{"id":320,"date":"2012-03-20T11:33:03","date_gmt":"2012-03-20T15:33:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sangamithra.wordpress.com\/?p=320"},"modified":"2012-03-20T11:33:03","modified_gmt":"2012-03-20T15:33:03","slug":"animal-farm-the-musical","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/?p=320","title":{"rendered":"Animal Farm-The Musical"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"In the center of the Brucennial Gallery Exhibit<\/a> downtown on Bleecker Street, stacks of hay bales set the stage for Bruce High Quality Foundation<\/a>\u2019s production of “Animal Farm- the Musical<\/a>“, which premiered the first weekend in March. \u00a0 In this Orwellian adaptation, the chicken trustees at BHQF University, reveal the financial crisis facing the school and decide they must \u201chatch a new strategic plan. Everything must be \u2018on the table.’\u201d<\/p>\n

One hen trustee of the equity firm \u2018Beak and Claw, \u2019 suggests they \u201c Diversify our debt, prioritize our portfolio, reassess our risk\u2026No risk. No reward.\u201d Another wants to clean up the pig stye, and create a 21st<\/sup> century institution. \u201cWhat we need is a Goddam state of the art architectural monstrosity<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

These options don\u2019t pan out. \u201c The economy has collapsed. ..No one could have seen this coming. No one should be blamed,\u201d the trustees cluck.<\/p>\n

Throughout the play, the chickens trustees switch their beaks to snouts and transform into recent piggie art student alum, while \u00a0Law and Order sound effects signal scene changes. \u00a0The piggies struggle making ends meet with their day jobs and finding time to pursue their passions : (”\u00a0We\u2019ve got art to make, but we\u2019re stuck working every stinking day.” ) They are reminded and inspired by these truths expressed in song:\u00a0“Every pig is an artist\/\u00a0No pig flies alone\/\u00a0Teaching others is our greatest work\/We can do it on our own”<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"\"While BHQFU takes the route of implementing tuition to solve its financial woes and turns into BITE-U, run by the big bad wolves, the Piggies decide to start their own free school: PORK-U, Pigs Organized Round Kuntz.\u00a0 (“Starts with a P, and ends in Germany.”)<\/p>\n

They invite the audience to join them: “Come on inside,\u00a0it\u2019s alright, you can know you know, we only want to free your mind.”<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

It is clear that BHQFU in this play \u00a0represents the current situation at Cooper Union<\/a>. The goddam state of the art architectural monstrosity, refers to the shiny U.S. Green Building LEED Certified, New Academic Building at 41 Cooper Square<\/a>. \u00a0 Cooper Union\u2019s capital campaign to\u00a0fund the construction of this new building did not achieve its goal. A $175 million loan was taken out from Metropolitan Life and mortgaged against the Chrysler building. Cooper Union\u2019s investment portfolio was not immune to the recent economic downturn, either.\u00a0To address the current deficit, implementing tuition at this historically tuition-free school is one of the options “on the table.”<\/p>\n

The performance ended with some words from one of the artists,who directed people to the Free Cooper Union “Money On the Table<\/a> ” pledge website where you can put money on the table \u00a0to keep tuition off the table. \u00a0\u201cWe\u2019re not always so good at activism here,” he said “but this sh*t is really really important.\u201d<\/p>\n

For more information about the current situation facing \u00a0Cooper Union: visit the \u00a0Friends of Cooper Union website.<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>For additional posts on Cooper Union click\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the center of the Brucennial Gallery Exhibit downtown on Bleecker Street, stacks of hay bales set the stage for Bruce High Quality Foundation\u2019s production of “Animal Farm- the Musical“, which premiered the first weekend in March. \u00a0 In this Orwellian adaptation, the chicken trustees at BHQF University, reveal the financial crisis facing the school … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Animal Farm-The Musical”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,9],"tags":[21,32,102,69],"class_list":["post-320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chickens","category-cooper-union","category-education","tag-animal-farm","tag-bruce-high-quality-foundation","tag-cooper-union","tag-orwell"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sangamithraiyer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}