The Culver City High School Academy of Visual and Performing Arts (AVPA) Theatre Department presents their first production of the season production calendar: Nicholas Nickleby, based on the novel by Charles Dickens and directed by Sheila Silver, AVPA’s new Creative Director of Theatre. The show opened to a full house on Thursday, November 12, and continues through November 22 with 7 p.m. performances on Thursday, Friday and Saturday and 1:00 p.m. matinee on Sunday at the Sony Pictures Theatre (The Blackbox), behind the Robert Frost Auditorium, 4401 Elenda Street in Culver City . Tickets are $15 general admission; $10 ASB/Seniors/ Children/Faculty; free for holders of a Season Pass and can be purchased online at www.tix.comor www.avpa.org.
Nicholas Nickleby is one of Charles Dickens’ most widely read novels, tracing the life and adventures of the persistently optimistic Nicholas, who along with his forlorn mother and sister, comes to London to “seek his fortune.” Unschooled in the wily ways of the world, Nicholas is waylaid by the machinations of his sinister Uncle Ralph, who helps him to retain his first position as a teacher at Dotheboys School in Yorkshire . Nicholas vows to find his way back to London where he can be reunited with his mother and sister, but along the journey back home, he meets an array of eccentric characters who offer him adventure aplenty. Written in serial form between 1838 and 1839, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby was brought into the limelight with the nine hour live stage version produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company. Angelinos may remember enjoying this remarkable show when it ran at the Ahmanson Theatre in 1986. AVPA patrons will be treated to a two hour fifteen minute performance in this well-constructed adaptation by Tim Kelly.
With costumes by Alicia Simmons of Actors’Gang along with student designer, Jennifer Schallert, lights supervised by AVPA Instructor Francois Pierre Couture and student light designer Zak Malsich and sets designed by Brian Cole, theatre goers will travel alongside Nicholas in this melodramatic romp of a tale through the cobblestone streets of Victorian England.
Sheila Silver, AVPA Creative Director of Theatre, selected Nicholas Nickleby as her inaugural production with AVPA in order to build an ensemble-based production company and to bring a literary classic to life. 22 students play 41 roles in this onstage/offstage production. “Even before our audiences enter the theatre, they will be emerged in the world of our play,” cited Silver, whose creative directing takes the production well beyond the theatre walls.
Nicholas Nickleby is produced in conjunction with The AVPA Foundation.
About the Academy of Visual and Performing Arts
The Academy of Visual and Performing Arts (AVPA) at Culver City High School has been inspiring and empowering students to build a compassionate, creative community through innovative and challenging arts education since 1996. AVPA enjoys tremendous support from Sony Pictures Entertainment and other area businesses as well as from the Culver City community. For more information about the Academy, go to http://avpa.orgor contact Tony Spano at 310-842-4200 x6094 or Kristine Hatanaka at 310-842-4200 x6001.
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