[NEohioPAL]Mark Twain Show in Solon

[Mark Dawidziak]

World Premiere of Twain Play at Solon Center for the Arts

    The world premiere of the Largely Literary Theater Company's two-act
collection of Mark Twain sketches will be June 15-17 at the Solon Center
for the Arts. Adapted and directed by Mark Dawidziak, who also portrays
Twain in this play, "The Reports of My Death Are Greatly Exaggerated" is
the company's third production in the Solon Center for the Arts'
Page2Stage series.
    "The play is designed to appeal to both those well acquainted with
Mark Twain and those just getting to know him," said Dawidziak, artistic
director and co-founder of the Largely Literary Theater Company. "The
emphasis is on humorous material, but the material is drawn from a wide
variety of Twain's works. It covers everything from Twain's scathing
views on politics and politicians to a moving excerpt from his imagining
of 'Eve's Diary.' "
    The play opens with Twain working at his desk. He talks to the
audience about his frustrations with critics, editors and publishers,
and this talk leads to a succession of stories. Four actors – Sara
Showman, Tom Stephan, Alex J. Nine and Jason Davis – play all of the
characters in these sketches.
    Presented by the Friends of the Solon Center for the Arts and the
Friends of the Solon Library, "The Reports of My Death Are Greatly
Exaggerated" will be staged at 7:30 p.m. on June 15, 16 and 17. Tickets
are $12 for adults, $10 for seniors and students, and $8 for groups of
eight or more. For information or reservations, call 440-337-1400 or got
to www.solonarts.org.
    The Largely Literary Theater Company was founded by Dawidziak and
Showman in 2002. Specializing in faithful adaptations of classic
literature, the company's mission is to promote literacy, literature and
live theater. The troupe has performed at such Ohio venues as the
Cleveland Public Library, Stan Hywet Hall & Gardens and Coach House
Theatre in Akron, the Kelton House Museum & Garden in Columbus, Lakeland
Community College in Kirtland and the Nordonia Hills Branch Library in
Northfield.
    The first Largely Literary presentation in the Solon Center for the
Arts' Page2Stage series was "The Tell-Tale Play," a two-act collection
of poems and stories by Edgar Allan Poe. Starring Showman, Stephan and
Nine, it was staged in October 2005. It was followed in December by the
company's acclaimed three-person version of Charles Dickens' "A
Christmas Carol." Starring Stephan as Ebenezer Scrooge, Dawidziak as
Dickens and Showman as "just about everyone else," this production is
entering its fifth year of touring to various Northeast Ohio locations.
    "We stress fidelity to the original language in all our
productions," said Dawidziak, the television critic at the Cleveland
Plain Dealer. "So we think these shows work best with high school
students and older. This isn't Mark Twain as a beloved children's author
in this play. This is more Twain as humorist, social critic and
satirist."
    Born Samuel Langhorne Clemens in 1835, Mark Twain did, of course,
author such classic children's works as "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"
(1876) and "The Prince and the Pauper" (1881). The scenes in "The
Reports of My Death Are Greatly Exaggerated," however, are drawn from
such books as "The Innocents Abroad" (1869), "Roughing It" (1872), "The
Gilded Age" (1873), "Sketches, New and Old" (1875), "Huckleberry Finn"
(1884), "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court" (1889) and "Merry
Tales" (1892).
    A Twain scholar, Dawidziak has twice presented academic papers at
the International Conference on the State of Mark Twain Studies. And he
has twice been a guest lecturer at the Elmira College Center for Mark
Twain Studies. Two of his nine published books are about Mark Twain:
"Mark My Words: Mark Twain on Writing" (St. Martin’s Press, 1996) and
"Horton Foote’s The Shape of the River: The Lost Teleplay About Mark
Twain" (Applause, 2003).

