The Exonerated Play Pdf
What do The Exonerated, Trumbo, The Guys and The Vagina Monologues have in common? All were/are socially relevant plays presented as staged readings, and with an army of celebrities - major and minor - traipsing through the runs.Without staging or memorization, heavily scheduled people such as Rob Lowe and Richard Dreyfus have been able to traipse through the the still going strong run of The Exonerated at random. Though this limits production values, it allows the cast to help pull in audiences as well as a way to keep the show fresh on its toes - a common challenge for open run productions.The most recent spin on this 'name' casting took a more literal route: on the show's first anniversary this past October, one of the people portrayed in the play, Kerry Max Cook, performed himself. From November 17 - 23 this experiment was stepped up with four of the exonerated individuals portrayed playing themselves - Kerry Max Cook, Gary Gauger, Sunny Jacobs and Delbert Tibbs.The afternoon of my attendance, all but Kerry Max Cook were on stage, leaving an even split of actors portraying exonerated individuals and exonerated individuals telling their own story. It was instantly recognizable who was who by on-stage demeanor.
The show is carefully and dramatically constructed, and therefore fit the movements and intonations of the veteran professional performers with ease. For Gauger, Jacobs and Tibbs, reciting lines about their own lives took warm-up time. Though I found it heart wrenching to hear these people tell their own story, the transition back and forth between the two camps took considerable adjusting.The writers, Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen traveled all around the country to interview many exonerated individuals, judges, prison guards, etc.
They say that the script was created by reconstructing the words of these individuals, and all stories are completely true. Whenever Gauger, Jacobs or Tibbs were reciting lines, I wanted them to stop, to close their scripts and tell me - tell us - what they had told Blank and Jensen, rather than this reconstruction of their story.With the continued cast rotationt, chances are good these exonerated individuals will return to the stage at The Culture Project. Chances are also good that another casting innovation could well be on its way for this show. For a full review of the play, the first cast and the non-changing production details, see Elyse Sommer's review following this box.Cast for Nov 17 - 23, 2003: Kerry Max Cook/ Bill Dawes, Gary Gauger, Erik LaRay Harvey, Sunny Jacobs, Delbert Tibbs, Ed Onipede Blunt, Bruce Kronenberg, Katherine Leask, Larry Block, William Jay Marshall, Curtis McClarin, April Yvette Thompson.- reviewed by, at a November 23rd 2003 matinee.
It's not easy to be a poet and yet I sing. We sing-Dilbert TibbsThe Exonerated is in the tradition of agitprop theater or what journalists refer to as muckraking. Not a bad thing when its message is as smoothly stitched into a human quilt as it is here, with the figures in that quilt brought to life by a committed ensemble of actors.As Moises Kaufman and the members of his Tectonic Project forged The Laramie Project from interviews with the people in the town where Matthew Shepard was killed, Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen have created The Exonerated from interviews they conducted with former death row inmates all over the country. Unlike Laramie, which focuses on a single case, The Exonerated uses the stories of six of its interview subjects to represent not only the forty people with whom they met but the eighty-nine people who were exonerated in the summer of 2000 when they took their tape recorders on the road. Exonerated, by the way, does not mean that you are declared unconditionally innocent that that you've been freed because it turns out that you have not been proven guilty beyond a doubt.While this is an unashamed anti-death penalty polemic, Blank and Jensen are theater people as much as American citizens with a cause. In format, The Exonerated, is, like The Guys, essentially a staged reading. However, with a strong assist from director Bob Balaban, the cross-cutting from one monologist to another and the power of the words (condensed,combined and extrapolated for theatrical impact but using the words from the authors' transcripts) is such that those who come expecting a play and not a lecture won't feel short changed. Like The Guys and other concert style plays, The Exonerated, could, with the right audience response, continue its open run indefinitely, with the cast rotating and kept newsworthy by the addition of other high profile actors like the current production's Jill Clayburgh, Sara Gilbert and Richard Dreyfuss.But don't expect any of these box office draw actors to dominate the stage.
Clayburgh and Dreyfuss powerfully relate two of six gut-wrenching stories so that we have a real picture of each one's personality. The same is true of the other stories and the rest of the ensemble. Gilbert has one of the smallest roles as the woman who marries Kerry Max Cooke (Richard Dreyfuss. After he is released from prison.Clayburgh at first seems too well-groomed and upbeat to be part of these at times gasp inducing experiences. But as we get to know Sunny Jacobs we understand the almost constant smile.
This woman, who along with her common-law husband was sent to death row based on false evidence given by a man who turned out to be a friend from Hell, is one of the most forceful characters on stage. At first incapable of taking in her incarceration - 'I'm a hippie, a vegetarian- how could I kill anyone?' - she survives her incredible twenty-two year ordeal when she determines to have faith because ' I wasn't just a lump of flesh you could put in a cage.'
