Kentucky voices on stage
Adaptation of Correll’s ‘Grounded’ hits Pioneer stage Tuesday
Posted: Monday, July 6, 2015 6:42 am
By CHANDLER GARLAND
Managing/Marketing Director, Heather Henson, and Author, Angela Correll watch as actors rehearse.
Photo via Central KY News
A flight attendant, a Kentucky farm, the mixing of two generations and an old family friend — the heart of Angela Correll’s novel “Grounded” has been carefully preserved in Pioneer Playhouse’s stage adaption.
“Whenever you adapt a play or movie out of a book, it’s always going to be different,” said actor Heath Haden. The play version of “Grounded” was adapted by Lila Acheson Wallace American Playwrights Fellow, Chelsea Marcantel. Originally from Louisiana, Marcantel had the same sense of a southern girl returning home just like the main character of Annie in the show.
“In the novel, Kentucky is featured in place and dialect. I wanted to capture the way people talk and what people talk about,” said Correll. “… Chelsea brought a lot of that into the play. My original editors wanted to change a lot of the dialogue because it didn’t make sense to them, but Chelsea had that background so she knew the language.”
If you’ve read Correll’s novel, you may notice some things have changed from page to stage. In the style of the dramatic arts, the conflicts have been heightened and the romance intensified.
“Many people go to see a movie and come away disappointed because it’s not the same as the book, but it has to be different. A movie, or a play, is not the same thing as a novel,” said Correll. When Marcantel sent in her second draft, Correll was pleased with how well she adapted the heart of the play. “I was nervous when I was about to read it. It was like handing your kids over to someone else and hoping they will take good care of them,” Correll explained.
As part of the eight-year long tradition that saw the performance of Catherine Bush’s “A Jarful of Fireflies,” and Robby Henson’s “The Wonder Team,” the show will run as part of the Kentucky Voices Series started by the late Holly Henson.
This story was selected for this year’s Kentucky Voices play out of a joke.
“I was on stage one night introducing the last Kentucky Voices show, and Angela was in the audience. I jokingly said maybe next season we would be watching a play adapted from her book. Later on Robby, Angela and I all spoke about it and here we are 10 months later, with a play,” said Managing Director Heather Henson.
The day after the opening night of “La Bete,” the playhouse held auditions for “Grounded.” “We already had people in mind for the parts. We really just needed to see how they interacted together on stage,” said Henson.
The cast of 14 has been in the process of blocking scenes since last Thursday, with their first run-through on Tuesday. Haden, who acted in the College Collaborations Project of The Farm Theater of New York City’s “In the Event of My Death,” (another first performance of a recently written play) said, “We are trying to keep to the script as is because the playwright isn’t here, but we do have Angela.”
Pioneer Playhouse is the only outdoor theater in the state that puts on an original play every year.
IF YOU GO
“Grounded” at Pioneer Playhouse, 840 Stanford Road, Danville
Opens Tuesday, on through July 18
8:30 p.m. nightly performances Tuesday-Saturday, dinner at 7:30 p.m.
Tickets: www.pioneerplayhouse.com or (859) 236-2747
