Wausau Daily Herald

"The 'Process

of Construction'"

By Keith Uhlig

Wausau East Grad Uses Avant-Garde Play to Explore the World

Laura Lamansky loves the ending of the play "Under Construction."It's part of a monologue, and it's not a spoiler to quote it here:

"We are in the constant process of construction

making and remaking

from where we are and what we have.

This is what human beings do.

This is the human project

as long as we are alive."

Lamansky, 20, of Wausau will be a junior theater and film major at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles when she returns to school in the fall. She's spending the summer here producing and directing "Under Construction," an avant-garde play written by Charles L. Mee. "Under Construction" will be performed at Wausau East High School tonight, the second of a two-performance run.

It's the second time the Wausau East graduate has used a summer break to produce a play. A year ago, she formed a theater production company called Silver Sparrow, and produced another Charles Mee play, "bobrauschenbergamerica."

Mee's plays don't have traditional story lines. They are mash-ups of monologues, dialogues, dances, songs, movie clips, etc., based around a theme. Lamansky likens them to collages, and she revels in the freedom they allow her as a director. She can move things around, add things, and has a lot of latitude when it comes to set design and other details.

"Under Construction" is "about the cyclical nature of innocence and corruption," Lamansky said. It's also about how innocence and corruption intermingle.

"You have to have both sides of the coin, actually," Lamansky said.

"Under Construction" has both bitterness and bite to it, and Lamansky doesn't rein it in in any way. There are controversial aspects to the performance. It delves into politics and has references to sex.

But the ending is hopeful, she said, and that's why she loves it so much.

Maybe another reason she's drawn to the play is that she's "Under Construction" herself -- like any college junior is.

She has always been into dance and theater. Lamansky headed to USC to become an actor, but it didn't take her long to change her mind.

"I wanted more control creatively in the process," Lamansky said.

Halfway through her undergrad experience, she's feeling "more settled, even though nothing is settled," she said.

She sees herself moving in a couple of different directions. She might become a film producer, or she could become a professor. Whatever path she chooses, expect Lamansky to blur lines of film and theater form. Lamansky is interested in melding live theater with movies, and "Under Construction" reflects that interest. Pieces of film are interspersed throughout.

This play won't be the last of Lamansky's creations, but it might be a while before Wausau residents get a chance to see her work on stage. Next summer she plans to travel to England to study dramatic combat, the choreography of stage fighting.

It's all about the "constant process of construction."

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