Traverse City will resound with the voices of farm women from across the Midwest as The Voices Project lands in Traverse City for a week of presentations.
Julie Avery, Assistant Curator of History and Coordinator, Rural Arts & Culture Program for the Michigan State University Museum, is part of a trio of women who will be in Traverse City this week as part of The Voices Project, a program to explore farmers, farming and food at the community level.
Avery said the project started approximately three years ago when Cynthia Vagnetti, an Agriculture and Rural Life Research Associate at MSU's Museum and a documentarian, received a humanities grant to do a documentary about Michigan farmers who were engaged in sustainable practices. Avery was brought onto the project as a humanities scholar and historian.
"(Cynthia) went out and did oral history interviews and throughout that process Cynthia and I became friends and talked more and more about the richness of her work," Avery said.
The two decided that the project had wings beyond the television documentary that Vagnetti original created. They decided to give the piece a "stage presence" in order to let these voices continue their message. What they came up with is a Readers' Theatre piece that gives a vehicle for the voices of farm women from the mid-west.
"Readers' Theatre is often used by playwrights to get input into their work before it's staged," she said. "But also increasingly Readers' Theater, as a process, is used a lot with social issues."
Vagnetti and Avery brought Barbara Carlisle in to create the Readers' Theater piece. Carlisle, Professor Emeritus, Theatre Arts and Women's Studies at Virginia Tech is a writer, producer and director.
"Barbara goes and gets people within a community to be engaged," Avery said. "Her work comes right from their voice as well so these two women are both doing similar work in different ways."
The result of the collaboration is a Readers' Theater piece entitled "What Will Be in The Fields Tomorrow." The trio of women are currently staging the piece in seven locations in five states, hoping to get feedback from those in agriculture and farming.
Locally, the piece will be presented on Sunday, March 12 at 3 p.m. at the Old Town Playhouse. All three women are in town this week putting the presentation together.
Margaret Schaal has served as the local liaison for the Readers' Theatre piece, serving as a casting director and rehearsal coordinator. She said the biggest challenge has been choosing a cast for someone else to direct.
"As much as we always love to second guess other directors when they pick a cast," she said. "It's so strange to pick a cast for another director."
Carlisle, who arrived in Traverse City on Monday, will spend time with each member of the Readers' Theatre cast. The goal is to keep the piece from feeling too staged and instead bring to light the words of the farmers.
"It's intended not to be staged dramatically, but to be presented very casually," Avery said. The piece has previously been presented in Iowa and last weekend at a conference in Ohio.
"(The piece) is built to be an educational tool and a discussion piece more than let's make a Broadway show,' " Schaal said. "It's kind of edu-tainment."
On Monday, March 13, Vagnetti, Carlisle and Avery will sit down with a group of approximately 20 people from within the agricultural community in the Grand Traverse area and get their feedback on the project.
"We're really interested in the Traverse area because there is a deep interest in the Traverse area around agriculture , about respecting the land and sustainable practices," Avery said. "I think partly because the area is such a beautiful place and everybody knows that and everybody wants that."
Locals will have three opportunities to take a closer look at the Voices project. Tonight at 7 p.m. at the Traverse Area District Library, Cynthia Vagnetti will show her original documentary and then do a question and answer session.
On Thursday, March 9, Barbara Carlisle and Cynthia Vagnetti will participate in a program sponsored by the Northwestern Michigan College Extended Education program. The "class" will allow participants to view parts of Vagnetti's video, learn how it was adapted into the Readers' Theater piece and then speak directly with the creators of the project.
"(The program will allow participants) to meet the director of this Readers' Theatre piece and the original source material person," Schaal said. "And then go together to the show on Sunday learn about (the project), talk with the author, basically hobnob with the people who bring you this project."
The final step in the program is the presentation of the Readers' Theatre piece. That program will take place on Sunday, March 12, 2006 at 3 p.m. at the Old Town Playhouse. The program will be held in the lower-level Studio Theatre. Donations will be accepted at the door.