Art Hounds: 'Halloween Tree' provides family seasonal thrills

From MPR News, Art Hounds are members of the Minnesota arts community who look beyond their own work to highlight what’s exciting in local art. Their recommendations are lightly edited from the audio heard in the player above. 

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Let’s meet at the Halloween Tree 

Kira Pontiff of St. Paul is a self-described occasional actress and full-time lover of all things autumnal and Halloween. She was thrilled to catch a rehearsal of the play “The Halloween Tree,” which she described as a magical Halloween adventure.

It’s playing at the Southern Theater in Minneapolis, Oct. 20 – 27. The world-premiere play is adapted from Ray Bradbury’s 1972 novel of the same name. The 90-minute show is recommended for ages 8 and up. 

Kira describes the show: A group of trick-or-treaters meet up on Halloween night, and they get taken on a magical Halloween adventure by a very mysterious character who takes them through time and to different locations to teach them about the origins of Halloween, how different cultures celebrate where the holiday come came from.

It is a very fun adventure story. Light tricks, some shadow puppetry. It’s really a good, magical time, so definitely appropriate for kids. But if you're anything like me and grew up on the story of “The Halloween Tree” by Ray Bradbury, or watched the movie when you were a kid, it definitely hits those nostalgia notes.  

I think the cast is just a ton of fun. A lot of very funny moments, a lot of really poignant, heartfelt moments. There will be trick-or-treating at some of the productions in the lobby, and there will be a place to light a candle to remember lost loved ones. So really, I think they’re really creating an environment in this space to celebrate the season.

— Kira Pontiff

What will people say? 

Ellen Fenster-Gharib is a freelance director in the Twin Cities, and she had an opportunity to read in advance an original play that takes on mental health stigma and community pressures.

The world premiere of “Log Kya Kahenge (What will people say?)”, written by Aamera Siddiqui, is a co-production of Exposed Brick Theatre, Lyric Arts and South Asian Arts & Theatre House. (“Log Kya Kahenge” is a well-known Hindi and Urdu saying that translates to “What will people say?”)

The show runs at Lyric Arts in Anoka Oct. 18 – Nov. 3. The play is recommended for ages 16 and up and takes on themes of mental health and grief. 

Ellen says: I love Aamera’s playwriting voice and how she investigates her own history with such wit and sensitivity. The play is about a family, and specifically about some daughters who are trying to navigate their way in the U.S. with pressures put on them by their family and by their community.  

I loved what Aamera had to say about it. She said that in her particular South Asian culture, there is this sort of collective interest and investment in everyone’s personal business. And she said in her playwright’s notes [paraphrase]: Now this might be making some of you feel very uncomfortable, like, Get out of my business. Shouldn’t you live for yourself? This is what happens in collectivist cultures, cultures in which each individual is seen as being responsible for the reputation of the whole community, and it’s sort of for better and for worse.

Everybody has your best interest in mind and also has a lot of opinions about how you’re living your life and the decisions that you’re making. So everyone’s in this pressure cooker of achieving and then also you can’t display any weakness. So the play addresses the stigma around mental health issues.

 — Ellen Fenster-Gharib

A tale of monsters and men 

Loren Niemi of Minneapolis is the founder of the American School of Storytelling. He’s heard Chris Vinsonhaler perform excerpts of her new translation of the old English epic “Beowulf: Monsters and Men,” and he’s looking forward to her bardic performance next Wednesday, Oct. 23 at 6 p.m. at the Episcopal Church of Saint John the Evangelist in St. Paul. 

Loren says: What is interesting to me about this performance is that A) it’s been a long time since there’s been a new translation that updates the language, and B) she is translating it with a slightly feminist view, so that her concerns, at least as I understand it, is that it's not “boys with swords” so much as the larger issues of politics and heredity and obligation.

So when I say heredity, I mean the who begat who, and who succeeded who, and how they arrived at power. One of the things I think I like about her performance is that she is very she is faithful to the rhythms of the material. The Beowulf text has a very rhythmic form to it.

— Loren Niemi