WSJ.com: Wring your hands all you want about how a cleaned-up New York City has sold its soul and is shooing all the best artistic talent to urban shells like Detroit.
It's not. Exhibit A is PigPen Theatre Co., a group of seven guys who met in 2008 at the Carnegie Mellon School of Drama in Pittsburgh and, upon graduating in 2011, moved directly to Astoria (OK, one posted up in Brooklyn). Together they write their own songs and weave them into narratives that become music-driven theater. The music is in an indie-folk idiom, and the stories are newly created myths.
11 comments:
I didn't know the members of PigPen when they were students since I wasn't here yet, but I'm so happy that they're able to achieve the success they have in New York. This article does a great job of highlighting how different and unique their process is compared to other theatre pieces. What I found interesting was their insistence that there isn't one leader of the group... they all have equal say and rely on listening and things they learned here at school to solve problems and disagreements. I think that says a lot about this program and about the skills we are taught.
Since joining CMU in the fall I've heard various people reference PigPen during class discussions about the structure of theatre organizations, among other topics. But, I've never heard a great deal about the group itself and the type of work they produce so I found this article to be really interesting. If given the opportunity I'd certainly make a point to catch a performance.
Funny to see David Beller get his first callout as a professional on the Green Page, and in the Wall Street Journal no less! I haven't had the chance to talk with him yet, but it's really interesting to hear about his involvement as a stage manager with a piece that's really driven and devised (and in many cases, the tech is entirely operated )by the Pigpen team. The article says he functions more as a "den mother", in which a more broad-logistics management may be useful for the fledgling company which is just finding its own in the professional world. I'd imagine there's a level of interaction that must take place between the team and the theatre management, box office, publicity representatives (real smart to pick up O&M Partners, they work wonders) which may be difficult while running a production every night, and could be a role where David's managerial mind could be really useful. It's also encouraging to see classmates working together and hiring their own - here's hoping when we all create our own theatre out there in the world, we look to each other as potential coworkers.
I love the fact that past students are being showcased like this espically with all the hard work they are putting in. I actually didn't really know about them when I stumbled across thier new album on spotify, but I like it and listend to it multiple times. It wasn't till later that I connect the theater company and the music togther. The creativity need to not only incorporate self written music into their plays but alo to run all the different parts of the show is insane, but in a good way. For example, who would have thought to use shadow puppets in their show, but it works so well.
I have also heard of this group from time to time, being from NYC myself and coming to CMU. In the City there are tons of theater groups putting up their own shows, indie shows, fringe shows, etc... and It is so much fun to be apart of the creativity. I love that upperclassmen and students strait out of school have such great opportunities, and are able to open such doors for themselves.
I am so excited for playground because I feel as though it is our chance to display such works that would go up off off Broadway such as the shows put up by Pig Pen
These people are so cool! I love modern theatre, in part because this kind of puppet-show-and-live-music is accepted and encouraged as theatre. I never knew these guys (as I am sure most of the freshman do not), but I wish I had. It takes a lot of guts to go out and put on shows like this, but when the audience is so responsive, almost anything is possible.
i wish i had been here when they were here! im so excited to see them someday though! I think that the idea that this came out of playground just speaks volumes of how important and amazing playground is and im so excited to be a part of it this year!
As somebody interested in "do-it-yourself" theatre, as the author calls it, I find this article and the success story of Pig Pen incredibly comforting. They have a drive to succeed, and put all of their energy and focus into making it happen. I do think it's interesting that in a devised group that does everything by themselves without clear leader, they have chosen to add a stage manager. I definitely see the benefits of having somebody not involved in the artistic process, who can help manage and guide the group. After adding David Beller, though, will their "We don't have a director, we don't even have a spokesperson" model start to fade away though?
I love guerrilla theater because it reflects the importance of challenging established norms to progress the quality of our craft. Pigpen is a wonderful example of this and i considered myself extremely blessed to have ha the opportunity to build their set when they went on the road after their graduation. My greatest hope is that in the future, younger and younger age groups also do this theater(like a group of high schoolers getting together on the weekends and putting together shows for the community, independently of the school). It teaches people that theater isn't all that scary and the industry is open to individuals of all skills and mindsets.
As David Bellers previous little it makes me extremly proud to see him get some recognition from the WSJ. I never really knew what PigPen was all about until reading this article. The fact that they are taking a step away from traditional theatre i think is very brave and even more brave is that they are taking a step back from their own brand of theatre and focusing on the music they are going to be playing at the pub.
This is such a great article! As others have said, I've heard many PigPen references since arriving at CMU, but this article very well explains just what and who exactly they all are. Their concept is very unique and intriguing... truly something different, and it seems to be going over very well! Awesome to see CMU grads having such successes in the real world.
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