This site requires Javascript to be turned on. Please enable Javascript and reload the page.

California State University, Dominguez Hills Theatre Department: The First Decade

Kabuki

This page is referenced by:

1972-1973 Season
King Oedipus

Synopsis: "King Oedipus" tells the story of the doomed King of Thebes, whose efforts to end a plague that threatens his city lead to horrible tragedy for Oedipus and his family. (Performed with Great Goodness of Life)

Playwright: Sophocles

Director: Tom Wheatley

Technical Director: Larry Dewey

Performed: November 10, 11, 16, 17, 18, 1972

Cast: Jack Vaughn (Oedipus), Valerie Shidler (Jocasta), Douglas McEwan (Tiresias), Dennis Lowden (Greon), Ed Pate (Priest), Dennis Lowden (Corinthian Messenger), Natalie Sherman (Servant to Jocasta), Dan Weinell (Herdsman), Maria and Diana Zarro (Daughters of Oedipus)

Production Images: To see production images from our digital collection, click here
Great Goodness of Life

Synopsis: "Great Goodness of Life" focuses on the trial of Court Royal, a middle-aged black man. He has been accused of unspecified crimes. An offstage voice and a sequence of Ku Klux Klan figures are asserting the claim that he has been harboring a murderer. However, Court interprets this claim as literal and the voice aims to strip away his black identity. (Performed with King Oedipus)

Playwright: Imamu Amiri Baraka (Le Roi Jones)

Director: Robert Carmack

Technical Director:

Performed: November 10, 11, 16, 17, 18, 1972

Cast: Anthony Green (Court Royal), Phil Smith (The Voice), Robert Mosley (Breck), Harawese Peaches Moore (The Young Victim), Vivien Purnell (The Woman), Roland Jefferson, Robert Mosley, Al McCloskey, and Robert Carmack (The Hoods)

Production Images: To see production images from our digital collection, click here

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Synopsis: The play follows a married couple, George and Martha, whose marriage has turned into a nasty battle. One evening, they use another couple as pawns and turn their guests into an audience to witness them humiliate each other.

Playwright: Edward Albee

Director: Jack Vaughn

Technical Director: Larry Dewey

Performed: January 12, 13, 18, 19, 20, 1973

Cast: Noreen Farley (Martha), Dennis Lowden (George), Richard Rutledge (Nick), Carol Hertford (Honey)

Production Images: To see production images from our digital collection, click here
Kabuki

Synopsis (The Demon's Magic Mallet): Gohei becomes an employee of a wealthy daimyō. He is tasked to accompanying the princess. They are attacked by a demon and Gohei defeats him by pricking him within with his sword.

Synopsis (Narukami): Resentful of the imperial court, Narukami captures the rain dragon. The court orders Princess Taema to seduce Narukami and make it rain.

Playwright (The Demon's Magic Mallet): unknown and translated by Shio Sakanishi

Playwright (Narukami): Tsuuchi Hanjūrō, Yasuda Abun, and Nakata Mansuke and translated by Miss Miyoko Watanabe

Director: Leonard C. Pronko and Jack Vaughn

Technical Director:

Performed: February 23 & 24 and March 1, 2, 3, 1973

Cast (The Demon's Magic Mallet): Edward Pate (The Demon), Barbara Kundrot (Jimbei), Dennis Kortheuer (Gohei)

Cast (Narukami): Edward Kerr (Narukami), Kathleen Buttrey (Princess Kumo no Taema), Donald Morea (Hakuun), Dan Weinell (Kokuun), Jobie Gayer, Veronica Gerger, Dennis Kortheuer, Benita Massler, Edward Pate, Craig Ridley, Michele Robertson, and Mike Sabol (Acolytes), Joe Grace (Narrator)

Production Images: To see production images from our digital collection, click here
Slow Dance on the Killing Ground

Synopsis: The play follows three people with morbid backgrounds who each use each other for cathartic exposition of their life stories.

Playwright: William Hanley

Director: Richard Wayne Abel, Hal Marienthal, and Tom Wheatley

Assistant Director: Donna Trelford

Guest Director: Leonard Pronko

Technical Director: Mitch Taylor

Performed: April 13, 14, 19, 20, 21,1973

Cast: Glas (Douglas Leonard), Randall (Robert Carmack), Rosie (Charlee Hutton)

Production Images: To see production images from our digital collection, click here
As You Like It
Synopsis: Rosalind and her cousin flee from persecution in her uncle's court into the forest for safety and to find her love, Orlando. She disguises herself as a boy shepard and convinces Orlando to woo "him" under the guise of "curing" him of his love for Rosalind.

Playwright: William Shakespeare

Director: Jack Vaughn

Technical Director:

Performed: June 1, 2, 7, 8, 9, 1973

Cast: Debbie Andres (Rosalind), Richard Rutledge (Orlando), Richard Abel (Touchstone), Carroll Hauser (Melancholy Jacques), Kathleen Buttrey (Cella), Daniel Weinell (Oliver), Francesca Miller (Phebe), Michael Sabol (Silvius)

Production Images:
The Venues The Playbox Theatre

The first structures built on the new campus were identical small, one-story buildings designed by campus architect A. Quincy Jones. Though utilitarian-looking, the structures were connected by walkways, benches, and lawns that helped create a thriving and communal campus environment. Among these buildings was the campus theatre, known as the Playbox Theatre. Later, when this part of campus became known as Small College, the theatre was likewise often referred to as Small Theatre.

The interior, at first glance, may not have been inspiring -- more lecture hall in appearance than university theatre. The stage was very small, and seemed destined for one-act plays, or if the productions were larger, they would have to have small casts and few scenery changes. There was little room between the stage and the audience, and the seating area consisted of three tiers: the auditorium floor, and then two tiers rising like wide steps. The seating might consist of classroom chairs, or small tables used to create a cabaret atmosphere, as in a 1976 production of The Drunkard.

But, as the photos in this exhibit show, if there were any shortcomings in the Playbox Theatre's size or set-up, they disappeared as soon as the curtain rose. Inspired direction, staging, costuming, and acting established Dominguez Hills as a destination site for exciting theatrical experiences from the very first production. The space was indeed perfect for intimate plays and intimate scenes. The 1975 production of The Diary of Anne Frank, for example, might rank among the most realistically claustrophobic presentations of that play.

But the Theatre Department also proved to be a perfect venue for productions of spectacle and scale. In its first five years alone, the Playbox was home to Jacobean, Shakespearean, and Edwardian comedy , Greek tragedy, a Morality play, Brechtian musical, Baroque Spanish tragicomedy. Even after close to a half century later, the images of these productions have a startling dramatic immediacy. Small wonder that the Theatre Arts program was twice recognized for excellence in costuming two out of three years at the American College Theatre Festival.