True to her name, she also goes on with her life as a Yoga teacher and public speaker, determined that her living will serve as a memorial for her lover.Unlike Sunny, Kerry (the Dreyfuss character), and several of the other exonerated have more difficulty dealing with the nightmare memories of their ordeals. As Kerry says, 'They executed me a thousand times and they're still doing it.' The most articulate character, a political radical named Delbert Tibbs, who was falsely accused of rape and murder while hitchhiking across America, is played with distinction by the mellifluous voiced Charles Brown who last excelled in. As already pointed out though, this is an ensemble piece includes besides Sara Gilbert's 'swing' character an African-American ( (April Yvette Thompson) who plays a variety of other supporting parts. There is also a male chorus, the versatile Bruce Kronenberg and Philip Levy, to take on all the bigoted and politically motivated rotten apples in the American justice system.If you're looking for a two-sided, open-minded play about capital punishment, this is not it.
Still, whether you're for or against it, you'll be moved by the potency with which these particular case histories are brought to life. The Exonerated is not easy to watch, but then it's not easy to be locked up and condemned to death for a crime you didn't commit and, as Sunny puts it, have an 'entire chunk from your life removed.' . The cast rotation began within a week of this review, with Peter Gallagher and Amelia Campbell scheduled to move into Richard Dreyfuss's and Sara Gilbert's chairs.LINKS TO OTHER PLAYS MENTIONEDThe ExoneratedBy Jessica Blank and Erik JensenDirected by Bob BalabanCast: Richard Dreyfuss (Kerry Max Cook), Jill Clayburgh (Sunny Jacobs), Sara Gilbert (Sue Gauger, Sandra), Charles Brown (Delbert Tibbs), David Brown Jr. (Robert Earl Hayes), Bruce Kronenberg (Male Ensemble #1), Phil Levy( Male Ensemble #2), Curtis McClarian (David Keaton), Jay O. Sanders (Gary Gauger) April YvetteThompson(Georgia Hayes, Judge, Paula, Prosecutor)Production Design/ Technical Supervisdor: Tom OntiverosCostume Coordinator: Sara J. TosettiOriginal Music and Sound Design: David RobbinsRunning time: 95 minutes without intermission45 Bleecker (corner Lafayette) 212-307-4100Tue - Fri at 8pm; Sat at 5pm, 9pm; Sun at 3pm, 7pm - $55Reviewed by based on performance.
Genre: LawPublisher: DIANE PublishingISBN10: Copyright Year: 1996File Format: PDF, EPUBFile Download: 85Price: FREEDESCRIPTION: The development of DNA technology furthers the search for truth by helping police & prosecutors in the fight against violent crime. Most of the individuals whose stories are told in the report were convicted after jury trials & were sentenced to long prison terms. They successfully challenged their convictions, using DNA tests on existing evidence. They had served, on average, seven years in prison. By highlighting the importance & utility of DNA evidence, this report presents challenges to the scientific & justice communities. A task ahead is to maintain the highest standards for the collection & preservation of DNA evidence.
Genre: Political SciencePublisher: Simon and SchusterISBN10: 420Copyright Year: 2019-09-24File Format: PDF, EPUBFile Download: 365Price: FREEDESCRIPTION: A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER “Great new book by wonderful and very street smart author Dan Bongino, EXONERATED, THE FAILED TAKEDOWN OF PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP BY THE SWAMP. Dan hits all of the crooked points of the greatest Witch Hunt in political history. Nevertheless, the Scam continues!” —President Donald J. Trump An explosive, whistle-blowing expose, Exonerated: The Failed Takedown of Donald Trump by the Swamp reveals how Deep State actors relied on a cynical plug-and-play template to manufacture the now-discredited Russiagate scandal. With the cutting analysis and insight he exhibited in his blockbuster bestseller Spygate: The Attempted Sabotage of Donald J.
Trump, Fox News contributor Bongino exposes who masterminded the dangerous playbook to take down Trump, their motives, and how a plan filled with faked allegations backfired—forcing investigators to up the ante and hide their missteps and half-truths in a desperate effort to prove a collusion case that never happened. The misguided multimillion Mueller investigation that tore the nation apart, tried to destabilize the presidency and led, as the world now knows, to nowhere! Genre: Literary CriticismPublisher: Gale, Cengage LearningISBN10: 486Copyright Year: 2016File Format: PDF, EPUBFile Download: 23Price: FREEDESCRIPTION: A Study Guide for Jessica Blank's 'The Exonerated,' excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Drama For Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more.
