of achieving his greatest ambitions, he mysteriously disappeared.
And what really happened to Leon Theremin?
Theremin's story is one of the truly great stories of the last century and we are proud to share a small part of it with New York this summer.
Tickets can be bought online if more than 24 hours in advance at www.fringenyc.org or 15 minutes before the show at the venue.
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Thanks to the company for bringing the news to the forums.
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Showing 11 Comments
{added that alert 8/20}
Don't know which one yet,
but word on the street is that there's
a second show, a rock musical, in the Fringe
that is also using a theremin.
What are the chances of that?
World Thereminization HO!
Wand Music
by RL Nesvet
Theremin (Fringe Festival) reviewed August 12, 2007
http://www.offoffonline.com/reviews.php?id=1139
Though the reviewer got one thing wrong, in the play she's a Russian conservatory graduate not a "New York University music student" understandable I guess and good word of mouth nonetheless.
[i]-- Kevin[/i]
I think the central theme of rewriting history, based on Brian Wilson's recreation of his personal history (which was later presented as fact in a famous documentary) is smartly depicted and does alert the thinking members of the audience to the reality of it's fictionalization and that it's just a fun play not an annotated history book.
But there's a lot of facts in it too. So far as anyone knows Clara Rockmore never performed with her maiden name so she must have been married by the time of her first public performance and was already involved with Bob Rockmore while working with Lev, and that's something that's explicit in the play and poignant for the Leon character.
Thereminists often take great freedom with other people's songs and we're obliged to allow the same creative license to other artists. I sincerely believe it's a strong out reach piece and I hope you can go see it Jon, I think it'd give you more to go on and there's a lot I'd love to discuss with you.
Are you saying that the play no longer has Clara & Lev becoming romantically involved right before he's whisked back to Russia? And Clara doesn't explicitly pine for him during their years apart as she's reduced to playing church basements? Because that's a big change from the version I saw.
Really wish you could see it.
trust me.
and my dear fellow thererminist,
please don't ever shut up.
Last night there were three people at the performance that knew Clara Rockmore personally and closely. They all agreed that there were creative historical discrepancies, but none of those things mattered to them much as the essential spirits of the people and the arc of their story were more or less captured.
It was one of those rare unexpected connections the Theremin seems to make with us.
There was also another review, I do not agree with him, and the play *never* mentions Good Vibrations, that is the critic's addition.
[break inserted in long url to wrap. TW Staff]
http://www.nypost.com/seven/
08222007/entertainment/theater/some_good_vibes.htm
I am the first to admit it's not a finished work yet, the play can still use some fine tuning. But even as written there remain some missed opportunities to play the history and subtext more; maybe making the flashback fantasies a bit more period or romantic, a bit more Russian, not so much in speech but rather in personal stature and that evasive sense of formality from that culture might have garnered better reviews without changing a word. And we really should see Lev play.
Be that as it is, I still believe it's introduced a bunch of people to the Theremin and given our tenuous hold on the planet, I consider it a good thing.