RAT Players’ ‘This Is Our Youth’ Explores Adolescence, Maturity – Twin Falls Times
August 7, 2015 by admin
Filed under Lingerie Events
TWIN FALLS • Three young adults who are at a crossroads of their lives. Living in New York City in the 1980s, they are seeking, and slowly finding their paths.
“This Is Our Youth” is a play about growing up — about individuals who are on the cusp of adulthood. The Random Acts of Theater Players will present the show at 7:30 p.m. Aug. 13-15 at the College of Southern Idaho’s Fine Arts Recital Hall.
The plot of the play involves wily and domineering Dennis Ziegler, living in his West Side apartment. Friend Warren Straub, a dejected 19-year-old, comes to the apartment hoping to stay with Ziegler for a few days. He has just been kicked out of his abusive lingerie tycoon father’s house and has stolen $15,000 on the way out.
Ziegler spends some of the money on cocaine, and hopes to sell it to a friend for much more. In the meantime, Jessica Goldman, an “anxiously insightful” fashion student comes to the apartment where Straub and Goldman engage in “an intricate dance of introduction, introspection and attraction,” according to promotion materials.
The play is directed by Jud Harmon and stars the three-member cast of Dustin Hobdey, Bryson Hatfield and Autumn Robinson. It explores timeless issues of adolescence and maturity. The characters feel adrift in 1980s-style materialism.
The production, written by Kenneth Lonergan is for mature audiences due to adult language and drug and sexual references.
“It’s about coming of age,” said Robinson, who plays Goldman. Hatfield, who plays Warren, said that when he is asked by acquaintances whether it is a comedy or dramas, said he responds that it is several genres rolled into one and encompasses many emotions.
Harmon sees the three cast members this way: Despite his sometimes self-absorbed personality, Ziegler is a caring individual at heart. Straub is “the lost boy of the play,” Harmon said.”He doesn’t have a clear path, and is trying to find pieces on which to build his adulthood.”
As for Goldman, “she knows where she came from and where she is going,” he said. She is happy about where she has been and who she is going to be.”
Robinson said that her character is argumentative as a way to find people’s viewpoints. “She is willing to listen,” she said.
As the cast members have rehearsed, they have gained more insight into the characters, she said.
In most productions, Harmon said, questions are raised at the start of the show and then answers are eventually provided. In “This Is Our Youth,” not all the questions are answered.
“It shows that they don’t have all the answers, and that is OK,” he said.
Harmon said the audience will need to think about the deepness of the dialogue.
“It is kind of a heavy piece; it has a lot of density to it,” added Hatfield.
“I think this is a show that needs to be seen,” Harmon said. “It helps us understand who we are at a society and who we are as a people.”
