DETAILS

WHAT: [Via] Corpora, a Performance R&D Center, presents the First Los Angeles Physical Theatre Arts Festival (LAPTAF) at Art/Works Theatre LOCATION: Art/Works Theatre , 6569 Santa Monica Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90038 DATES: Thursday –Sunday, 11/24 - 12/23, 2007. Times vary depending on the evening. See schedule below. PRICES: $15-25. Cash/check only at the theater. Group rates available.

TICKETS: http://www.laptaf.eventbrite.com/,

or at 323.871.1912.

SCHEDULE & LINE UP:

November 29 -December 23.
Thursdays 8PM and Sundays 7PM
An evening of Physical Comedy with inspired lunatics Ten West presenting Limoncello
&
The"versatile and translucent" Mitchel Evans Mime Project exploding The BIG BANG & other small things.

____________________

November 24-December 22.
Fridays/Saturdays at 8:30 PM and Sunday 11/25 at 7pm
An evening of Physically-induced Terror and Laughter, celebrating A Very Grand Guignol Christmas featuring The Laboratory of Hallucinations by André de Lorde.
Due to violence, this show is inappropriate for children.

The Festival is HERE!

October 22nd, 2007 Los Angeles, CA –
Los Angeles theater is about to bring Los Angeles back to its roots! With the universal language of physical artistry, the First Annual Los Angeles Physical Theatre Arts Festival (LAPTAF) brings together three imaginative, profound, and hilarious performances that will have audiences splitting at the sides, rending at the hearts and remembering that theater is a place, above all, to have fun!

As the studios learned in the early days of Hollywood with the international success of such luminaries as Laurel and Hardy, Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd, and the Marx Brothers, physical-based performance is the bridge to all cultures, all languages and all ages!

Evolution proves it! We all come from the same tree of life, sharing the same basic body, right down to the same genetic structuring! Imbibing this firm belief of the body as the primary organizing principle, a new physical training center [via]Corpora (Latin for "Through the Bodies") has organized LAPTAF which includes such local veterans as mime-extraordinaire Mitchel Evans, comic duo Ten West and new sensation to LA, the Grand Guiginolers de Paris, led by Debbie McMahon. The festival consists of two alternating evenings of presentations, offering a lighter fair for all ages, and a darker one, for adults only.

Holiday Season is upon us and what could make it more dynamic and unforgettable than the sharing of heartfelt laughs, gut-wrenching screams and truly tender moments with our families as well as our extended communities!

"A Very Grand Guignol Christmas" by Debbie McMahon's GRAND GUIGNOLERS DE PARIS

Le Théâtre du Grand Guignol was once known as "the greatest horror show on earth." Enter the underworld of 1930's Paris: horrific and erotic, unsettlingly sophisticated and morally dubious. It is a world where retribution is taken to an unimaginably gruesome extreme.

Debbie McMahon's GRAND GUIGNOLERS DE PARIS are returning to Los Angeles with their "Theatre of Laughter and Terror," in a new enthralling performance of the age-old Grand Guignol favorite, The Laboratory of Hallucination written by one of the Grand Guignol's most influential playwrights and operators, André de Lorde. The 1930s speakeasy-like atmosphere will feature an absinthe demonstration prior to showtime. The violent farce, These Cornfields by Georges Courtleline and les petit guignolers (gory finger puppets) serve up the final nog and misteltoe for the patron's evening's bill.

The Laboratory of Hallucinations depicts a determined scientist who performs torturous experiments on the brains of his patients, invoking pain and terrible hallucinations before enacting the ultimate revenge on his wife's lover.

These Cornfields is a highly physical farce wherein a tempestuous couple, the Cornfields, violently fight through their innocent guest, Herring, escalating the evening to mayhem.

