Opening Thursday, the new play "Be Brave, Anna!" which recounts the tragic rise and fall of tabloid superstar Anna Nicole Smith, is the product of a completely student-run theater production. Tara Schuster '08 wrote and directed the play independent of the Brown theater group Production Workshop.
"The basic idea was to collapse French melodrama over the story of Anna Nicole Smith and see what has become virtue in this age of reality TV," Schuster said.
While taking HIST 1973P: "City as Modernity: Popular Culture, Mass Consumption, Urban Entertainment in 19th Century Paris" with Professor of History Mary Gluck, Schuster became intrigued by melodrama as an art form.
"Melodrama today is a pejorative term, but in 19th-century France, it was the most popular art form of the day," Schuster said. "I was trying to rescue this degraded art form, this joke theater."
Melodrama - with its clear distinctions between evil and good - provided the ideal framework for expressing reality television and celebrity-obsessed culture through the tragic story of Anna Nicole Smith, Schuster said.
"This tawdry form of cult of personality is the new freak show," Schuster said. The play examines "celebrities who become aliens."
Putting together "Be Brave, Anna!" began when Schuster was studying abroad in Paris during the mysterious death of Anna Nicole Smith in February.
America was represented as a land of "rich blond heiresses drugged out of their minds" Schuster said. So working within that paradigm, Schuster wrote the rough draft. Yet the play is the result of a truly collaborative process.
Though she wrote a rough draft in Paris, Schuster rewrote the script this summer in Providence, she said. She e-mailed friends whom she had worked with in previous productions asking if they would like to be involved.
"Surprisingly, everyone said yes," Schuster said. "That shows how fascinated everyone is by Anna Nicole Smith's life."
Because Schuster's show is not affiliated with PW, she and her friends had complete creative control. "It's a bunch of friends hanging out and being creative," said Lauren Fischer '08, production director and costume designer for the show.
Another friend, Herald Staff Writer Jessica Kerry '08, has curated a "museum" display for the show. Upon entering the theater space, audience members will pass through an exhibit of reality television and celebrity culture which is "based off of a curiosity shop," said Schuster.
"In PW, there is a show packet, but now we just play it by ear and do what needs to be done. There is no book to follow which is really scary," Schuster said.
The play and will be performed in the upstairs space at PW. There is no selection process for the upstairs space, said Alexander Rosenthal '08, a PW board member who runs the space. "There is a lottery because it is in such high demand," Rosenthal said. "The directors run the gambit from freshman who've never directed before to experienced directors like Tara."
"You can just come in and do it on your own," said Schuster.
The play runs Thursday through Saturday.
