Student-led productions provide learning opportunities Performance senior Missy Gibbs has taken the rhinoceros by the horn as she uses skills learned in NAU's theater department for her first directing opportunity. As part of the "Second Stage Student Directed Productions," a new theater initiative to provide further learning experiences for students, Gibbs will be the first student director of the school year. "It was a challenge to learn to work within a budget and collaborate between the design team and production," Gibbs said. "The biggest challenge, however, was learning to differentiate myself as a director and a friend of my peer group." Theater patrons may have seen Gibbs in previous productions at NAU such as The Diviners, Taming of the Shrew and The Grapes of Wrath. A veteran of the U.S. Army, Gibbs will graduate in May and hopes to continue her career with a job in a theater company in Phoenix. She has been involved in theater for 12 years. "The allure of the theater got me at a young age," Gibbs said.

NAU provides a sharp study in absurdist theater

Rhinoceros, a drama written by absurdist French playwright Eugène Ionesco, will be performed by Northern Arizona University theater students Oct. 30 through Nov. 4 in the NAU Studio Theater.

The production will be directed by theater student Missy Gibbs.

Berenger, an average citizen in a nameless city, is not interested in the fact that rhinoceroses are on the loose. This causes him to quarrel with his friend Jean and his attractive co-worker, Daisy. In the local government office where Berenger works, he first realizes that people are turning into rhinoceroses.

Berenger eventually concludes that he will fight against the rhinoceroses, even if he is the last man left.

"Rhinoceros is an allegory of our time," Gibbs said. "Ionesco was writing about French collaboration with the Nazis, but there are many similarities to today's world."

The lighting design is done by theater student Dylan Uremovich. Scene design is by theater student Beth Hammer, with sound design by theater student John Meyer and prop design by theater student Levy Baltazar. Costumes are by Kyleen Colter, also a theater student.

Rhinoceros will be staged at 8 p.m. Oct. 30, 31, Nov. 1, 2 and 3, and at 2 p.m. Nov. 4.

Tickets are $11 for general admission, $10 for faculty, staff and senior citizens, and $8 for students and children. Call the NAU Central Ticket Office at (928) 523-5661, or go to www4.nau.edu/cto/.