Schenkkan - The Kentucky Cycle

The
Kentucky
Cycle The
Kentucky
Cycle Robert Schenkkan Grove Press New York Copyright 1993 by Robert Schenkkan Cover artwork by Cathie Bleck All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Scanning, uploading, and electronic distribution of this book or the facilitation of such without the permission of the publisher is prohibited. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the authors rights is appreciated. Any member of educational institutions wishing to photocopy part or all of the work for classroom use, or anthology, should send inquiries to Grove Atlantic, 154 West 14th Street, New York, NY 10011 or .

CAUTION: Professionals and amateurs are hereby warned that The Kentucky Cycle is subject to a royalty. It is fully protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America and of all countries covered by the International Copyright Union (including the Dominion of Canada and the rest of the British Commonwealth), the Berne Convention, the Pan-American Copyright Convention and the Universal Copyright Convention as well as all countries with which the United States has reciprocal copyright relations. All rights, including professional/amateur stage rights, motion picture, recitation, lecturing, public reading, radio broadcasting, television, video or sound recording, all other forms of mechanical or electronic reproduction, such as CD-ROM, CD-I, information storage and retrieval systems and photocopying, and the rights of translation into foreign languages, are strictly reserved. Particular emphasis is laid upon the matter of readings, permission for which must be secured from the Authors agent in writing. Stock and amateur applications for permission to perform The Kentucky Cycle must be made in advance to Dramatists Play Service (440 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 10016, 212-683-8960) and by paying the requisite fee, whether the plays are presented for charity or gain and whether or not admission is charged. First Class and professional applications must be made in advance to William Morris Endeavor Entertainment, LLC, Attn: Derek Zasky (11 Madison Avenue, 18th Floor.

New York, New York 10010, telephone: 212-586-5100) and by paying the requisite fee. Published simultaneously in Canada Printed in the United States of America First published by Plume, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Books USA Inc., November 1993. First published by Grove Atlantic, June 2016. ISBN 978-0-8021-2527-9 eISBN 978-0-8021-8989-9 Grove Press an imprint of Grove Atlantic 154 West 14th Street New York, NY 10011 Distributed by Publishers Group West groveatlantic.com For Mary Anne ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The author wishes to acknowledge the assistance and contributions of the following individuals and institutions to the development of The Kentucky Cycle : Dr. Greg Culley, Harry Caudill, Scott Reiniger, Jessica Teich, New Dramatists, the Ensemble Studio Theatre, the Mark Taper Forum, the Long Wharf Theatre, David Kranes and the Sundance Playwrights Institute, TheatreWorks, Liz Huddle and the Intiman Theatre, the Fund for New American Plays, the Arthur Foundation, the Vogelstein Foundation, Conal OBrien, Russell Vandenbrouke, Michael Keys Hall, and Ernie Sabella. A special thanks to both the Seattle and the Los Angeles acting companies, some of whom have been associated with the play throughout its many years of development.

Finally, the author is especially grateful to Tom Bryant, dramaturg extraordinare, for his good advice and good cheer; and to the director, Warner Shook, for his unflagging hard work and his brilliant staging, much of which has now been incorporated into this text. The World Premier of THE KENTUCKY CYCLE was produced by Intiman Theatre Company Seattle, Washington Elizabeth Huddle, Artistic Director and subsequently co-produced in Los Angeles by Centre Theatre Group/Mark Taper Forum Gordon Davidson, Artistic Director/Producer THE KENTUCKY CYCLE was originally developed in the Taper Lab New Work Festival Center Theatre Group/Mark Taper Forum The Play was further developed at The Sundance Institute The Intiman Theatre Companys production of this play was awarded a major grant from The Fund for New American Plays, a project of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts with support from American Express in cooperation with the Presidents Committee on the Arts and the Humanities. PREFACE The Kentucky Cycle is a series of nine short plays that chronicles the history of three fictional families over two hundred years in the Appalachian portion of eastern Kentucky. It is intended to be performed by an ensemble of twelve principal actors and actresses with an additional chorus of seven on a variable-unit stage. The play is in two parts and may be performed on consecutive evenings or in single, all-day marathon performances with a dinner break between Parts One and Two.

There is a fifteen-minute intermission within each part. While there are a number of ways to solve the design challenges of The Kentucky Cycle, the author feels that the original design concept created in Seattle is the most elegant solution. This concept, arrived at over a period of several months of intense collaboration among the author, the director, Warner Shook, and the set and lighting designers, Michael Olich and Peter Maradudin, was also used, with modifications, in Los Angeles. The stage is a large, oval wooden platform raked from upstage to downstage. In the center of the oval is a large, rectangular pit full of an earthlike substance. Surrounding the stage is tubular construction scaffolding holding a wooden floor, which creates an open gallery.

Directly upstage is a sky cyc created by stretching a square of unbleached muslin on a frame. This cyc remains in place until the end of Play 6, at which point it is lowered in front of the audience to reveal a cratered and burnt wooden back, which now functions as a ramp up to the second level of the gallery. Finally, underneath the gallery on either side of the stage are wooden benches on which the actors who are not immediately involved in the action will sit. These benches are in plain view of the audience, and the actors resting there will function as a kind of witness to the action onstage. As the action progresses through Part One, at the end of each play several wooden plugs will be carried out and inserted into the earthen pit, covering the soil. With Randalls burial, the earth disappears from view, not to be seen again until the violated graves are revealed in Play 9.

As these plugs are carried on, a skeletal version of the Rowen homestead will be gradually constructed from simple elements: a rolling wagon, several log pillars, and pieces of a roof, which are flown in. The entire construction disappears in Play 5 when Jed leaves for the Civil War. Props are historically accurate but minimal. Costumes consist of a basic outfit to which various pieces are added or deleted. This changes significantly only in the move from Play 7 to Play 8. The key design idea here is twofold.

One: Everything is visible to the audience. With the possible exception of the end of Part One and the end of Part Two, all the mechanics of the stage are in plain view. This is theater that does not pretend to be anything else. Two: Nothing must hinder the smooth, forward movement of the action or detract from the story being told. The most important thing here, always, is the actor standing in the light speaking the words.