Biographies for "The Reports of My Death Are Greatly Exaggerated":
    Mark Dawidziak (director, plays Mark Twain) has been a theater, film
and television critic for more than twenty-five years. Since July of
1999, he has been the TV critic at the Cleveland Plain Dealer. During
his fifteen years at the Akron Beacon Journal, he held such posts as TV
columnist, movie critic and critic-at-large. His nine published books
include a novel, "Grave Secrets" (1994), and such non-fiction works as
"The Barter Theatre Story: Love Made Visible" (1982), "The Columbo
Phile: A Casebook" (1989), "Night Stalking" (1991), "Mark My Words: Mark
Twain on Writing" (1996), "The Night Stalker Companion: A 25th
Anniversary Tribute" (1997) and "Horton Foote’s The Shape of the River:
The Lost Teleplay About Mark Twain" (2003). He is currently
collaborating with Paul Bauer on a biography of "hobo writer" Jim Tully.
His 1982 play, "To Preserve, Protect and Defend," a two-act drama about
Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt, has been produced on both sides
of the Mason-Dixon line. A journalism graduate of George Washington
University, he was born in Huntington, New York. He lives in Cuyahoga
Falls, Ohio, with his wife, actress Sara Showman, and their daughter,
Rebecca “Becky” Claire. His stage roles include E.K. Hornbeck in
"Inherit the Wind," the Writer in Neil Simon's "The Good Doctor" and the
Wizard in "The Wizard of Oz." He and Showman started the Largely
Literary Theater Company in 2002. He has adapted and directed all of the
Largely Literary productions, including the three-person version of "A
Christmas Carol" (in which he plays Dickens), "The Tell-Tale Play" and
Robert Louis Stevenson's "A Child's Garden of Verses."

    Sara Showman (Emmeline Grangerford, Sara McWilliams, Eve, Mrs.
McWilliams and other roles) has appeared in many productions in Ohio
since moving to the Akron area in 1983. She has worked with professional
companies, as well as college, children's and community theaters. She
has appeared at Kent State, Weathervane, Coach House Theatre, the Beck
Center for the Performing Arts, the Canton Players Guild, Porthouse
Theatre Company, the Working Theater and Actors Summit Theater. An
Equity membership candidate, she earned a bachelor of fine arts degree
in acting and directing from Kent State University. Favorite roles
include Bella in "Lost in Yonkers," Melissa in "Love Letters," Clara in
"I'm Not Rappaport" and Shirley in "Shirley Valentine." She also has
appeared in four Shakespeare productions at Stan Hywet. Before moving to
Ohio, she appeared in several productions for theater companies in her
native Tennessee, including "Another Part of the Forest," "A Little
Night Music," "A Streetcar Named Desire," "Ten Little Indians" and
"Inherit the Wind." The co-founder and managing director of the Largely
Literary Theater Company, she plays 15 roles in "A Christmas Carol,"
performs "The Bells" and "The Masque of the Red Death" in "The Tell-Tale
Play" and co-stars in "A Child's Garden of Verses."

    Tom Stephan (Scotty Briggs, the King, Mr. McWilliams, Joe Twichell
and other roles) combined his acting avocation with his vocational
pursuits for 31 years before he retired from English and drama teaching
at Stow-Munroe Falls High School. He was recognized as a "child star" at
the age of seven when he first appeared onstage in Canton, Ohio, but it
was actually at the age of 21 when he began teaching school that the
drama bug bit once more. He started with a supporting role in a Stow
Players production, and has now been seen in over 70 major productions
in the greater Akron-Canton area, including the Weathervane Playhouse,
Coach House Theater, Goodyear Theater, the old Bath Players, and the
Players Guild of Canton. He has won three Best Actor and one Best
Supporting Actor Awards from the Weathervane Playhouse, and was honored
by the State Department of Education for implementation of a middle
school program called “Drama in the Classroom.” For 15 years he has
either succumbed as murder victim or triumphed as scoundrel in numerous
"Mysteries by Moushey," audience interactive murder mysteries, in the
Akron/Cleveland/Canton area. Several years ago he branched out into
radio and TV, serving as spokesman and voice-over talent for commercial
and industrial work. As a retired teacher, he intends to pursue acting,
voice work, radio-TV, commercial work, and all other performance
ventures that look both interesting and lucrative. Stephan performs "The
Raven" and "The Tell-Tale Heart" in the Largely Literary Theater
Company's "The Tell-Tale Play," and this will be his fifth year playing
Ebenezer Scrooge in "A Christmas Carol."