Be terrfied as the Grand Guignolers ('big puppets') come to life! Laugh until it hurts as the silent Master of Ceremonies artfully guides you through this strange world! Try not to faint as the les petit guignolers desperately ravage themselves in full Holiday cheer! True to form, a resident doctor may be employed to treat the numerous spectators unaccustomed to a performance of such explicit violence and blood-curdling terror, a performance that terrifies and titillates the spectator through a mixture of horror, laughter and the erotic. A typical evening's entertainment by the Grand Guignolers reveals the sophisticated exploitation of the audience's fears, taboos and desires, inevitably featuring eye-gouging, throat-slashing, acid-throwing, or some other equally grisly climax.

Co-produced and Presented by [via]Corpora. Co-Produced/Directed by Debbie McMahon.
Performed by Kevin Dulude, Ramy Eletreby, Ruthie Frank, Jeremy Guskin, Gary Karp, Debbie McMahon, Dani O'Terry, Michael Serwich, and Tina Van Berckelaer.

"The BIG BANG & other small things" by the Mitchell Evans Mime Project

Mitchel Evans, critically acclaimed as " a genuinely gifted performer, so complete his body seems translucent", expands his "odd blend of the precise and the casual" into a tightly wound ensemble, the Mitchell Evans Mime Project, debuting their new work, THE BIG BANG ...& other small things. Utilizing precise physical movement, lyrical clowning, and music reminiscent of the Universe's First Delta, The Big Bang...& other small things dives into the richness of the world that awes and frightens us. From the Creation of the Universe, to Love and Heartbreak, to the Quest for Chocolate Caramels, the Mitchel Evans Mime Project presents the LARGE and the small of life through the ever charming, always provocative Soul of the Clown.

"The versatile Evans is a marvelous clown " (L.A. Weekly)
"Inspirited Mime with fresh life." (Dance Magazine)

Cast: Mitchel Evans, Tara Strand, Janell Burgess, and Jeff Robinson. Music: High Priestess, Tribalogical, and M.Y. Evans.

"Limoncello" by Ten West

This two-man clown show, featuring Jon Monastero and Stephen Simon, is a masterfully executed, engagingly imagined, wacky physical comedy. Combining old routines of vaudeville, comedia dell'arte, and silent films with fresh perspectives on modern realities, this show balances slapstick with the profundity of existentialist human existence squarely in the traditions of Beckett and other early twentieth century European theatre.

Ten West is a Los Angeles-based comedy duo who has received critical and audience acclaim in LA, San Francisco, Toronto, Seattle, Bellingham, Portland, NY, Chicago, and Vancouver. Of their shows in January 2007, TimeOut Chicago writes, "I think it's safe to say I was unequivocally mesmerized the entire length of the show. I don't even think I risked blinking. They were that good."

In addition to touring their shows, Ten West has performed with the renowned Velvet Hammer Burlesque at the El Rey (LA), guest starred on Q TV, and recently enjoyed successful theatrical runs of their show, Nights Errant, at the Sacred Fools Theatre and the 24th Street Theatre in Los Angeles. The LA Weekly gave the show a "GO!" pick and wrote,

"The two-man clown show is a wacky, Dadaist trip…all very goofy, giddy, funny and executed with infectious charm."

While Backstage West gave a Critic's Pick, writing,

"…inspired lunatics… absurd practical jokes, wild improvisations, comic deceptions and farcical battles of will… highly endearing… performed with Saroyanesque charm."

For more information, visit http://www.tenwest.net/.

What is [via]Corpora?

[via]Corpora, a Performance Research & Development Center

[via]Corpora, an extension of not-for-profit Los Angeles based theater collective ARTEL, is a center designed for performers and non-performers alike who desire to deepen their experience of the world and their expressive abilities. Through classes and workshops participants explore individually as well as collectively the connections between breath, rhythm, alignment, coordination, voice, intellect, emotion and spirit. Our goal is to build a community of participants based on Joy and Play in which all can discover and share their insights into body-mind perception and expression. Performance Research and Development Center, is the heart of [via]Corpora. While extending our research into non-performance related applications, the bulk of worksessions offered at the center are designed to provide training to the Los Angeles community of actors and performers based on physical approaches to the craft.