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Student adapts book into play - Daily Star
By Denise Richardson
Staff Writer
ONEONTA — Two Hartwick College theater students are shedding light on the doctor-patient relationship through a play based on a locally created book.
"Let Me Listen to Your Heart" presents some of the cares, concerns and vulnerabilities of patients and physicians. Aimee Doyle, a Hartwick senior, adapted a collection of essays by the same title, and classmate Christian Hegg directed the production.
"I read the book and I immediately fell in love with the source material," said 22-year-old Hegg, who is majoring in theater. "These stories needed to be heard because they were dealing with real issues and real people."
Four actors will present the play in the Lab Theatre at Hartwick at 7 p.m. Thursday through Saturday and at 2 p.m. Sunday. The play also will be performed in a dinner-theater format in Cooperstown on May 13 and 14.
The book, "Let Me Listen to Your Heart: Writings by Medical Students," was edited by Dr. Alan Kozak, a physician at Bassett Healthcare, and Dr. David Svahn, director of the Humanities and Medicine Program at Bassett Healthcare in Cooperstown. Svahn will lead a discussion after the Friday performance.
The book has 42 essays, stories and poems written by third-year medical students from the University of Rochester and Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons. The students were asked to write about their first experiences working with patients.
Svahn proposed adapting the essays to the stage, and Hartwick faculty arranged student participation, Doyle said. She focused on abWhat's Related Talk to be on misinformation in texts out 18 essays for the series of monologues.
Doyle said she hopes the audience will feel empathy not only for the patients but for the medical students and doctors in the stories.
Doyle, 22, has a double major in theater and biology and is preparing to go to medical school. She said writing the play was appropriate for an academic project.
Doyle, who started the project last spring, said some monologues are paired together to create dialogues.
Hegg cast the play in February, then began rehearsals.
The cast includes Hartwick students Rich Bocek and Kristin Strader; Susan Navarette, associate professor of English at Hartwick; and Charlie Reiman of Cooperstown.
Each actor plays four or five characters. Hegg said he staged the play to be a waiting room, and as one character speaks, the others sit nearby, sometimes reading or just waiting.
Ken Golden, associate professor of theater arts at Hartwick, said the play is the first adaptation of its type done at the college. Doyle has captured the tone of the topics effectively, he said, and the production has good dramatic and sympathetic moments.
"The audience is going to like it," Golden said.
Reiman, a home inspector from Cooperstown who has appeared in local theater productions, said the play conveys the hope, pain, desperation and exhilaration of medical care and conditions.
"It really helps bring the characters to life," he said. "It’s great."
For reservations for the Hartwick performances, call 431-4CAP. The Lab Theatre is in the basement of Bresee Hall.
The Leatherstocking Theatre Company will present the play in a dinner-theater format at Templeton Hall, 63 Pioneer St. in Cooperstown, on May 13 and 14 with dinner at 6:30 p.m. and the performance at 8 p.m. Svahn will lead a discussion afterward with the actors, director and writer. For more information, call the theater office at 547-1363. |
