PAST... EVENTS, PROJECTS, ADVENTURES

4.29.10 - 5.15.10
The Happy Show (Premiere: The Bedlam Theatre, 2010)
Why are we happy? What makes us happy? And how can we stay in this intangible state of being? Exploring these questions, Live Action Set installs its latest innovative theatrical experience throughout the nooks and crannies of the Bedlam Theatre. A show that is nearly impossible to experience the same way twice, audience members choose-their-own-adventure to follow a troupe of happy-makers performing the ancient Ritual of Happiness, a buffet of large spectacles and intimate sideshows exploring the ephemeral state of happiness. Full of whimsy, poetry, surprise, eccentricity and, above all, happiness, The Happy Show features song, dance, sunsets, picnics, detailed explanations, lightening bugs, and if you are lucky an opera for two or an encounter with the king of all dogs.

Cast: Noah Bremer, Brant Miller, Emily King, Isabel Nelson, and Diogo Lopes
Ensemble Cast: Lisa Bol, Mark Benzel, Holly Brimhall, Noah Coon, Alicia Dansby, Amelia English, L. J. Johnson, Katie Jorgenson, Andy Langenfeld, Many Langenfeld, Ryan Lear, Nick Marcoullier, Rachel Petrie, Matt Riggs, Blythe Riske, Mike Rylander, and Allison Witham
Director: Ryan Underbakke
Additional Direction: Matt Spring and Galen Treuer
Consigliere / Stage Manager: Matt Spring
Production Manager: Katherine Clanton
Technical Director: Mark Ruark
Additional Sound Designers: Kalen Keir and Zeina Khalife
Video Elements: Joshuah Nelson
House Manager: Kristin Campbell

5.1.10 and 5.9.10
The NightCap Series-- to the Lighthouse! (Premiere: The Bedlam Theatre, 2010)
Live Action Set proudly supports the exceptional talents of emerging and established artists following select performances of The Happy Show. Ally Cary and Joanna Harmon present to the Lighthouse! Join us for bursts of song, ballet-sans-ballerinas, and petite shadow shows. We borrow Virginia Woolf's story of the desires of an English family and their house guests who dream, "I want… I want to be somewhere else than here… but where? And how?" Woolf made the form of the novel her own. She inspires us to do the same with the theater, and to follow her into the imagination, asking: How do you put the imagination on stage?

Cast: Tim Cameron, Ally Carey, Elizabeth Griffith, Joanna Harmon, Damian Johnson, Gabe Murphy, and Skyler Nowinski.
Director: Ally Carey
Original Music: Much Gumption: Skyler Nowinski, Daniel Hirsch Taylor, and Liam Benzvi

6.18.09 - 6.28.09
My Father's Bookshelf at the Guthrie (premiere: The Guthrie Theater's Dowling Studio, 2009)
My Father's Bookshelf is a new work about dementia, neuroscience, and the mortality of families. Part family drama, part lecture, and part clowning comedy, this engaging performance springs from Live Action Set's uniquely collaborative style. It tells the story of a man afflicted with Alzheimer's, his family, and scientific response to a disease that eats at the essence of human society: our ability to communicate. A basic introduction to the latest developments in neuroscience research is at the heart of My Father's Bookshelf. Used to highlight the dramatic gap between contemporary Alzheimer's research and practical application, it explores the tragic humor of decline and the inspirational relevance of science.
Read the Reviews

Visit the Guthrie Theater's Site and watch an interview with Director Noah Bremer and Actor Robert Rosen.
Cast: Robert Rosen, Barbra Berlovitz, Dario Tangelson, Jason Ballweber, Megan Odell
Director: Noah Bremer
Assistant Director / Dramaturg: Galen Treuer
Set and Lighting Designer Paul Whitaker
Sound Designer Guy Messenger
Costume Designer Anna Lee
Stage Manager Stacy Davis Spensley
Assistant Stage Manager Alexandra Gowdy-Jaehnig

