Honors Thesis in Theater&Dance

This project was an exploration and synthesis of my separate majors to argue for the power of both storytelling forms working in tandem. Taking scenes from the play, The Luckiest, by Melissa Ross, I went through a series of methodical structures to create a theater-dance piece that told the story of a woman with ALS through movement and scene work. I was interested in the dichotomy of using movement to express the story of an individual who is slowly losing her ability to move. I began by scoring the scenes, and used Laban Effort Actions to label each beat. I then used the beats to generate choreography to express the internal journey of my character, Lissette within each scene. The choreography, in turn, inspired my acting choices in the scene. The piece culminated in a monologue that combined my text and movement work as Lissette reasons through her choice to have an assisted suicide due to the advancement of her condition. 

Performers: Seth Gunawardena, Alana Burgess

Thesis Advisor: Marco Barricelli