Blinn-Brenham Theatre Arts Program to stage Greek tragedy 'Medea'

Performances will take place Feb. 22-25 at O'Donnell Performing Arts Center

February 15, 2024

The Blinn College-Brenham Campus Theatre Arts Program will continue its journey into the supernatural with four public performances of the Greek tragedy “Medea.”

“Medea” will be staged at 7 p.m. Thursday and Friday, Feb. 22 and 23, and 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Feb. 24 and 25, at the Dr. W.W. O’Donnell Performing Arts Center. Preview performances for area schools will be held Thursday, Feb. 22 (10 a.m. and 1 p.m.), and Friday, Feb. 23 (10 a.m.).

Tickets are $10 for adults and $5 for Blinn students and children. They are available online at www.blinn.edu/boxoffice, by calling 979-830-4024, or by emailing [email protected].

“Medea” will be Blinn’s 2024 Texas Community College Speech and Theatre Association Play Festival entry. This year’s Play Festival will be held Feb. 28-March 1 in Baytown, Texas.

In this stunning new version of Euripides’ work, Medea and Jason find themselves refugees in the city of Corinth, struggling to bring up their children in an alien and unsympathetic society. When Jason hatches a plan to better integrate himself into society – a plan that involves abandoning his wife and children – Medea is spurned, destitute, and desperate. She uses the dark arts to extract her terrible retribution.

Theatre Arts Director and Professor Brad Nies, who will direct the play, said this version of “Medea” is “brave, imaginative, and daring.”

“Liz Lochhead recasts the character of Medea as an ‘everywoman’ that audiences may actually sympathize with,” Nies said.

Technical direction will be by Kevin Patrick, Technical Theatre Arts Professor. Theatre Instructor Jennifer Patrick will oversee costumes, makeup, and hair design, and chorus choreography.

Cast members are Samantha Nolen, Medea; Ryan Kendall, Jason; Benedite Trecy, nurse; Steven Houlihan, manservant; Josiah Bartlett, child and guard; Aliana Hernandez, child and Glauke; Jayden Peavy, child and guard; Colin Schroeder, Kreon; and Aidan Johnson, Lily Marrs, Bianca O’Neal, Ana Soto, Steve Torres, and Y’Lila Willis, members of the chorus.

Crew members are Madison Manchester, stage manager, dramaturg, and properties; Eric Cruz and Jalil Taylor, assistant stage managers, dramaturges, and properties; Luke Parker, sound design and board operator; Fabian Carranza, assistant lighting designer, master electrician, and board operator; and Payton Jolly, costume supervisor.

“The Yellow Wallpaper” will close out the “Year of the Supernatural” season, with performances at 7 p.m. Thursday and Friday, April 18 and 19, and 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, April 20 and 21. Based on a short story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the play is about an imaginative young woman who finds herself sequestered on a remote estate that her husband has rented for the summer.

The program’s improvisation troupe “Slaphappy” also will perform at 7 p.m. Thursday, April 4, at the O’Donnell Center.

Blinn’s Theatre Arts Program cultivates a quality educational foundation of study, application, and experience through a wide range of performance, technical, and production studies. Students have an opportunity to audition for a variety of performances related to drama and theatre and are prepared to transfer to four-year colleges and universities. For more information, visit www.blinn.edu/theatre.