8.1.08 - 8.10.08
Deviants (Premiere: the Soap Factory, 2008)
Meet four individuals you'd rather not know but can't ignore. Follow them into an old Soap Factory. See what they do.
Live Action Set in collaboration with Theater de la Jeune Lune co-founder, Robert Rosen presents DEVIANTS, a reincarnation of the sell-out show, DESIDERARE: DESIRE THE UNDESIRABLE, initially presented by the Red Eye Theater in their 2007 New Works 4 Weeks Festival. DEVIANTS showcases the Set's trademark idiosyncratic, highly physical, morphing of dance and theater while exploring one of the more basic but agonizing of human emotions: desire. DEVIANTS tells the story of four individuals who become seduced by their transgressive desires and engage behaviors that conventional society does not want to see but can't ignore. Originally inspired by the Amish schoolhouse shootings in 2006, DEVIANTS looks inside the human psyche and investigates, with humor and poignancy, the intersections between revelation, repression and expression.

Cast: Noah Bremer, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil, Megan Odell
Director: Robert Rosen
Scenic Design: Robert Rosen
Lighting Designer: Paul Whitaker
Sound Designer: Robert Rosen
Technical Director / Operator: Mark Ruark
Stage Manager: Katy Clanton

5.29.08 - 6.15.08
Rite of Spring (premiere: Ritz Theater, 2008)
Imagine yourself in Paris, May 29th 1913. The clock strikes 8:00 pm and the outrageous performance begins at Le theater des Champs-elysee. The audience begins angrily crying out, screaming, writhing, biting, tearing, pounding, in a tumultuous mass of self-destruction....Programs flutter around in the air. The music hardly audible above the shouting, crying, screaming of the audience. Back on stage, the choreographer calls out the cues to the dancers...
Rite of Spring was first performed 95 years to the day. Live Action Set collaborated with Myron Johnson of the Ballet of the Dolls to re-interpret this ground breaking work with fellow Twin Cities envelope pushers Zorongo Flamenco. Each company offered a unique view of the Stravinsky classic. From di Palma's passionate & innovative flamenco ballets to Live Action Set's profoundly engaging ensemble work to Ballet of the Dolls' fearless approach to the classics.
"astounding, profoundly disturbing, even brilliant at times in its singularly brutal way"
-Camille LeFevre, Star Tribune
Presented by the Ritz Theater in collaboration with the Ballet of the Dolls and Zorongo Flamenco
Project Director for Live Action Set: Vanessa Voskuil
Co-created and performed by:Galen Treuer, Sarah Jacobs, Vanessa Voskuil
Artistic Support: Megan Odell and Noah Bremer
Video: John Koch
Sound Design: Vanessa Voskuil with support from Katherine Horowitz
Music Excerpts: Stavinsky - "Rite of Spring", Steffen Schleiermacher - "Stille Und Klang", Friedrich Goldman - "sinfonie 3"
Costumes: Vanessa Voskuil, Galen Treuer, Sarah Jacobs
4.10.08 - 4.13.08
The Piano Tuner (premiere: The Southern Theater, 2008)
Critically acclaimed performance ensemble Live Action Set returns to the Southern to premiere their latest hybrid theater-dance-music work, The Piano Tuner. Known for a surreal logic where anything is possible, this exciting and award-winning collection of physical theater artists creates a grand and romantic new work of dangerous elegance. Inspired by the dissonant labor of the Southern Theater's own piano tuner, the production brings to light a community out of tune and the unassuming master craftsman who is pulled into their drama of discord.
"Live Action Set... is responsible for some of the most innovative and fearless work in town these days."
-Caroline Palmer, City Pages
Cast: Heidi Berg, Noah Bremer, Laurel Cameron, Tim Cameron, Ryan Hill, Paul Kovakovic, Nicole LeDuc, Andrew Lynch, Katie Melby, Eric Sharp, Mike Swanson, Sheila Regan, Kimberly Richardson, Galen Treuer, Jessica Weappa.
Director: Megan Odell
Assistant Director: Noah Bremer
Music Director Paul Kovacovic
Set and Lighting Designer Paul Whitaker
Costume Designer Lindsey Strange
Stage Manager Stacy Davis Spensley
Desiderare: desire the undesirable (Premiere: The Red Eye, 2007)
A passionate and provocative event of theatre and dance, Desiderare: desire the undesirable explores the act of wanting what we don't have and wanting those things we wish we didn't. Critically acclaimed experimental theatre company, Live Action Set, collaborates with Robert Rosen, co-founder of the Tony Award-winning Theatre de la Jeune Lune, to create this physical new work about desire, transgression, and what happens between realization, repression, and expression.
"This surprising melange of transgressive theater and dance is disturbingly funny."
-Rohan Preston, Star Tribune
Cast: Noah Bremer, Megan Odell, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil
Director: Robert Rosen
Assistant Director: Leah Cooper
Filmmaker: Kevin Obsatz
Dramaturg: Amy Radermacher
Stage Manager: J.J. Johnson
Lighting Designer: Ron Albert
Set and Costume Designers: Everyone!

