2022 LSU Gumbo - Book - Page 189
A dead horse that I have and will continue to relentlessly
kick throughout my time as a columnist and beyond is that
the arts and humanities are owed much more of our time
and attention than we presently give them.
While our university’s love for sports is unparalleled, and
our administration never neglects a chance to boast about
the university’s latest accomplishments from the world of
STEM or business, the arts and humanities must contend
with scraps of tepid acknowledgement.
It is certainly not the case that there is nothing of value
happening in the arts on campus—countless students and
faculty from a variety of disciplines are doing spectacular
artistic work.
In fact, we received a much-appreciated reminder of this
just the other week.
Theatre performance senior Sophia Brazda wrote and
directed a dazzling honors thesis in the form of a play
entitled “GOD GUN!” Under the formal supervision of
theater professor John Fletcher, Brazda rounded up a team
of undergraduates, graduate students and alumni to build a
full-length production from the ground up.
The show follows the staff of The Columbus Post—
presumably a national newspaper comparable to The
Washington Post—as the world trembles in the grips of
cataclysmic occurrences some have confidently deemed
“the end times.”
However, opinion columnist and ex-seminarian Scott
Butler, played by senior Nicholas Russo, is not convinced.
In an article titled “Opinion: Global Phenomena Born of
Natural Causes,” he dismisses the public’s hysteria as mere
superstition.
Naturally, in a scene that any experienced opinion
columnist knows well, Butler is flooded with hate mail from
across the country.
Things crank up a notch near the end of the first act
when Jean, the office head of HR played by Arden Forrand,
brings Butler a special package from God Himself. Needless
to say, things spiral into hilarious absurdity from there.
There isn’t much I can say by way of summary after the
first act. In an experimental twist, the entire second act was
completely improvised, inevitably meaning that the ending
of every performance, and ultimately the way in which one
experienced every performance, was entirely unique.
This was undoubtedly the show’s most impressive feat.
Brazda, whom I was lucky enough to chat with after my
viewing of the show, plans on synthesizing the various
second acts into a fully cohesive “mega-act,” as she terms it,
that would take the best points from every performance.
The set design was effectively minimal. The entirety
of the show takes place in and around an office cubicle,
furnished solely by an empty desk, chair, office phone and,
occasionally, an outdated MacBook.
Interestingly, the famously sterile setting of a corporate
office evokes heightened feelings of both foreboding and
comedy that play off one another quite well throughout the
show.
The fact that the show presents us with, in one sense at
least, a vision of the apocalypse as seen from a cubicle is
quite funny. One cannot help but laugh as the mundane
world of HR and op-eds collides with the world of divine
destiny and celestial beings. It is the sort of absurdity that
might arise from a crossover between “The Office” and
Dante’s “Divine Comedy.”
However, there is also something unsettling about this
juxtaposition of the ordinary and supernatural. It quietly
invites a reflection on modern life and its divorce from the
spiritual. Brazda acknowledged this thematic exploration
by describing the play as “a love-letter to the recovering
Catholic, kids who grew up very religious and find
themselves adrift as adults.”
Needless to say, the show was a refreshing and muchneeded reminder of the artistic talent present on campus.
The university may not have widely publicized the
ingenious play, but luckily Brazda and the cast of “GOD
GUN!” did not need much help from the university to get
their show to the masses. They, a completely student-run
production, managed to sell out all five of their shows.
Perhaps I am understating the show’s potential as a mere
“reminder” of the artistic talent present on campus. It also a
brilliant model for talented students looking to capture the
attention of our largely philistine campus.
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