XPost: rec.sport.skating.ice.figure, alt.skate.figure, alt.fan.t   
   nya-harding.whack.whack.whack   
   From: e-mail_@ddress_classif.ied   
      
   We now have a press release about this project, which was mentioned a few   
   months ago:   
      
      
   Tufts University Presents Tonya and Nancy: The Opera,   
   May 2, 2006, 7 & 9 pm, at the Zero Arrow Theater, Cambridge   
      
   MEDFORD/SOMERVILLE, MA – The Tufts University Department of Music will   
   preview the much-anticipated new production of Tonya and Nancy: The Opera, an   
   exciting new work by Tufts music graduate student Abigail Al-Doory, on   
   Tuesday, May 2, 2006.  The preview will be held at the American Repertory   
   Theatre’s Zero Arrow Theatre, in Harvard Square, Cambridge, Massachusetts, at   
   7 pm and 9 pm.   Each performance will be followed by a panel discussion and   
   workshop with Ms. Al-Doory, librettist Elizabeth Searle, the   
   actors/vocalists, musicians, Tufts faculty advisors, and production staff.   
   The presentation should last about one hour.   
      
   Tickets are required for the preview/workshop.  Tickets are $20 for adults,   
   $10 for students.  Tickets will be available in advance only by calling the   
   Tufts University Music Department at (617) 627-3679, Monday – Friday, 12:30   
   pm to 3:30 pm. Ticket sales for the general public will begin on Tuesday,   
   April 18, 2006 at 12:30 pm.  Seating for both shows is general admission.   
   There is no reserved seating.  Doors will open 20 minutes prior to each   
   presentation.  There will be very limited tickets available at the door.  The   
   Zero Arrow Theatre is fully accessible to wheelchairs.   
      
   Ms. Al-Doory’s music for the opera, which has a running time of just under 40   
   minutes, is being presented as her graduate thesis performance.  The   
   performance will complete her master of arts degree in music from Tufts   
   University.   
      
   Al-Doory’s cutting-edge new music is set to the libretto of author and   
   Arlington resident Elizabeth Searle.  Searle’s libretto is based upon the   
   infamous ice-skating scandal that surrounded the 1994 Winter Olympics in   
   Lillehammer, Norway, before which Nancy Kerrigan was attacked and suffered a   
   knee injury.  The attack, which brought the rivalry between Kerrigan and   
   fellow figure skater Tonya Harding to the forefront, remains one of the most   
   famous sports scandals of all time.   
      
   Through actual quotes from media interviews and newspaper articles, Searle’s   
   libretto and Al-Doory’s music present a possible interpretation of the   
   intense competition, overwhelming suspicion, and fierce jealousy that may   
   have existed between the two rivals.  The opera also depicts (in fantasy   
   sequences) the environments in which each skater grew up to further explore   
   how the two women came to be who they are.  The show climaxes with the final   
   Olympic skate-off between Tonya and Nancy, and then finally examines their   
   post-Olympic lives: Nancy as wife and mother and Tonya as a professional   
   boxer.   
      
   Written over the last two years, the new work is one of the largest student   
   projects to come out of Tufts’ respected and fast-growing Music Department,   
   which will open an impressive new music building in early 2007.  Though a   
   student written opera is rare to emerge from the department's composition   
   program, its creation and production are not a surprise.  Students studying   
   in the composition program at Tufts University have always been innovative in   
   their music outputs, and students are encouraged to compose music that   
   challenges the norm while also appealing to the intended audience.   
      
   Al-Doory was guided in the project by her advisor, Tufts Associate Professor   
   of Music John McDonald, a noted composer and pianist.  Al-Doory received her   
   undergraduate degree from Pomona College, studied piano with Leslie Amper at   
   the Longy School of Music, and recently completed a Master of Library Science   
   degree at Simmons College in Boston.  In addition, Al-Doory has been employed   
   at the Tufts Music Library for the past five years.   
      
   The opera also demonstrates the talents of members of the Tufts Department of   
   Drama and Dance.  Doctorate student Meron Langsner will direct the opera and   
   lead a team of Tufts drama students in managing the show’s production.   
   Langsner is very active as a director in New England and his native New York   
   City, including work in venues such as Ensemble Studio Theatre, the Lower   
   Manhattan Theatre Festival, and the Boston Center for the Arts, Boston   
   Playwrights Theatre, and several other top area universities.   
      
   Author and librettist Elizabeth Searle is the author of three books of   
   fiction: Celebrities in Disgrace; A Four-Sided Bed, a novel nominated for an   
   American Library Association Book Award; and My Body to You, a story   
   collection that won the Iowa Short Fiction Prize.  The New York Times Book   
   Review called her novella Celebrities in Disgrace “a miniature masterpiece.”   
   Searle’s stories have appeared in magazines such as Redbook, Ploughshares,   
   Agni, and Kenyon Review.  She is the 2000 winner of the Lawrence Foundation   
   Prize in Fiction.   
      
      
   ###   
      
   The Tufts University Department of Music is one of the fastest growing music   
   programs in the New England region.  With a solid and innovative academic   
   faculty, Tufts Music offers programs for undergraduate and graduate students.   
   The department embraces a wide variety of course offerings in musicology,   
   ethnomusicology, composition, and theory.   In addition, Tufts Music now   
   presents over 100 concerts, recitals, and special events during the academic   
   year, offering mostly free performances to more than 12,000 patrons annually.   
      
   Tufts University, located on three Massachusetts campuses in Boston,   
   Medford/Somerville, and Grafton, and in Talloires, France, is recognized   
   among the premier research universities in the United States. Tufts enjoys a   
   global reputation for academic excellence and for the preparation of students   
   as leaders in a wide range of professions. A growing number of innovative   
   teaching and research initiatives span all Tufts campuses, and collaboration   
   among the faculty and students in the undergraduate, graduate and   
   professional programs across the University's eight schools is widely   
   encouraged.   
      
      
   Tonya and Nancy   
   The Opera   
      
   Credits:   
   Music by Abigail Al-Doory • Libretto by Elizabeth Searle   
   Directed by Meron Langsner • Music Direction by Adam Grossman   
   Faculty Thesis Advisor: John McDonald, Tufts University   
      
   Cast   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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