This play is an adventure that began as a dream. Quite literally. It began as a dream hastily jotted down in the notes app on the way to a witchy hour bathroom stop and then promptly forgotten about until months later, when the note app revealed a typo-laden title: The Seven Secret Plays of Madam Caprice.
The dream, like most dreams, was full of holes. So the play was written like a scrapbook and left room for other visual and performing arts to inspire a scene that might have otherwise lacked meat on its bones. But everyone agreed that the script was fun to flip through:
When it was time to gather a cast of actors for the play, invitations to a devising workshop were slid inside purses and coat pockets, left under cracks of doors and windshield wipers. The invitations were in bright red colored envelopes and were mysteriously placed so that the recipient would have to make the choice to show up to an event they had little knowledge about and had to take the leap into the world of Madam Caprice and Old Bridge.
The mysterious red colored envelope invitations were a running theme.
Rehearsals got underway, original music got written, props and sets got built, and after a couple of months, we started exhibiting some work-in-progress performances to a select audience at our space, Hq. Those nights were memorable and unpredictable. One time, in the middle of the play, Gillian delivered the line: “I woke up from a dream in a place made of brick. It had a stage and a red velvet curtain, and there was a train that rolled by with a bell…” And as if right on queue, the Western Blue Line rolled by under the window of our space and dinged, prompting laughter from the spectators. Another time, one of the actors didn’t show up for the show. AS audiences were piling in, the remaining performers split the role up amongst themselves and figured out how to carry one. And just like that, the play went from a seven-person cast to a six-person cast. And yet another time, Gillian’s black cat, Sheba, made an appearance during the show whilst Kyla was reading the cathartic letter of Madam Caprice. It was all very magical and surreal.
To raise some money to produce the show, we threw a giant scavenger hunt party that invited audience members to take part in a mysterious and whimsical happening.
Depending on what you drew out of a hat, the scavenger hunt could lead you to free drinks, special prizes, tickets to the show…It could lead you to a giant gong which you would be struck boldly to signal a performance or it could even lead you to a lifetime membership to Silent Theatre. There was a magical photo booth, and a silent auction — captured here in a short slide show and time-lapse:
We drank, we ate, we made short silent movies, and we ultimately raised enough money to produce the play at the beautiful Chopin Theater in Chicago.
The music was catchy and a CD was made and distributed.
There were a few teasers made for the show, some of which you can see at the end of the full production video at the top of this post.
And our friends, The Harmonious Hunks made this quick 30-second spot for us to boot:
In the end, this show captured an essential Silent Theatre: an unorthodox approach to creating and presenting theatrical works. Those who participated and witnessed this adventure took away something truly magical. During lockdown, Paul Brennan took the raw footage of the production and created a digital masterpiece from the confines of his apartment. We hope you enjoy the Redux version of The Seven Secret Plays of Madam Caprice.
And finally, the monthly round-up of the daily social media feed celebrating our 20th anniversary (click on the image for further captions):
Celebrate Silent Theatre’s 20th anniversary by subscribing or making a one-time tax-deductible donation to help kick-start our live presentations post-hiatus. You can also contribute in any of the ways below:
*cure for the common bore* *creating a universal language one gesture at a time*
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