Five women actors working during the Golden Age of Hollywood vie for the lead role in a sprawling epic movie titled “The Pirate Queen.” Alliances and rivalries form among the women with the impending involvement of America looming in the background, and the struggle between democracy and fascism form a thread running through the action on the film set.

The theatre curriculum at Hopewell High School began eleven years ago with one course; it now has expanded to three courses. Because the last course in the sequence may be repeated for credit, a student in this curriculum may earn four credits in theatre study. The first course is English 124, entitled Drama I, and it may be taken by students in grades 9 through 12. This course introduces the student to performing in pantomime, improvisation, and in scripted scenes. The second course is English 125, entitled Drama II, which is open to students in grades 10 through 12 who have completed Drama I; college bound juniors and seniors without any theatre credits may also take Drama II. The emphasis in Drama II is theatre history and literature. The third course is English 147, entitled Theatre Ensemble, which is a play production course with work on the production process leading toward a finished performance. Students in Theatre Ensemble must have successfully completed at least one other theatre course, and they must submit an audition and/or interview for admission to the course. Theatre Ensemble may be repeated once for credit. The overall objectives of the theatre program at Hopewell High School are: to provide the student with a creative vehicle to learn about himself and about himself with others to provide the school with a viable and visible performing arts group to provide the community with its only regular theatre group to use school and community resources in theatrical production and study to provide training in acting, production, theatre history, dramatic literature, and management skills to encourage independent study and artistic endeavor to follow current mandates and guidelines of the Virginia State Department of Education to provide training on the high school level for the gifted theatre student who has professional goals to cooperate with, and often incorporate, all other arts programs within the school system to assist in the development of a total appreciation of all of the arts to develop a program on the secondary level in dance and movement to develop a community theatre group It is important that any curriculum have objectives, but it is even more important that a theatre program have strong objectives which will win the support of the school board, the school administration, the faculty, and the study body. The theatre curriculum at Hopewell High School has been fortunate in this regard.

There are four elements involved in this production of Poe per se which make it interesting and suitable as a thesis: the actor, the subject, the format, and the audience. I will discuss the problems posed by each and the methods of attack I will pursue to those problems. I will then describe the evolution of the script from research through performance. My conclusion will be an assessment of the success of the script in solving my acting problems.

In the fall of 1981 I came to the point in my studies where it became necessary to choose a thesis project. The standard procedure in the Department of Theatre at Virginia Commonwealth University is to have design students do set designs for one of the mainstage productions as their thesis project. At the time that the thesis proposal was due the 1981-1982 season had not been decided upon, so I submitted a proposal stating that I would design a "mainstage production for Theatre V.C.U." as my project and that the documentation of this project would be my thesis. I expressed an interest in doing a show early in the season so that I could do a good deal of the design work during the summer. I was assigned the set design for the opening show of the season, Fifth of July by Lanford Wilson, to be directed by Richard L. Newdick, a professor in the Department of Theatre. Because of work I had been doing in an advanced lighting design class, it was suggested that I should do the lighting design for the show as well. This suggestion pleased me because it would allow complete artistic control of all the visual aspects of the show other than costumes. My assistantship at the university included the supervision of the scene shop. Because of this, and because one of my professional goals is to teach on the university level, it was decided that the supervision of the construction and the installation of the set and ordering of the materials--basically the technical direction of the show could also be added as a third part of the thesis project. It was finally decided that for my thesis project I would design sets and lights and act as technical director for the production of Fifth of July to be performed at Shafer Street Playhouse, October 6-16, 1982, for the Department of Theatre at Virginia Commonwealth University.

This is the thesis of Keyla McClure analyzing her artistic process, growth as an artist, and future artistic goals. It includes an annotated performance history and bibliography of academic resources from her time at the University of Iowa.

As the reader, you have to imagine my pain and joy in sharing the complex simple motive behind the journey of living. It is a journey based in truth and spiritual progression. We risk our spirit and soul to reach beyond what we know of one another. We attempt to capture an essence of truth in a moment's time. It's a very big moment's time that lends itself to the viewer as infinity. For we, like the viewer, have much to learn and, perhaps, take in this journey. We bend time, place, and motive to find the ugliness of our species and the beauty of our world. With this "one-self", the collective, we search for our past, reveal our future, and capture our "beings" in a light called the stage. It is the essence of the living and dying.

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The two women presented in this paper have existed in print, in performance, and in people's minds for centuries. One, from India, is praised as the epitome of the honorable and devoted wife and mother. The other, from Greece, is commended as the noble and benevolent daughter. This paper, and the accompanying performative work, is a cross-cultural investigation of sacrificial women in literature using two women from two ancient mythologies: Sita from Valmiki's Ramayana and Iphigenia from Euripides' Iphigenia at Aulis. In various forms of literature and performance, Sita is presented as the role model of wifely duty. Iphigenia is praised as the sacrificial daughter by honoring her father, and her country, with her sacrifice. This work seeks to remain close to the original texts, while also re-shaping them to fit a modern argument.

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