Presented by The Red Eye as part of the New Works 4 Weeks Festival, created with additional support by the Jerome Foundation.
The Percussionist (premiere Southern Theater, July 2006)
"The Percussionist" is an exciting collaboration with Spaghetti Western String Co., hailed as "the hippest string quartet in town" (Star Tribune), created as part of the Momentum: New Dance Series. This project is commissioned by the Walker Art Center and Southern Theater, and will feature guest artists and the musicians as characters alongside the performers of Live Action Set. The show delves into the dark themes of revenge, capital punishment, and explores society's perception of normalcy.
"Another ambitious odd-angle work… this is a must-see night for followers of the local avant-garde (hype duly dispensed)."
-Quinton Skinner, City Pages
Cast: Noah Bremer, Denise Guelker, Robert Haarman, Nicholas Lemme, Megan Odell, Kimberly Richardson, Michael Rossetto, Levi Schwartzberg, Ethan Sutton, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil
Director: Noah Bremer
Composers: Spaghetti Western String Co.
Set and Props Design: Mark Ruark and John Catron
Lighting Design: Jeff Bartlett
Costume Design: Sara Richardson
Stage Manager: Crane Adams
Presented with support of the Walker Art Center, Southern Theater, and The Soap Factory
Zombies on Ice (premiere: frozen Medicine Lake, 2006)
Presented as part of the Soap Factory's Art Shanty Project, Live Action Set explores the genre of zombie films and the phenomenon that surrounds Zombie-ism. We use roughly 20-30 actor/dancers to create a site-specific performance, using the perspective of horizontal distance that can only be captured on a frozen lake.
Cast: Willa Ahlschwede, Alecia Ball, Julia Blaha, Noah Bremer, Cara Delavallade, Julia Eagles, Jon Ferguson, Mickey Foley, Tyson Forbes, Rich Goldsmith, David Harris, Damian Johnson, Taous Khazem, Tara King, John McCarten, Theresa Madaus, Chris Morris, Chris Nelson, Rebecca Orman, Antonia Paulitsch-Leutgeb, David Pitman, Sara Richardson, Matt Ruch, Guy Schaffer, Julia Stanfield, Monica Thomas, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil, Jeremy Wilker
Written and directed by: Noah Bremer, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil
Presented with support of The Art Shanty Projects and The Soap Factory
Storming of the Bastille (premiere: Barbette Cafe, Bastille Day, 2005)
Live Action Set and its collaborators storm the stage of Barbette's annual Bastille Day Celebration in the style of Bouffon, a French form of grotesque clowning. Society's misshapen castoffs seek out the jolly-making crowd, and the chaotic romp culminates in a ludicrous re-enactment of the storming of the Bastille. Viva la (twisted) France!
Cast: Noah Bremer, Kari Kelly, Megan Odell, Kimberly Richardson, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil
Directors: Jon Ferguson, Sarah Richardson
Props Master: Christian Ferguson
Presented with support of Barbette Restaurant and Amusements, Norcostco
Ice Cube Documentary (premiere: Invention Arts, Bath, England, 2005)
Live Action Set collaborator Jon Ferguson filmed the building of our Art Shanty, including a light saturated time lapse of the final stages on the ice of frozen medicine lake. Available on DVD in three different running times.
Cast: Noah Bremer, Megan Odell, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil, Jon Ferguson (cameo)
Director and Cinematographer: Jon Ferguson
Before Dark (premiere: Minneapolis Theatre Garage, 2004)
