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Ravin' of the Week : (Jan 25- Feb 01, 1996)Ted Keener's One Man Poe Show : You & Me & Ed It's a theatrical presentation, ala Hal Holbrook doing Mark Twain. Following is some text from the tri-fold brochure I designed:Poe : the very name evokes in literate Americans a sense of mystery and darkness. Renowned as the father of the modern detective story, his writings have a secure place in the education of our youth and in general pleasure reading. Now his best-loved stories and poems are brought to life in the dramatic interpretation style of local performer Ted Keener. With make-up and costuming, he creates for the audiences senses the mood of an evening with Edgar Allan Poe hearing the tales from the authors own lips, as it were. Many of Poes stories (and all of his poetry) lend themselves well to the spoken word. Such Readers Theater as this recalls the days of radio plays when ones own imagination filled in the missing visuals. Todays movie screens and, of course, television diminish that power of the theater in our minds. Thus, Mr. Keeners purpose in his presentation of Poe to awaken our imaginations and, especially, arouse our youth to both the beauty and expressiveness of our language. Poes language was that of the early nineteenth century when our vocabularies were commonly more extensive. Upon exposure to a personalized Poe, perhaps a new curiosity about the power of words will be encouraged!" I perform it at schools, private parties, and some public events. I belong to a professional storytellers group which does two performances a year, so it gets exposure there. I've also taped at the local education tv channel and they run the three half hour shows periodically. My favorite audience commentary was "Chilling!" The greatest audience response I ever received as an actor was when I performed TellTale Heart at the Columbus Cultural Arts Center - after the final words, spoken with my hand outstretched downward to the floor and my eyes following it, "...the beating of his hideous HEART!" I froze in place momentarily... no reaction. I stood erect and faced the audience... no reaction... I slowly returned to the lectern and, again faced the audience, still nothing. Then I shuffled my papers and, as I began the introduction to the next story, they burst into the "thunderous applause!" They had been *that* awestruck, had lived the story with me so well they were still in reaction to the narrator's horror of the moment! Did I mention I'm pretty good at it? (g)
TedPF replies: Yo Ted! How can I dare parallel an act like yours with so much extra experience of insanity, drinking, and poetics on the Poe Front! hehehe!
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