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1. Reminder: Alert Students about Job Opportunities |
The Rozsa Center, Dining Services, Campus Bookstore and University Images will host the first Student Employment Expo (SEE) on Wednesday, April 8, from noon to 5 p.m., and Thursday, April 9, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., in the Horner Lobby of the Rozsa Center.
The main employment areas represented will be the Rozsa Center, Memorial Union, Campus Bookstore, University Images and Dining Services, which includes Catering, Memorial Union Food Mall, Residence Hall Dining and Concessions.
A wide variety of student jobs are available for the next academic year, including retail sales, dining services, ticket sales and theater setup. This is a great opportunity for "one stop" information and job applications for on-campus employment. Free refreshments will be available. |
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2. Tech Theatre Presents the Musical "The Robber Bridegroom" |
submitted by Visual and Performing Arts
The Tech Theatre Company will present a rascally, rollicking musical in the Rozsa Center Friday and Saturday, April 10 and 11, as Patricia Helsel directs "The Robber Bridegroom," by Alfred Uhry and Robert Waldman, in two performances, both at 7:30 p.m.
Leading the cast of 12 are Lucy Kurtz playing the coquette Rosamund, Andy Johnson as the dashing rogue Jamie Lockhart, Trish Goggin as Rosamund's conniving step-mother, and Adam Sommerfield as her rich, clueless father. Joining them as a troupe of sidekicks, accomplices, outlaws and not-too-upstanding citizens are Mitch Schuh, George Wagner, Jake LaJeunesse, Nikki Kangas, Laura Larsen, Mollie Trewartha, Brian Gilbert and Terra Schneider.
The score of "Robber Bridegroom" features bluegrass, good ol' country ballads and fiddle tunes. The singers will be accompanied by Mike Irish on bass, Pat Valencia and Josh Martin on guitar, Craig Kurtz on banjo and Libby Meyer and Emily Petersen on fiddle. Nick Enz is the show's music director.
Michigan Tech's production of "Robber" will bring a number of innovations to the Rozsa stage. Helsel and her design crew set the show in a derelict but once-thriving Mississippi River town, abandoned after the river changed course leaving it high and dry.
Now the ruins--once a rich, important place but now no place--are home to a shifting group of oddballs and misfits surviving by their wits, living in cast-off trailers, using the townsite as a haven. Among them are unemployed actors who now find the decayed barns, buildings and refuse piles of the old town a treasure trove of useful items, if you know how to improvise. They stage "The Robber Bridegroom," a tale of the legendary Harp Gang, which lived a Robin Hood-style existence on the Nachez Trace in the early days of the country. It's a tale of chicanery, greed, wit, deception and hilarity, with a little terror thrown in, about a set of characters who, like the actors themselves, live by their wits.
Playing actors who in turn play rascally backwoods characters requires all the traditional musical theater skills of acting, singing and dancing, with room for lots of improvising and comedy, Helsel says. Luckily, the land of Da Yoopers provides just the props needed for the "Robber Bridegroom" set. Finding an old trailer and pickup truck were easy, Helsel says--the Copper Country grapevine turned up lots of candidates. Yoopers also understand about a make-do life in a tough place and savor olden-days tales of our own.
"The costumes and props are often hilarious because they come straight from what you'd find in an abandoned townsite or farm anywhere, if they fall into the hands of someone spunky and resourceful."
"Robber Bridegroom" was originally developed by John Housman's Acting Company in New York and staged on Broadway in both 1975 and 1976, with casts including Raul Julia, Kevin Kline, Patti LuPone and Barry Bostwick (the latter two winning Tony Awards for their performances). It was nominated for Tony and Drama Desk Awards for Best Book, among other honors. Michigan Tech staged the show as dinner theater at the Onigaming Supper Club in the early 1980s, directed by Richard Blanning.
The new production features a set designed by Kalen Larson, costumes by Mary Carol Friedrich, sound by Ben Boeshans and lights by Frank Sopjes. Larson and Friedrich are faculty members in Visual and Performing Arts; Boeshans majors in audio production and technology, and Sopjes in theatre and entertainment technology. Michael McKeller, senior in theatre and entertainment technology, is stage manager.
Tickets for the performances are free to Michigan Tech students, $7 for other students and $14 for general public. More information, with pictures from rehearsals, can be seen at the Visual and Performing Arts site, http://vpa.mtu.edu .
For more information, contact Karen Snyder, 487-3094 . |
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3. Industry Leader Gives Next Grain Processing Seminar |
Chemical Engineering's next Grain Processing Seminar features Laercio G. Albuquerque, who will give a talk, "Process Improvements with Derrick Screens," at 8 a.m., Wednesday, April 8.
Albuquerque is the sales manager for Derrick Corporation’s Latin American operations.
For more information, contact Alexis Snell at 487-3132 or at aesnell@mtu.edu .
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4. Seminar Thursday on Multiscale Modeling |
Professor Mark Horstemeyer from Mississippi State University will give a MEEM Graduate Seminar, "Multiscale Modeling and Practical Engineering Applications," Thursday, April 9, 3-4 p.m., in MEEM 112.
For more information, contact JoAnne Stimac, jstimac@mtu.edu . |
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5. In the News |
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Articles on bone deformities among Isle Royale's wolves have been published widely since John Flesher's AP story on Rolf Peterson and John Vucetich's (SFRES) research was distributed nationally. To see the BBC photo and caption, visit http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/default.stm . |
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