For any literature project, trust Drama For Students for all of your research needs. Genre: Biography & AutobiographyPublisher:ISBN10: Copyright Year: 2014-02-10File Format: PDF, EPUBFile Download: 308Price: FREEDESCRIPTION: The story of a man who stood for something and the woman he loved. Falsely accused of murdering his girlfriend, James Woodard served more than twenty-seven years in prison. In April 2008, James became the seventeenth man exonerated by DNA evidence in Dallas County. The same day he was granted his freedom, James laid eyes on Joyce King, the 'prison wife' he'd fantasized about falling in love with for nearly three decades.
The Exonerated Summary
It was the happiest day of his life. Their mutual attraction was immediate, but a major hurdle complicated their relationship. Joyce was a prominent activist, the first non-lawyer to serve on the board of directors for the Innocence Project of Texas, the nonprofit that helped James win his freedom and ensure justice by working hard to change the compensation law in Texas. EXONERATED vividly details the instant bond James and Joyce shared as soul mates and the challenges that arouse when their disparate worlds collided.
This riveting account serves as a blueprint for how to navigate innocence and avoid the painful lessons they learned about justice, freedom, power, and love. A gripping yet tragic story of how imprisoning an innocent man for twenty-seven years destroys him and traumatizes the woman who loves him. This very personal account of a wrongful incarceration and its victim will deeply touch not only those who fight for justice but also folks who sit on the sideline. Morris Dees, Founder, Southern Poverty Law Center EXONERATED looks at James s life from the unflinching perspective of a woman who witnessed firsthand the lasting damage done when the criminal justice system fails and puts an innocent man behind bars. Texas Senator Rodney Ellis, board member, Innocence Project, New York This is one of the best books I have read regarding criminal justice issues. I would recommend it to anyone interested in knowing more about our system of justice!
-Alex del Carmen, Ph.D., Professor & Director, Liberal and Fine Arts Program, Tarleton State University'. Genre: Political SciencePublisher: Simon and SchusterISBN10: 028Copyright Year: 2006-09-15File Format: PDF, EPUBFile Download: 320Price: FREEDESCRIPTION: A love story. An artistic journey. A matter of life and death. In 2000, Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen embarked on a tour across America - one that would give them a glimpse of the darker side of the justice system and, at the same time, reveal to them just how resilient the human spirit can be. They were a pair of young actors from New York who wanted to learn more about our country's exonerated - men and women who had been sentenced to die for crimes they didn't commit, who spent anywhere from two to twenty-two years on death row, and who were freed amidst overwhelming evidence of their innocence. The result of their journey was The Exonerated, New York Times number one play of 2002, which was embraced by such acting luminaries as Ossie Davis, Richard Dreyfuss, Danny Glover, Tim Robbins, Susan Sarandon, and Robin Williams.
Living Justice is Jessica and Erik's fascinating, behind-the-scenes account of the creation of their play. A tale of artistic expression and political awakening, innocence lost and wisdom won, this is above all a story about two people who fall in love while pursuing their passion and learn - through the stories of the exonerated - what freedom truly means.
Genre: True CrimePublisher: Algonquin BooksISBN10: 104Copyright Year: 2005-10-14File Format: PDF, EPUBFile Download: 304Price: FREEDESCRIPTION: Fans of Serial and Making a Murderer, meet Kirk Bloodsworth, the first death row inmate exonerated by DNA evidence. Charged with the rape and murder of a nine-year-old girl in 1984, Bloodsworth was tried, convicted, and sentenced to die in Maryland's gas chamber. From the beginning, he proclaimed his innocence, but when he was granted a new trial because his prosecutors improperly withheld evidence, the second trial also resulted in conviction. Bloodsworth read every book on criminal law in the prison library and persuaded a new lawyer to petition for the then-innovative DNA testing.
After nine years in one of the harshest prisons in America, Bloodsworth was vindicated by DNA evidence. Intense and hard-hitting, Bloodsworth is the story of a man’s tireless fight against a justice system that failed him. Genre: HistoryPublisher: McSweeney'sISBN10: 919Copyright Year: 2015-10-01File Format: PDF, EPUBFile Download: 489Price: FREEDESCRIPTION: On September 30, 2003, Calvin was declared innocent and set free from Angola State Prison, after serving 22 years for a crime he did not commit.
The Exonerated Play Script
The Exonerated Play Characters
Like many other exonerees, Calvin experienced a new world that was not open to him. Hitting the streets without housing, money, or a change of clothes, exonerees across America are released only to fend for themselves. In the tradition of Studs Terkel's oral histories, this book collects the voices and stories of the exonerees for whom life — inside and out — is forever framed by extraordinary injustice.