Wonderland
with ‘Playing with the Pieces’
By Christine G. Adamo
On-line Forty-Niner
A
rabbit hole may be the only wonderland element
missing from “Playing with the Pieces,”
which premiers Friday in the Players Theatre
at Cal State Long Beach.
According to the play’s lead actor, CSULB
senior Eric Tiede, the play’s events unfold
much as they do for Alice’s character in
“Alice in Wonderland” — according to the
conscious and unconscious actions and desires
of its main character.
 Tiede,
double majoring in theater arts and film
production, said the play represents a collaborative
effort between Maria Viera, Ph.D., head
of cinema studies at CSULB and a recent
graduate, Wes Hadden, who wrote the original
script titled “The Life of One.”
A CSULB faculty profile cites Viera, the
play’s director, with analyzing “the relationship
of theory to artistic practice” in her film
version of “Playing with the Pieces.”
In an abstract of her research Viera credits
Jean Baudrillard, a French social theorist
and writer, with providing her inspiration:
“All that is left is to play with the pieces.
That’s what postmodernism is — playing with
the pieces.”
Baudrillard is a professor of philosophy
of culture and media criticism at the European
Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland,
which has dubbed him “a leading critic of
postmodern culture, the economy of communication
and the media system.”
Tiede said Viera’s job was to, literally,
play with the pieces and make “The Life
of One” work; so she turned it into a play
within a play.
“The director, the choreographer and the
writer of ‘The Life of One’ get together
to adapt the play into a film [or] musical,”
Tiede said of how the play pays homage to
Hadden’s script.
They introduce film, live theater and dance
— sampling from vaudeville and the ballet
— into “The Life of One,” the actor said,
using various theatrical devices to offer
their audience something novel, something
new.
“Playing with the Pieces” winds up being
a story about One, sort of.
“One — as in everyone, every person, every
man,” Tiede said. That is the name assigned
to his character by his constant companion,
Girl.
The scenes are underlain with comedy and
tragedy, according to Tiede, which are heightened
by the philosophical dialogue exchanged
between the director, the choreographer
and the writer. The 10-actor cast serves
much as Alice’s entourage did in wonderland,
recreating themselves in various stages
of life and serving as obstacles for One
to overcome.
“Playing with the Pieces” will run from
Nov. 15 to Dec. 7 at the Players Theatre
at Cal State Long Beach, facing Seventh
Street. Ticket and scheduling information
is available at (562)985-7000 or (562)985-5526.
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