GREENFIELD, MA — The LAVA Center is proud to present “Off the Shelf,” a play reading series of new classic plays, that will take place on Saturdays afternoons: August 12, 19, 26 and September 2 at 1 p.m.
The plays encompass a range of international, professional plays from the 1960s through the 1990s, and will be read by local actors.
There is an optional, $5–10 suggested donation for each performance, to help The LAVA Center cover royalty and production costs.
The schedule:
Saturday, Aug. 12, 1 p.m.: The Memorandum by Václav Havel
Václav Havel holds several distinctions: last president of Czechoslovakia, first president of The Czech Republic, political prisoner and renowned playwright, memorist and essayist. The Memorandum was first written and produced in 1965 prior to Prague Spring and Havel’s arrest and imprisonment as a political dissident and subsequent leader of the first democratically elected government of his country. In The Memorandum, Havel peels away layers of implacable bureaucracy to poke fun at the absurdity and the venality of Soviet-style communism and the well-founded anxieties of the people who did their best to get along in spite of it. The play centers around the sudden introduction of a new inter-office language, Ptydepe, mandated and lauded as scientific and efficient. Of course, it is anything but. And of course, there will eventually be a new absurd mandated language to replace it.
Saturday, Aug. 19, 1 p.m.: True West by Sam Shepard
Sam Shepard’s plays are known for their bleak, poetic, surrealist elements, black comedy and rootless characters living on the outskirts of American society. True West, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1983, is about the sibling rivalry between two estranged brothers who have reconnected. It is also an exploration of how we live and succeed (or don’t) in a demanding, dehumanizing society: Which brother is more “in touch” with life, the one who’s been living on the desert, essentially off the grid, or the one who watches the news and drives the freeway every day — and which one is more satisfied with his life?
Saturday, Aug. 26, 1 p.m.: Spinning into Butter by Rebecca Gilman
Rebecca Gilman is a playwright from Alabama whose plays deal with contemporary societal issues. She is best known for Spinning into Butter, which was named one of the best plays of 1999 by Time and became the third-most-produced play of the 2000–’01 season in the country. A searing, comic expose of political correctness at a small Vermont college, the play continues to provoke heated conversations about racism in America today.
Saturday, Sept. 2, 1 p.m.: Can’t Pay? Won’t Pay! by Dario Fo
Dario Fo’s modern classic, translated variously as We Won’t Pay, We Won’t Pay!, Can’t Pay, Won’t Pay!, and Low Pay, Don’t Pay! was first produced in 1974. A slapstick comedy with unabashed political tones, overtones and undertones, the play features housewives who are caught up in the action when women of their city protesting high grocery prices take what they want from the store shelves. In their efforts to hide their transgressions, they convince their husbands that the groceries being hidden under their clothes are pregnancies. Like a mashup of “The Honeymooners,” “I Love Lucy,” and Bernie Sanders on the Senate floor, the play delivers laughs and serious commentary on the wealth gap. That it is nearly 50 years old and still so relevant should give us all something to contemplate, even as we enjoy the classic antics.
The LAVA Center is a community arts space in Greenfield, MA whose mission is to create opportunities and build inclusive community in and through the arts and humanities. We are focused on making The LAVA Center a space where all artists, including marginalized communities and individuals, can have their voices heard. The LAVA Center is located at 324 Main St., in downtown Greenfield, MA. https://thelavacenter.org