Daily Pioneer News

PLATTEVILLE-The University of Wisconsin-Platteville Department of Performing and Visual Arts and Pioneer Players will open their fall theater season with "Dead Man's Cell Phone" by Sarah Ruhl. The production opens with a special pay what you can preview performance on Wednesday, Nov. 11 at 7:30 p.m. and continues through the week with evening performances Thursday through Saturday, Nov. 12-14, at 7:30 p.m. There is also a matinee performance on Sunday, Nov. 15 at 2 p.m. All performances are in the Center for the Arts Theatre on the UWP campus.

This 2007 surrealist comedy by Ruhl explores the incessant ringing of cell phones, the constant need to be in touch with everyone and anyone, how we deal with death, and the choices we make that can change our lives. When Jean answers the cell phone of a dead man in a café, her world will never be the same. Described by New York Times critic Charles Isherwood as "a beguiling comedy ... a hallucinatory poetic fantasy that blends the mundane and the metaphysical, the blunt and the obscure, the patently bizarre and the bizarrely moving," "Dead Man's Cell Phone" is a thoughtful exploration of human interaction in the 21st century.

The five member cast includes UWP students Jared Baker, Lizzie Hansen, Erin McDermott, Kalynn Raifsnider and Craig Schlagel (who is also the costume designer). Karalyn Fitzgerald is the stage manager. Scenic and lighting designs are by Brad Carlson, the UWP theater program's technical director/designer, and the production is directed by Ann Dillon Farrelly, UWP professor of theater.

According to Farrelly, "This play is not your traditional theater experience. The play is funny, poignant and strange, and the world in which it takes place is surreal and unbalanced. The characters are eccentric and awkward one moment, wise and philosophical the next. Ruhl is one of the most exciting American playwrights working today and it is an honor to be the first theater in Wisconsin to produce this wonderfully weird play."

Ticket prices are $9 for general admission, $8 for UWP faculty, staff and senior citizens and $5 for UWP students with a valid ID, or persons under the age of 18. Tickets are available through the University Box Office at (608) 342-1298 or at www.uwplatt.edu/arts/cfa/information/office.html.