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Theatre students create play rife with swamp folklore and the poetry of Robert Frost
February 25, 2022 : By Ryan Klinker - Office of Communications & Public Engagement
A team of students from Liberty University’s Department of Theatre Arts have crafted a tale where fact and fantasy meet in Virginia’s Great Dismal Swamp, inspired by the true story of American poet Robert Frost who ventured there alone in 1894.
“The Darkest Evening,” an original play produced by students in the department’s Writing Project, opens on the Tower Theater stage on Friday. Though no one knows for sure what the poet encountered during his night in the swamp, the students wrote a script, part love story and part mystery, using his poems and research on the legends of the swamp. They created a mystical world where Frost is tormented by the voices of the swamp and his own poems but searches for hope in a stranger he meets there.
This is the fourth play written and produced by the Writing Project, which is supported by a grant from Liberty’s Center for Research & Scholarship. Previous plays have been based on a time in Virginia history — “Bloodroot: The Ballad of Clinch Mountain” in 2018, “Bedford Boys” in 2019, and “Decipher: An Unpenned Story of the Civil War” in 2021.
SHOWTIMES
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- Feb. 25, 26, March 1, 3, 4, 5-7:30 p.m.
- Feb. 26, March 5, 2 p.m.
- Feb. 27, March 6, 3 p.m.
Visit the Department of Theatre Arts box office for tickets.
Whereas the past plays told stories of wartime, the students were encouraged by department chair and Writing Project advisor Linda Nell Cooper to delve into legends and folklore, ultimately leading them to the stories of the Great Dismal Swamp in southeast Virginia.
Junior Kaley Hutter, who is in her second year with the Writing Project, said the team came across the connection to Robert Frost a couple months into their research.
“We looked at a lot of places that had mystery and folklore surrounding them, and the Dismal Swamp came up as a place that was so shrouded in opportunities for drama and storytelling,” she said. “There were so many directions we could take it, and then we found out that Robert Frost was there for a night and wondered what happened then. It was the intersection of folklore and history that we really fell in love with.”
Frost is confirmed to have been there based on his poetry and biographies. At the time, he was in what Hutter called “a deep emotional pit.”
“We as playwrights asked, ‘What happened that night?’ because no one knows except for Robert Frost himself,” Hutter said. “We asked those questions and looked at the two years of his life leading up to that (day).”
“It’s a story about psychological warfare,” junior Christian Mucci added. “We tried to bring the legend to life along with Frost dealing with his personal demons.”
School of Communication & the Arts Dean Scott Hayes, who assisted Cooper in the direction of the play, said that he has been amazed by the depth the students have reached with their work, either as writers or actors or both.
“As a person who has encouraged the projects for years, I’m continually amazed seeing the specific spiritual connections students can make about these stories,” Hayes said. “As a playwright, having the platform to put this story onstage, I’m not surprised that the students are so passionate about it.”
Beginning in January 2021, the team of 10 students and Cooper met in-person and over Zoom (during school breaks) to research, write, and edit throughout the year. Much of their research came from books about Frost and the swamp, including multiple volumes by the poet’s biographer, Lawrence Thompson.
“A lot of our research came from books rather than the Internet, so it was fun going into the (Jerry Falwell Library) and having the (retrieval system) pull out a book and having that lead us to other books,” said sophomore Joshua Thomas, who will be portraying Frost in one of two casts for the play.
Mucci said writing an original play with peers is a rare experience for college theatre students, and he’s grateful for the opportunity.
“Working with friends that I’ll have for life, seeing my words on a page being spoken by actors who are also my friends, and now having it being performed on Liberty’s biggest stage, I don’t take that lightly,” he said. “My time at Liberty has been a privilege, and this is definitely one of the highlights I’ll take away from it.”
After writing, editing, re-outlining, and writing again, six of the students have now transitioned to actors. Hayes said that the students who have worked on both sides of the storytelling process have had to find a balance between their roles.
“They have to make decisions about the story that they’ve made as the writers in order to turn it into something active for them as actors to perform,” he explained. “It’s been so interesting to see them come at this from those different perspectives.”
Hutter said the experience came to a climax for her when she overheard her roommate, a theatre student performing in the play, memorizing lines that Hutter had written.
“As I heard her rehearsing her lines like she would for any other show, I had this moment of realizing she’s a third-party actor who is memorizing lines that we wrote,” Hutter said. “We get to read Robert Frost’s biography and translate it into text and stage (directions), it’s so incredible to me. I’m never going to get tired of seeing words that I helped write come out of someone else’s mouth onstage.”
