Pig Iron Company performs at 185: New plays without playwrights

The Program in Theater and Dance at 185 Nassau Street opens the fall season this Thursday with a special guest and old acquaintance from Philadelphia: The Pig Iron Theatre Company.

An up-and-coming ensemble that's been performing for the last 10 years on local as well as international stages, Pig Iron is best known for its emphasis on physicality. Pig Iron's show, entitled "Hell Meets Henry Halfway," will be at the Matthews Acting Studio from September 23rd through the 25th.

The Pig Iron Company makes a point of performing entirely new plays and oftentimes works without a playwright; for "Hell Meets Henry Halfway," however, they have teamed up with writer Adriano Shaplin, founder of The Riot Group.

This duo is a fusion of two distinct styles. Michael Cadden, Director of the Theater Program at Princeton, compares Shap-lin's writing to that of David Mamet's fast-paced verbal style.

Pig Iron, on the other hand, is primarily concerned with the physical components of theater, a trademark of the Jacques Lecoq School in Paris, France where many of the company trained; recently, they performed "Cafeteria," a piece entirely devoid of speech. A blend of the two will certainly lead to some interesting and novel stage work.

Adapting the 1930's novel "Possessed," by absurdist Polish author Witold Gombro-wicz, Adriano Shaplin seeks to reshape and revive a highly original and darkly-comic piece.

Pig Iron actor Dito van Reigersberg, who plays the character Henry, describes the play as a "fanciful adaptation," whose characters and plot remain the same but is otherwise loosely based on the original work.

"There are strong similarities between the writing styles of Shaplin and Gombrowicz," van Reigersberg continued, "which makes the play close in spirit. There's a reverent but very intellectual quality to the whole thing."

The marriage of Shaplin and Pig Iron's two distinct approaches may already seem something from a fairy tale, but there are also some magical qualities to the play itself.

The play centers on the duo of professional tennis player Maya and her coach, Walchak, whose intense love/hate dynamic leads an exploration of the simultaneously destructive and addictive nature of human rapport.

The give and take of the play's dialogue is reinforced by both a tennis court physicality and verbal exchanges which Van Reigersberg called "one step away from a Hepburn, 1930s-ish sparring match."

Maya's engagement to the character Henry (played by van Reigersberg) complicates the story, introducing themes of love and betrayal.

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When coupled with a "Scooby-Doo-esque" mystery gothic mansion, shifting identities and an absurdist background, the piece suddenly merits the disturbing tennis-playing dragon on its publicity posters.

This is not the first time that Pig Iron has partnered up with the University.

In 2001, the company performed "Shuteye" at 185 Nassau and then returned in the spring of 2003 to lead one of Toni Morrison's Atelier programs: "James Joyce is Dead and So is Paris."

Yet while the troupe is not a University affiliate, its influence on campus theater has been noticeable, from the 2003 Atelier through last year's senior thesis collaboration, "Spettacolo."

Indeed, several Princeton students have even worked with the Pig Iron Company.

"Most of our shows are student shows," Cadden explained. "It's rare that we produce something like this . . . they've been very influential for teaching students."