    Alex J. Nine (the Duke, the Editor, Colonel Sellers, Captain Ned
Wakeman, the Guide and other roles) has acted or directed at most of the
theaters in the greater Akron area. An Akron native and University of
Akron graduate and an employee of Wayne Homes. Some of his favorite
roles are Freddie in "Noises Off" at Hudson Players, Brick in "Cat on a
Hot Tin Roof" at Weathervane Playhouse and Hamlet at Coach House Theatre
(for which he won his first of four Royal Coach Awards). Other notable
roles include Oberon, Lysander and Demetrius in "A Midsummer Night's
Dream," Master Ford in "The Merry Wives of Windsor," Leonard Vole in
"Witness for the Prosecution," William Blore in "Ten Little Indians,"
John Proctor in "The Crucible," Shep Henderson in "Bell, Book and
Candle," Joe Pendleton in "Heaven Can Wait" and Willum Cubbert in "The
Nerd." He directed Neil Simon's "Broadway Bound" at Coach House, where
he has appeared in eleven shows, including "Chapter Two," "Crimes of the
Heart," "6 Rms Riv Vu," "Private Lives" and "The Real Thing." He is
currently a member of the Stow Players' Production Committee and he
recently directed another Neil Simon comedy, "The Sunshine Boys," at
Stow. For four years, he was a member of the Board of Trustees for Tree
City Players in Kent, serving as vice president for three of those
years. During those years, he directed seven shows for the company,
ranging from Shakespeare's "Love's Labours Lost" to William Saroyan's
"Hello, Out There!" and Eileen Moushey's "My Fatal Valentine." His
directing credits also include "The Odd Couple" and "The Foreigner" at
North Canton Playhouse and Communicating Doors at Hudson Players. "The
Reports of My Death Are Greatly Exaggerated" is his second Largely
Literary production. He also co-stars in the company's "The Tell-Tale
Play," performing, among other Edgar Allan Poe works, "Annabel Lee" and
"The Cask of Amontillado."

    Jason Davis (the Minister, Huckleberry Finn, Joe Goodman, the
Interviewer and other roles) is a junior in the Firestone High School
Campus for the Visual and Performing Arts, where he is studying theater.
He has appeared in many plays there, including "Grease," "Twelfth Night"
and "The Servant of Two Masters." He also has appeared in many youth
productions at Weathervane Community Playhouse, including "The
Crucible," "Little Women" and "The Emperor's New Clothes."  His various
Ingenue Theatre productions include "The Lion, the Witch, and the
Wardrobe," "Macbeth," "Gardens of Olympus," "Dr. Faustus," "As You Like
It" and "A Midsummer Night's Dream." An Akron native, he was diagnosed
at age three with a sensory-neurological hearing impairment and began
wearing hearing aids. He attended special classes until second grade, at
which point he began regular classes, in which he has always excelled.
In middle school, he was a three-time recipient of Academic All-Stars,
was president of National Junior Honor Society, and received the
Outstanding Student of the Year award for scholarship, service,
leadership, and character. In high school, he became a member of the
Thespians, and besides acting and working behind the scenes on several
productions, he played soccer both for his school and for a premier
team. Jason loves to ski, travel, play video games, and write poetry. He
is currently writing a fantasy novel, and hopes to become a writer. He
resides in the Fairlawn Heights area of Akron with his parents, sister
Amanda and brother Matthew. He is making his debut with the Largely
Literary Theater Company.