Live theatre to entertain, educate, and elevate
By Julie Chavez Harrington
The Basin Lake Theatre Project has always been closely linked to Prescott and the surrounding area, and now it plays an integral role. It all started in 2014 when founding members Julie Chavez Harrington, Jeannen Calvin, and Ered Matthew launched it to produce a documentary-style play. Since then, it’s grown to be so much more, thanks to its mission of collaboration, entertainment, education, and elevation.
Basin Lake Theatre Project’s goals are to foster interest in the community and to promote professional growth and continuing education among local actors and technical theatre practitioners.
As the level of excellence increases in many of the performing arts in Prescott and the surrounding area, the company’s members hope to significantly raise not only the quality of live theatre, but the expectations of the local theatre audience.
The Basin Lake Theatre Project’s first production: The Fence, a documentary-style play that told the stories of several items left as mementos on the chain link fence surrounding the Granite Mountain Hotshots’ Station 7 in Prescott after the Yarnell Hill fire, which took the lives of 19 firefighters.
Most recently, Julie and Matthew wrote, directed, and staged The Tolerance Project, an original play based on personal stories of abuse, discrimination, and survival as told by students of Prescott’s Northpoint Academy. This effort, performed in the new Black Box Theatre at Yavapai College Performing Arts Center, achieved international recognition.
And, this October, the company will stage its most ambitious project to date: a production of William Shakespeare’s Scottish tragedy, “Macbeth,” at the Elks Theatre and Performing Arts Center. The production will employ the area’s top acting and technical talents and will be groundbreaking in its use of “O.P.,” or original pronunciation, an interpretation by expert linguists of the accent one might have heard in Shakespeare’s time.
It differs greatly from the “high-brow,” received pronunciation the typical Shakespeare audience has come to expect. Original pronunciation has more common, earthier roots and tends to be more understandable – therefore making the Bard’s works more accessible. Of interest is the fact that this style of speech was brought to North America by the Pilgrims, and shares many of its characteristics with those of American English.
Founding members Julie, Jeannen, and Ered, along with consultant Karen Murphy, bring to the company vast, professional experience and training in all aspects of the theatrical field: performance, design, and education. Local theatre-goers may be aware that this array of talents has been displayed locally in countless productions staged in both community and college venues.
But, taking its cue from the Arizona Philharmonic, members of the Basin Lake Theatre Project are determined to move forward, and confident that the company can develop and sustain professional theatre in Prescott, further supplementing the area’s live performance offerings.
For more information, visit www.basinlaketheatre.com.