New play can be personal Odyssey

Picture this: it’s near dusk on a summer’s eve. You’re in the stands, surrounded by 186 acres of some of most beautiful real estate in the County. Birds sing; a horse whinnies in a barn to your right. A pond sits quietly before you, moved only by the riot and ripple of bugs skimming its surface.

A clarion calls. Something is imminent. Suddenly performers populate the land and what was once still is now alive with sight and sound. You are no longer merely a spectator. In a single transcendent moment, you have become part of the production.

This is what you can expect when Two Planks and a Passion Theatre Company present The Odyssey next summer.

As indicated on their website www.twoplanks.ca/">www.twoplanks.ca) “July 2007 sees the advent of a new chapter in Two Planks and a Passion Theatre’s evolution - our first in a series of major outdoor theatrical productions on the grounds of our sister organization, The Ross Creek Centre for the Arts. Rick Chafe’s adaptation of Homer’s The Odyssey will be staged in, on, and around a large pond overlooking the world’s highest tides on the Bay of Fundy. Immersed in the flora and fauna on the 186 acres that surround the Ross Creek Centre for The Arts, The Odyssey will be an experience unlike any in the region featuring a magical theatricality inspired by the elements and a story as old as literature itself.�

Can you dig it? I can. Sure, it’s an ambitious undertaking, but who wouldn’t be excited by the opportunity to be in the thick of live, outdoor theatre? For many of us, it’ll be the experience of a lifetime.

Ken Schwartz and Chris O’Neill are the company’s founding artistic directors. Last week they invited a prominent collection of local talent – media, businesspeople, artisans, communications experts, marketing analysts and theatre people – to a brainstorming session at Ross Creek Centre for the Arts.

The group was asked to answer a fundamental question: how can Two Planks serve the community and make it stronger through community economic development?

Indeed, how can we in Kings County – as individuals, business owners and community stakeholders – provide a value-added experience for those coming to share in adventure of The Odyssey?

It’s a good question and there were some fantastic responses. Essentially, the bottom line is this: we can all benefit from this undertaking if we come together to support the production and identify the myriad spinoff opportunities it entails.

Bed and breakfast owners, innkeepers, bus tours, ferry service, restaurateurs, boutiques, outdoor experience organizations, hikers, cyclists, you name it: all have a chance to partner in this venture.

The assemblage saw immediately the huge economic and marketable potential in a theatrical experience like The Odyssey and it’s incumbent on us to get behind it.

I’m sure that as much as Ken and Chris would like to say their concept is unique, the fact is it has been done elsewhere.

Ken did a great deal of research prior to assuming the task of producing The Odyssey. He cited 4th Line Theatre Company in Millbrook, Ontario, the Blyth Festival in Ontario and Bread and Puppet Theatre in Vermont as case studies to support Two Planks’s interest in this.

Each company has found its niche because every night the presentation is unique. Mist could rise up off the land; light will be various and tricky; the conjoining of sight and sound distinct in every performance as surely as every day is different.

Schwartz says The Odyssey will be performed six times a week, from July 26 to Aug. 12, 2007. Shows will start at 6 p.m. and will run about two hours. A sumptuous meal will accompany the price of admission, although they haven’t decided if it will be eaten in a tent after the performance or be given to patrons in a box to enjoy as the play unfolds.

The devil’s in the details and they’re wise to have put the wheels in motion now to gather input, forge community links and get people enthused about their endeavour.

I know I am. If you live around here, mark a date on your calendar and plan to attend. If you’re coming here from away, book now and schedule your vacation around The Odyssey experience. From what I’ve heard so far, you won’t be disappointed.