 |
A Potable Joyce: A Watered-Down Version of Ulysses, has been one of the Rosenbach’s consistently most successful projects… We present it every spring, it remains truly original, mysterious, beautiful, and engaging. Teachers and students have given it rave reviews year after year, and Joycean scholars have been consistently impressed with its clever, meaningful interpretation of the novel. Sebastienne’s talents and creativity have been one of the Rosenbach’s greatest educational assets…”
-Bill Adair, Curator of Education, Rosenbach Museum and Library
Since April 2003 I have been the National Coordinator of ReJoyce Dublin 2004, an arts initiative of the Irish Government. The festival, which lasted from April 2004 through August 2004 offered over 80 events and had the support of 26 corporate sponsors in addition to the Irish Government. International response to ReJoyce Dublin 2004 was overwhelmingly enthusiastic. Over 1500 individual media items including television, radio, Internet, and print articles appeared across the globe. A Potable Joyce was repeatedly mentioned as a highlight of the festival. I would recommend this show for any audience, adult or youth.”
-Laura Barnes Weldon, National Coordinator of ReJoyce Dublin 2004
| PERFORMANCE DESCRIPTION AND HISTORY | |
|
…A boat that becomes a loom, a shadowy, red-eyed Cyclops, a pub inside a cigar box, live music, shadow puppets, and much more. This three-tiered hero story follows the journeys of Ulysses, Leopold Bloom and Joyce himself. The performance demonstrates how James Joyce interprets an ancient story to fit his own experience in order to write his revolutionary novel, Ulysses. In 1998, The Rosenbach Museum and Library commissioned Sebastienne Mundheim to create an educational program for elementary students based on the museum’s collection. James Joyce’s manuscript of Ulysses is one of the museum’s most significant holdings. “A Potable Joyce” was developed as the performance component of a larger educational program that sought to introduce students to the value of the manuscript as a document or artifact of the artist/author’s process. The performance introduces the manuscript, the process of writing, a little Joyce and Homer, as well as some new vocabulary. It also opens up discussion about how writers use metaphor as a literary tool. Through discussion and exercise, the program explores how an author collects experiences and images, in order to make his own life experience richer, and in order to build tools for expression. The larger education program includes hands-on art making, discussion, and writing. This larger program was originally conceived and implemented in collaboration with the Fleisher Art Memorial and local schools. “A Potable Joyce” has had many runs. In 2004 the Irish Ministry of Arts and Culture invited and sponsored the show to tour 3 cities in Ireland for 5 weeks. It has been part of the Philadelphia Fringe Festival 2002, Bloomsday Weekends 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005 and was featured in the Excellence in Arts and Education Celebration at the House of Representatives in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, 2001. Currently the show is being adapted for film, with funding provided by Dolfinger MacMahon Foundation and the Lenfest Foundation. Editing will be completed in July 2006. “A Potable Joyce” is one of 17 performances created by Sebastienne Mundheim. |
| A POTABLE JOYCE TO THE SCREEN! COMING SOON! | |
|
“There are many reasons why this interesting and innovative program deserves to be known to a broader audience… I have no doubt that this will be a most valued production. A Potable Joyce, and WHYY’s audience, deserve to have an introduction.” Ken Finkel, Executive Director, Arts and Culture, WHYY-TV12, 2004. Thanks to the Lenfest Foundation, Dolfinger McMahon Foundation, and several private donors, “A Potable Joyce” is becoming a film. The film will stay true to the live performance. However, the special eye of the camera will allow viewers to see the fine details of the objects and specific movements of the performers. Lighting and sound will be refined. And “A Potable Joyce” will reach a broader audience. “A Potable Joyce to the Screen” will be completed in 2006. |
A Potable Joyce has had many incarnations and has been inhabited by many cast members, including: Bill Zeilinski, Edward Snyder, Thaddeus Phillips, Michael Ewing, Leslie Euler, Nicole Venice, Alison D'Amato, Charlotte Ford, Janette Hough, and Mc Kenna Kerrigan. Each of these performers has contributed in some way to developing the show.
The current cast for both live performance and the film project include:
 |
JEFFREY COON (Collaborator/Performer,
James Joyce) Jeff has appeared at many local Philadelphia theaters.
