Producer Tim Yergeau had to come up with some inventive ways to promote the Boston University Stage Troupe’s newest performance — not all of which were PG-rated.
“We can’t exactly go to the Catholic centers to promote it,” Yergreau said. “We had to be more creative. I bought a bunch of premium condoms and printed labels advertising the play. We found them to be very popular. You can’t hand out condoms for The Music Man.”
Curtains rose this weekend on Stage Troupe’s production of David Mamet’s Sexual Perversity in Chicago, a one-act play that follows the travails of two men and two women who are dating in Chicago.
The performance at the Agganis Arena Black Box Theatre differed from past Stage Troupe shows, Yergeau said. Stage Troupe does not usually perform non-traditional shows that require difficult sets.
“A lot of Stage Troupe shows in the past have been funny murder mysteries, mistaken identities,” he said. “Doing something edgy, dramatic and funny is a really good thing, especially with someone like David Mamet. The characters and dialogue are difficult to tackle.”
Cast members said the audience might be surprised to learn the play is deeper and sadder than the title suggests. Actor Danielle Kosan, a College of Communication senior, said the play is raunchy, but conveys a larger theme
Director Bryan Lowry said he does not want audiences to be offended by the vulgar dialogue.
“Let’s treat words like notes or colors and look at how the artist is using one as a small part of a much bigger whole, rather than isolating it and objecting to it outright,” Lowry wrote in his director’s note in the play’s program.
For the performance, participants said the behind-the-scenes work was exceptionally challenging. The comedy has more than 30 scene changes, as well as about 15 costume changes for each character. Sets include a bar, several apartments, a library, a pornography theater and a beach landscape.
“They did a good job for the limited amount of people involved,” audience member John Shwartz, a COM sophomore, said. “To change all of those scenes in such a limited time was pretty amazing.”
Elizabeth Harris, an actress in the play, said she has never performed in a play with so many costume changes.
Harris, a COM and College of Arts and Sciences sophomore, said she has participated in four Stage Troupe productions, but Sexual Perversity in Chicago, was an anomaly because it does not follow the usual arc of a show with rising action, a climax and falling action.
“Most of the action takes place offstage,” Harris said. “Getting into the relationship takes place offstage, and the in-between moments take place on stage.”
Audience member Tiffany Ledner, a COM sophomore, said she was impressed by the plot’s originality.
“I thought it was refreshing how the plot was in snapshots, vignettes, not exactly a set beginning, middle and end,” Ledner said. “That’s not something you see all of the time. I thought it was all well done.”
