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All APA and AIA members, be they Grizzled comic veterans or Dewy-eyed tiros, are invited to participate in The 12th Annual Staged Reading of The Committee on Ancient and Modern Performance (CAMP): Plautus’ Rudens, directed by Alison Futrell (University of Arizona) and John Given (East Carolina University). This is the journey of a plucky young woman, kidnapped, torn from the arms of love, shipwrecked, waterlogged, epiphanied, menaced and manacled, to be bound again at last by the salty ties of tender devotion! This is the rambunctious musical production populated by pimps, piscatores, prostitutes, pirates, peons, and paramours! This is the rope-y tug-of-war to tug your heartstrings and tease your toes to tapping!

Rudens aims to be an uproarious extravaganza. There will be singing. There will be dancing. There will be silliness. We need actors able and willing to play big, even in small roles. We also need costumers and other off-stage crew. We need you!

The Rudens performance will take place on the Friday evening, January 3, 2014, at the APA-AIA Meetings in Chicago. Rehearsals begin two days prior to the performance, on January 1. (Travel on December 31 may be necessary.) Actors are expected to familiarize themselves with scripts in advance, though memorization is not required. Acting experience is not required, but is not unwelcome.

Are you interested? Alert one of the directors: Alison Futrell (mailto:afutrell@email.arizona.edu) or John Given (givenj@ecu.edu). Please include your name, contact information for the summer and fall months, academic affiliation, a short description of any experience you may have (stage-y, musical, that sort of “experience”), any other special talents, and your preference for role(s) in the production. Most roles are open to both men and women. The more specific your description of yourself, the better. Deadline: August 15, 2013.

The CAMP Staged Reading has become a national platform for scholarly experimentation in the theatrical lab. Given the increasing prominence of performance and reception studies, this represents a real opportunity for the exploration of genre and presentation, for the consideration of the function and meaning of stage as social and political node, for the practice of scholarly interaction and innovation. Past performances have included ancient comedy (Birds, Thesmophoriazousai, Persa [adapted as Iran Man]), satyr play (Cyclops) and (quasi?) tragedy (Alcestis). There have also been productions of post-antique, ancient-themed works, including an operetta (Gilbert & Sullivan’s Thespis), a radio drama (The Heavensgate Deposition, based on the Apocolocyntosis), Renaissance plays (The Golden Age, Thersites) and new dramatic compositions (The Invention of Love, The Jurymen).