Noises off: A play within a play

Three performances of the play Noises Off took place on Apr. 10,11 and 12 in the Maureen Stapleton Theatre. The play, written by Michael Frayn, was directed at Hudson Valley by Rosanne Raneri, theatre club advisor. Noises Off consisted of three acts and was approximately three hours long.

 The cast of Hudson Valley students included Paige Jami Marmel, Phil Burns, Matthew LaVare, Celina Pulenskey, Lucy Montanto, Joshua Henderson, Bailey Medici, Alex Gomez and Justin Zielinski.

 The play focused on the on-stage and off-stage relationships between the cast of a fictional play called Nothing On.

 In Act One, set on January 14, the cast of Nothing On is at dress rehearsal and it is made clear to the audience of how unprepared they are. Through multiple missed lines, missed cues and dropping of props, Act One illustrated just how little the actors were ready for their performance.

 Act Two again focused on the cast of Nothing On, however, this time from behind the scenes. This is about a month later and takes places at the fictional Theatre Royal in Ashton-under-Lyne. From watching what goes on behind the scenes, the audience was able to see the relationships and feuds betweens the actors.

 Finally, Act Three takes place on April 6 at the fictional Municipal Theatre in Stockton-on-Tees. In this act, the audience sees a performance of Nothing On, however, due to the many quarrels and tensions between the cast the play does not go as planned. Most of the cast forgets their lines and also their cues of when to enter and exit.

 Rosanne Raneri, director of Noises Off, said, “The show is a marathon of blocking, comic business and lines that alternate between script and script-within-a-script.”

 “I think it’s a good idea to have plays at Hudson Valley because it is a nice source of entertainment for students,” said Antone Correria, first year theatre arts major.

 Noises Off was sponsored by Hudson Valley’s Student Senate and the Student Activities Office.

 On Thursday and Saturday, May 1 and 3, the  theatre club and the theatre arts program will present “An Evening of Student Directed One Acts” at 7:30 p.m. in the Maureen Stapleton Theatre.

 “The one given that empowered me to go for it with this gorgeous beast-of-a-show was the group of people I knew I’d be working with,” said Raneri.