Telluride Theatre: “Consider This,” 3/16 & 17

07 Mar Telluride Theatre: “Consider This,” 3/16 & 17

Telluride Theatre presents Santa Fe’s Theater Grottesco’s “Consider This…” The event takes place Friday & Saturday, March 16 & March 17, 7 p.m. at The Bob Saunder’s Memorial Theatre (or The Palm’s Black Box). Tickets are $15 for adults (GA); $10 for students (ages 5+). Tickets here or call 970-708-7629.

Telluride Theatre is hosting the Santa Fe-based theatre company Theater Grottesco, presenting their critically acclaimed show CONSIDER THIS…

The production is part of Telluride Theatre’s new BEYOND THE BOX SERIES designed to bring original performances by theatre-makers from around the country to Telluride.

CONSIDER THIS… is a 60-minute romp through the pre-history of Western theater: from Greek tragedy to Commedia dell’Arte, Clown, Buffoon, masks and more.

Enjoy the irreverence of one of the United States’ most creative theatrical ensembles as they share the many theatrical styles that make up their imaginative, original plays.

CONSIDER THIS… opens with a reflection and a question: ‘There were times when theater artists were changing the world. Are they still?”

The lecture-performance unfolds as a journey through the creation of each theatrical style as a response to social and political movements.

CONSIDER THIS… has toured throughout the United States and was mounted in Colombia in 2014.

Theater Grottesco artists create their own plays collectively.

The choice of realism, generic comedy or musicals is replaced with a broad range of historical theatrical styles or combinations of styles – distinctly “unrealistic” – with most often pushing the artists into unknown territory. Instead of the intellectual arguments and emotions conveyed through a script, the company uses imagery, movement, stillness and silence to move audiences.

Grottesco’s artists prefer to ask questions rather than provide answers. And instead of three to six weeks of rehearsals, the company spends years developing a piece.

In many ways, Theater Grottesco is closer to dance, music and the fine arts then it is to conventional theater.

Founded in 1983 in Paris, France, Theater Grottesco creates a new kind of performance that is visual, explosive and full of surprise, rekindling interest in live performance by juxtaposing classical theatrical styles with a daring, poetic research into cultures –  and imagination – taking audiences to the brink of emotional wonder and soulful reflection.

Grottesco has created 13 full-length original plays and over 40 shorter works ranging in style from Tragic Buffonery to Performance Poetry, Expressionistic Melodrama and Gesture-Based Dance.

The company has received 12 National Endowment for the Arts Professional Theatre Awards, and national grants from the Rockefeller MAP Fund, MetLife, Doris Duke, Andrew Mellon, Theater Communications Group and The Network of Ensemble Theaters.

Grottesco moved to the United States in 1985, basing out of New York and Detroit before settling in Santa Fe in 1996.

Theater Grottesco has performed in seven countries, 30 states, most major U.S. cities and dozens of smaller communities, as well as Off-Broadway in 1999 with a production that will be permanently archived in the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.