1. Sept. 7 Convocation to focus on decision-making, shared purposes
2. We’re following the Class of 2014′s AESOP trips
3. Childress contributes to research untangling ‘spooky’ quantum effect
4. Save the dates: Homecoming Weekend Oct. 29-30
5. Theater standout Sulochana Dissanayake ’09 to discuss Watson year
6. The arts at Bates – a glimpse online
7. Summer Scholars Program accelerates introduction to sciences, math
8. Bates Magazine summer issue online
9. Bates Clean Sweep raises nearly $16,000 for local nonprofits
10. Women’s lacrosse team honored for top grades in Division III
11. Garcelon Field renovation on track for home opener
12. Bates in the News

Students in the Bates course “Acting and Directing for the Camera” screen their class projects on April 3. The projects are scenes adapted from well-known motion pictures such as Armageddon, 28 Days Later, Juno, Bridget Jones’ Diary and American Beauty.

The screening also includes senior-thesis films by Rachael Garbowski of Brussels, Wis., and Rufat Hasanov of Baku, Azerbaijan, as well as films produced in the “Digital Film Production” course. That course and “Acting and Directing for the Camera” are taught by Professor of Theater Paul Kuritz, a member of Bates’ theater faculty since 1978.

• Friday, April 3, at 4 p.m.
• Pettigrew Hall, Filene Room (Room 301), 305 College St.

Martin Andrucki, Dana Professor of Theater at Bates, directs the college theater department production of “Measure for Measure,” William Shakespeare’s dark comedy about sex, public morality and private hypocrisy.

Performances take place at 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday, March 7, 8, 14 and 15; and at 2 p.m. Sunday, March 10 and 16, in Gannett Theater, Pettigrew Hall, 2 Andrews Road.

Admission is $6 general admission, and $3 for Bates faculty and staff, senior citizens and non-Bates students. For more information, please call 207-786-6161 or visit the online box office at www.bates.edu/boxoffice.

“Measure for Measure” is believed to have been written in 1603 or 1604. Though known as a comedy, it’s also one of three Shakespeare plays that scholars term “problem plays” — meaning they address, but reach no conclusions about, problematic social issues such as the need for mercy in justice, the definition of gender roles in human sexuality, and, in particular, questions of sexual morality.

“Measure for Measure,” says Andrucki, “raises more questions than it answers, leaving the audience without any final or settled sense of the moral stature of the major characters.”

In the story, the Duke of Vienna has left the city in the hands of Angelo, a strict and austere judge. Though the Duke has rarely enforced the city’s laws against fornication, Angelo is an outspoken supporter of them, and his control of the city spells trouble for young lovers.

When one Claudio gets Juliet, his betrothed, pregnant, Angelo sentences him to death. But when Isabella, Claudio’s distraught sister, pleads for mercy for her brother, Angelo tells her he will spare her brother’s life only if she has sex with him.

Thus begins the commentary on the hypocrisy of public figures, and how social morality does not necessarily correlate with private morality. When it turns out that the Duke has not gone away at all, but stayed in Vienna incognito to observe the happenings without him, chaos reigns as the theme of secret identity prevails throughout the play.

Andrucki edited the play slightly, cutting a number of scenes, but is presenting the play essentially as it appears in standard editions of Shakespeare. But he has moved the action from Renaissance Vienna to New York in the 1970s, a setting for an urban breakdown parallel to that depicted in the Duke’s Vienna .

Two Bates seniors feature prominently in the production. Stephen Lattanzi of Winchester, Mass., plays Angelo and Sam Leichter of Wallingford, Pa., portrays the Duke. Both students are using the play as their senior acting thesis production.

“I knew I had two strong actors to play the male leads,” Andrucki says. “Then, I like the fact that the play has a lot of colorful and challenging cameo roles, which would allow a large number of students to get involved.”

One of William Shakespeare’s first comedies, The Taming of the Shrew is the major fall production of the Bates College theater department.

Directed by Professor of Theater Paul Kuritz, “The Taming of the Shrew” will be performed at 8 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday, Nov. 2-5, and 2 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 6, in Gannett Theater, Pettigrew Hall, Andrews Road. Admission is $6 for the general public and $3 for Bates faculty and staff, senior citizens and non-Bates students.

For reservations and more information, please call the box office at 207-786-6161 or visit its Web site.

A lighthearted romantic comedy, The Taming of the Shrew was written in London around 1592, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. Set in Italy, the play comments on marriage and the duties of women to their husbands.

The plot deals with the loves and marriages of two sisters, the mild-tempered Bianca and the unmanageable Katherina, as they and their lovers deal with arranged marriages, money, love and the “taming” of a scolding wife. The play has inspired several adaptations including the Tony Award-winning Cole Porter musical “Kiss Me, Kate” and the 1999 film “10 Things I Hate About You.”

“We had not produced a Shakespearean comedy in a while, so I selected ‘Taming of the Shrew,’ ” says Kuritz. “The subject of marriage has been in the news quite a bit and I thought Shakespeare’s take on the institution should be considered.”

Kuritz’s approach to the comedy breaks from convention. “A traditional interpretation would have this arc: Wild, untamed, ‘manly’ Kate is broken by Petruchio into a submissive, passive wife,” he explains. “Kate is the character who changes most in this interpretation.”

But, says Kuritz, “I have read and re-read the play with another point of view. What if Kate is at the beginning of the play as she is at the end? What if she doesn’t change at all? Who then changes, since someone must change in the course of a play?

“I believe Petruchio is the one who changes. In fact, I believe Kate tames him.”

Also of interest is the visual setting of the production, created by costume and set designer B. Christine McDowell, assistant professor of theater. Setting the production in Italy during the late 1950s-early 1960s provides a context in which “Kate can be more of a rebel than a harpie,” she explains. “We liked the idea of playing up the cultural shifts that happened at that time when ‘good’ girls wanted to be Sandra Dee and ‘bad’ girls wanted to be rock ‘n’ rollers or bohemians.”

With the play originally set in Padua, “we also liked to play on the conservatism of Italy at that time,” she adds.

New to Bates this academic year, McDowell has been a freelance designer for New York and regional theatres and has taught theatrical design at SUNY New Paltz, The College of William and Mary and the University of South Florida.

The cast of the Bates production includes Molly Joyce Marquand, a senior from Garrison, N.Y., as Bianca; junior Kym Bell of Carver, Mass., playing Katherina; Maggie McCally, a sophomore from Westport, Conn., as their father, Baptista Minola; Joe Williams, a first-year student from Washington, D.C., playing Bianca’s primary suitor, Lucentio; sophomore Stephen Lattanzi of Winchester, Mass., portraying Petruchio; and Dane Cunningham, a junior from Topsfield, Mass., as Hortensio.