A character-driven work that integrates music, humor, and socio-political viewpoints: a pirate, a postman, bandito, and a cello-playing working mom – each reflecting a different aspect of the human condition, from virtuous to foibled, from revolutionary to self-obsessed.
"Fantastic! The cast of talented dancers and actors offer strikingly funny -- and sometimes tender -- vignettes that create a gripping, edgy performance… I can't wait to see more from these guys."
- audience review
Cast: Noah Bremer, Rebecca Disrud, Megan Odell, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil
Director: "Sascha Undine"
Props: Emily Allan
Bomb Builder: Big John
Presented in collaboration with Jake Endres and the Theatrical Music Company
Please Don't Blow Up Mr. Boban (premiere: The Soap Factory, 2005)
A highly visual and physical clown show that is the story of Mr. Boban, his war-torn bistro, and the struggle to keep his lights on. Based on an English newspaper article about where to eat in a war zone, this collaboration with UK theatre director Jon Ferguson, is comic, tragic and hard to forget.
"Must See! A richly layered piece of comic/tragic performance art... at turns slapstick funny, abstract, physical, emotional and metaphorical, always riveting, always surprising."
-Matt Peiken, Pioneer Press
Awards: "2005 Artists of the Year" (City Pages), "Outstanding Experimental Theatre Work of 2005" (Star Tribune), "Best Stage Production" (City Pages)
Cast: Noah Bremer, Robert Haarman, Kari Kelly, Megan Odell, Kimberly Richardson, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil
Director: Jon Ferguson
Set and Light Designer: Mark Ruark
Sound Design and Music: DJ Bach and Rebecca Disrud
Musician (October remount): Sam Adams
Stage Manager: Eva Treuer
Presented with support of the Minnesota Fringe Festival, The Soap Factory, and the Minnesota State Arts Board
Hello Remember Me (premiere: Southern Theatre, 2005)
Live Action Set and Jerome Fellow Abi Basch explore the Southern's dusty memories to create a site-specific trilogy about ghosts, desire, and the space between. Presented as part of 2005 Best Feet Forward festival.
Cast: Noah Bremer, John Heimbuch, Megan Odell, Maesie Speer, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil, Lina Wiksten
Playwright: Abi Basch
Costumes: Cesia Kearns
Ice Cube (premiere: frozen Medicine Lake, 2005)
Ice Cube (premiere: frozen Medicine Lake, 2005) Part of the Soap Factory's Art Shanty Project, Ice Cube delves into a multi-faceted exploration of "home." The interactive sculpture literally reflects the surroundings and people who choose to battle the elements, live, play, and build on the ice.
"I'm too cold to stay, but I know I'm lucky to see this, to have a glimpse of that larger field to which both death and life belong."
-Lightsey Darst, mnartists.org
Builders: Noah Bremer, Rebecca Disrud, Jon Ferguson, Megan Odell, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil
Architect: Dan Vercruysse
Presented with support of Art Shanty Projects, Soap Factory
Exposure (premiere: Minneapolis Theatre Garage, 2003)
This twisted love story is about the dynamic and metaphysical journey of four characters discovering truths about themselves, and their relationships to each other. Driven by dance and fueled by emotion, Exposure fuses art forms and creates a unique physical-theater experience.
"Wow. Short version - If you're wondering whether or not to see this, 'SEE IT'"
- Matthew Everett, In My Humble Opinion
Cast: Natasha Hassett, Megan Odell, Galen Treuer, Vanessa Voskuil
Director: Noah Bremer
Costumes: Ritchie McFadden
Scene Painter: Emily Allan