Stagecrafters’ Crucible’s Crew Heavy on the Pulchritude

In 1692, one would think that people should be celebrating the bicentennial of Columbus’ discovery of the West Indies; instead, people chose to just sit around and express hate. Salem Village was divided between a group that wanted to maintain ties to Salem Town (the Village was several miles away - today it's called Danvers) and those who wanted to break away from Salem (to gain the right to name its own minister, take care of its own local taxes, yada yada). The local minister, Samuel Parris, did not enjoy the full support of his parishioners, and he quarreled with a faction who thereinafter withheld some of his benefits, like firewood and food. So pilgrims used religion to hate – to wit, accusing innocent people of witchcraft. There seems to be some pattern to the accusations: the Putnam faction and its supporters tended to make the accusations, and the other faction tended to be accused. Of the accused, 19 people and two dogs were hanged, and one man was crushed by stones. Now, who would accuse a dog of witchcraft? The answer is simple – those who love to hate.

The Salem Witch Trials became a national sensation after playwright Arthur Miller wrote a fictional script for a play he called “The Crucible,” whose plot is taken from the events of 1692, but whose spirit is drawn from McCarthyism during the cold war. The story retains elements of philosophy that are relevant even today: People are scum when they use religion as an excuse to hurt others.

As a work of literature, The Crucible, is considered a masterpiece. It is a biting social commentary on the need to separate church and state, invasion of privacy, and ulterior motives. Miller never trusted ideologues of the cloth, saying “I can't attach myself to a going religion.” He refused to answer in congressional hearings when asked to name people associated with the communist party – this landed him in contempt of congress.

In Miller’s play, we recognize certain sins that never disappear – one group is greedy and wants to control the other. Putnam is like the bankers who rule Wall Street without any conscience. I doubt very seriously that the real Putnam ever believed his enemies were witches, but he found a Bible verse to conveniently attack his opponents. The protagonist in Miller’s play is John Proctor – he wasn’t a proctologist, but he did seem to be a pain in the butt, at least to the Putnam faction.

Stagecrafters presents The Crucible in a rather softened version of its non-fiction history. Aaron Kurilik is a gorgeous hunk who plays a real-life ugly man (John Proctor). According to the play, Proctor is wooing the ladies with his charm, and I can certainly believe Kurilik charming any woman he wants. The real Proctor was oversized, under-charming, and hard to get along with. Kurilik is so cute he could get away with murder; Proctor was nothing special to look at, so there were no riots when they hanged him.

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Putnam wanted land and he was able to get it by directing his goons to accuse outsiders as witches. The cast of Stagecrafters perform a marvelous re-enactment of the famous witch trial scandal.

Advance tickets are $18 and $20. Tickets may be purchased onlineor by phone at 248-541-6430. All seats are reserved. If shows have not sold out, tickets can be purchased at the box office one hour prior to the performance for an additional $2.00 per ticket. Shows take place Thursday through Saturday at 8:00 p.m. and on Sundays at 2:00 p.m.

The Crucible Cast and Staff by Community

Berkley: Ben Feliciano(Reverend John Hale); Beverly Hills: Sammie Edwards (Tituba); Birmingham: Celeste Blanch (Producer); Bloomfield Hills: Meredith Deighton (Mary Warren); Clinton Twp: Scott Huard (Marshall Herrick); Jessica Mazak (Town Girl); Ferndale: Barry Cutler (Reverend Parris); Matt Horn (Hopkins); Marc Meyers (Thomas Putnam); Ryan Moore (Director); Grosse Pointe Park: Kristin Schultes (Mercy Lewis); Lathrup Village: Phil Berns (Deputy Gov. Danforth); Madison Heights: William Dixon (Ezekial Cheever); Pleasant Ridge: Ed Berger (Francis Nurse); Regan Castle (Betty Parris); Royal Oak: Kendra Barnowski (Town Girl); Sandy Krell (Rebecca Nurse); Tom Krell (Giles Corey); Anna Marck (Abigail Williams); Jack Tillotson (Judge Hathorne); Julie Tillotson (Martha Corey); Saginaw: Colleen Cartwright (Elizabeth Proctor); Troy: Meg Brokenshire (Susanna Walcott); Julia David (Town Girl); Cindy Cole Hansen (Sarah Good); Aaron Kurilik (John Proctor); Beth Tetrault (Mrs. Ann Putnam).

Take advantage of this special offer for tonight's performance only of THE CRUCIBLE... Buy One, Get One Half Off! Order by phone 248-541-6430 or use online at stagecrafters.org. Coupon Code is CRUCIBLE

Anton Anderssen is a professionally paid writer for Examiner.com, a Top 100 website, having over 18 million unique monthly visitors. Examiner.com has teamed with Thomson Reuters to license, distribute and share news articles across the United States through their new flagship service, Reuters America. Syndication in Reuters America marks a huge milestone in the history of Examiner.com. Reuters, the news and media division of Thomson Reuters, is the world’s largest multimedia news provider touching more than 1 billion people a day. Examiner.com is a division of the Clarity Digital Group, LLC, which owns a broad array of assets in print and digital media--including Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG) and Walden Media--live sports and entertainment, hospitality, film production and exhibition and wind energy development. Examiner.com launched officially in April, 2008, as a unique national news and information website with targeted local content.

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