Spring’s Awakening

The Looking Glass Theatre presents Spring’s Awakening, a new adaptation of Frank Wedekind’s 1891 tragicomedy about puberty, adapted by Kenneth Nowell and featuring director Charmian Creagle.

Depicting the onset of puberty as violent and chaotic, Spring’s Awakening is no after-school special. Reptilian impulses erupt in children terrorized by adults sunk deep in neurotic denial. One boy has suicidal tendencies as he struggles with his shock over discovering the facts of sex and the possibility of flunking. Another expresses his awakening libido in cool sadism. Masochism appears in a young girl whose mother insists that a stork delivers babies.

The staging of this production contrasts two worlds, an adolescent world depicted by the live actors and a disembodied adult world looming above on screen.

Written at the turn of the twentieth century, Frank Wedekind’s play unfolds in an absurdist atmosphere that foreshadowed Brecht and Beckett. This story of the uncomfortable nature of sexuality blooming during the teen years remains relevant still today. The play renders the devastating neglect adolescents experience when family bonds erode while puritanical elements in society grow stronger.

Cast: Melissa Coleman, Kevin Coyle, Christina DeRosier, Will Ellis, Hana Nora McGrath, Annie Reilly*, Josh Silverman and Ben Sumrall.*

Crew: Kenneth Nowell (adapter) Charmian Creagle (Director), Libby Sturrus (Assistant Director), Noreen Wilson (Stage Manager), Ryan Metzler (Lighting Design), Jessa-Raye Court (Costume Design), Inseung Park (Set Design), Sean Doran (Sound Design), Amanda Boekelheide (Movement Director), Christopher Romero (Film Director) and Daryl Lathon (Director of Photography).

* Courtesy of Actor’s Equity Association

Appropriate For Ages: 13+