Some of his favorite roles in children’s theater include: Frog (A Year
with Frog and Toad), Buldeo (JungleBook), Harold the Dog (Bunnicula), and Boj
the Bear (Snow Queen). He is currently performing as El Gallo in The
Fantastiks, at Walnut Street Theatre.
|
 |
BETHANY FORMICA (Collaborator/Performer, HandMaid) Bethany is a dancer for Melanie Stewart Dance Theater, Group Motion Dance Company, Myra Bazell, and Kate Watson-Wallace. She has worked with Kevin Wynn Collection, Sean Curran, Sara Pearson/Patrick Widrig and Co., Martha Bowers Dance Theater Et cetera, Michael Foley Dance, Sanzo Nemo Collective, Rennie Harris PureMovement, Mermaids, Julia Ritter’s Performance Group, Steeldance, Kim Whittham and Co., Meghan Durham, and Joanna Mendi Shaw. She is currently adjunct faculty at Rowan University, and teaching dance at Olney High School for the Philadelphia Dance Projects. |
 |
ELLIOT LEVIN (Collaborator/Flutist) Elliot has performed with groups including Cecil Taylor’s Ensemble, Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes, Odeon Popes’ Sax Choir, Scram!, New Ghost, Atzilut (Fourth World), and Taking Free Bebop. He has collaborated with poets Miguel Algarin, Gloria Tropp, Mbali Umoja, Marty Watt, and Spoken Motion, among many others. Venuses have included: Carnegie Hall, Lincon Center, United Nations, U.S. Embassy in Moscow, Yale University, Watts Towers, Lollapalooza! and scores of galleries, clubes and theaters. He performed at the Crossing Boarders Festival in the Hague, the Sexial Jazz Festival in Lisbon, The Alternative Festival in Prague, and the Sonic Logos Festival in Philadelphia. Elliot has performed with A Potable Joyce from the beginning, and with Sebastienne Mundheim for 10 years. |
 |
MICHELLE PAULS (Collaborator/Performer HandMaid) Michelle is an actor, director, singer and educator. Most recent acting credits include: Martha, The Misunderstanding, B.Someday productions. Recent directing credits for B.Someday include Stan Heleva’s adaption of A Child’s Christmas in Wales, and the 2004 Philly Friinge hit, The Midlife Crisis of Dionysus, by Garrison Keillor. Michelle has worked with many theaters in Philadelphia and New York including: The Walnut Street Theatre, Philadelphia Theatre Company, Troma productions, The Wilma Theater, Love Creek Productions, Iron Age, Philadelphia Dramatist Center, and The Brick Playhouse. She is founding member fo the rock band Edgar Allan and the Poettes, performing in Philadelphia and New York. Michelle’s greatest credit is her two year old daughter, Astrid. |
 |
SEBASTIENNE MUNDHEIM (Creator/Director/Performer)
is a writer, director, designer, performer, educator, and recently filmmaker.
She has created 17 original performances commissioned by institutions including
the University of Pennsylvania, The Rosenbach Museum and Library, The
Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Franklin and Marshall College. She is known for
synthesizing complex, sophisticated academic content into lyrical educational
performances geared toward young audiences, appealing to all ages. Using
sculptural props, shadow puppets, dancers, actors, and music, her performances
teach lessons and ask questions. Her shows have been performed locally and
internationally. Performances include: “Were the Sunny Sombreros Somber
Somehow: Stories of 20th Century Mexican Revolutionary Painters,” “
Giorgio de Chirico and the Myth of Ariadne,” “Under the Hat: Life
and Works of Poet Marianne Moore,” “A Potable Joyce: A Watered-down
Version of Ulysses, the Story of James Joyce and his Manuscript,”
and “Currently Franklin: the Story of a Paper Boy. “ She has collaborated with other visual and performing artists including, but not limited to:
Whit McLaughlin, New Paradise Laboratories, Thaddeus Phillips, Lucidity
Suitcase, Madi DiStefano, Brat Productions, Kate-Watson Wallace, Agita Dance,
and the Reactionaries, to name a few. Sebastienne has also been a community
artist/educator since 1992, creating programming through the Fleisher Art
Memorial, the Institute of Contemporary Art, Young Audiences, Big Picture
Alliance, and many other organizations and schools in Philadelphia and New
Orleans. Sebastienne received her BA/BFA from the University of Pennsylvania in
1990, and her EdM from Harvard in 2000.
|
 |
|