by Kim Grizzard Staff Writer | Feb 21, 2025
Joan of Arc’s character wearing pink Converse shoes and belting out pop songs on stage is like nothing anyone has ever seen.
That’s not just because this military heroine and these modern hits are separated by hundreds of years. It is also because East Carolina University is making history with this production.
“Wild Heart,” a modernized story of the French peasant girl who saved her nation, is scheduled to make its world premiere tonight in ECU’s McGinnis Theater. Presented by ECU/Loessin Playhouse, this new musical by Chelsea Marcantel features songs made popular by artists such as Kelly Clarkson, Weezer and Melissa Etheridge.
“It’s a really contemporary take,” Director Trent Blanton said. “You don’t know what you’re going to see.”
Among the many surprises in the first staging of this work are denim in the place of 15th-century armor, saints from centuries gone by (St. Catherine of Alexandria and St. Margaret of Antioch) as a teenage girl’s besties and hints of humor amid the Hundred Years’ War. At the center is the fearless fighter and medieval martyr who later became the patron saint of France.
When a representative from TRW (Theatrical Rights Worldwide) told Blanton about a Joan of Arc musical with songs by Pink, he didn’t wait for the rest of the pitch. Blanton and his wife, fellow associate professor of theater Rebecca Simon, had previously collaborated with TRW on another world premiere in New Jersey more than a decade ago.
“I said, ‘I want that. I don’t even need to read it,’” Blanton said. “Then they sent me the script. I said, ‘We’ll do a full production of it.’”
The script is by Marcantel, an award-winning playwright whose works include “Airness,” “Everything is Wonderful” and “Tiny Houses.” She also collaborated with Disney on such films as “Strange World,” “Wish” and “Moana 2.”
“I love Joan of Arc, as a person, as a historical figure, as a story,” Marcantel said in a telephone interview from Los Angeles, where she works as a writer, director and collaborator. She remembers hearing stories beginning in her childhood in southwest Louisiana about the celebrated French heroine.
“I think the thing that really inspires me most about Joan of Arc is that she was always fighting for the poor and for the weak and for people to be living in peace,” she said. “She was born into a war that had been going on for generations and she said, ‘I was born to end this.’ I’ve always found that to be incredibly inspiring because then she went and did it.”
Marcantel previously wrote an adaptation of the 1920s George Bernard Shaw play “Saint Joan” but felt the work that she was commissioned to update focused less on Joan and more on the men around her.
“I’d always wanted to tell this story again from the point of view of Joan as a teenager,” she said. “I always wanted another chance to do it, and now I’m getting one. This is the story I’ve always wanted to tell.”
Beginning with a staged reading last spring at the Paramount Theater in Farmville, Marcantel and TRW have been working with ECU to bring the songs and the script to the McGinnis Theater stage. The musical, which continues through Monday, features a cast of 18, with 10 additional offstage voices to make big numbers like “I am Here,” “Rise Up” and “Fight Song” sound even bigger.
For ECU junior Casey Wild, the part of Joan is not only her biggest role at ECU, but it is also a chance to leave her mark on a show that is expected to be performed by other university theater programs as well as by high schools and community theater companies.
“It’s so different,” said Wild, a Raleigh native who was previously seen in “Bright Star” and “The Winter’s Tale” at ECU. “Normally when you’re preparing, you can listen to the musical soundtrack. For this, it’s original material, so we have the great opportunity to really make it our own. We can say that we were the first people to do it, and that’s not something a lot of people can say.”
The ECU/Loessin Playhouse production is being filmed for TRW to share with other theater companies that may want to stage “Wild Heart.”
“They’re going to leave an imprint on the play that shapes it as it goes forward as to how it’s defined,” Blanchard said, adding that he will continue to seek opportunities for his students to perform new work.
“This is really what students are going to be doing in the real world is developing new work,” he said. “Every film script’s a new world, every play is brand new. You’re doing them a disservice if you’re not teaching them to create from nothing.”
Chris Brammer (“Sweeney Todd,” “Company”) is excited for members of the Greenville audience to be the first to see the show.
“It’s taking this old story and making it in a new way for people of the 21st century can totally get it and totally understand it,” Brammer, an ECU junior, said.
“For us as the actors on stage, it’s an incredible experience,” he said. “This show is 100% a product of the team that’s currently working on it. Typically there are years’ worth of productions to have a base to work off of. All we have is the script.”
Just the script and the songs, which Wild says pair astonishingly well with a 500-year-old story.
“The most surprising thing to me is how applicable some of the songs are,” she said. “I feel like when you’re thinking about Weezer and Pink and Kelly Clarkson, your mind isn’t going to, ‘Oh, those songs would be perfect in a Joan of Arc musical.’ But they really are.”
Kim Grizzard can be contacted at 252-329-9578 and kgrizzard@apgenc.com.
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