A Crucible of Conscience at Classic Theatre of Maryland
From February 27th through March 16th, Classic Theatre of Maryland in Annapolis dives into the fraught, morally murky world of Salem, Massachusetts circa 1692 by way of Arthur Miller’s celebrated 1953 allegorical drama, The Crucible.
The production is helmed by Sally Boyett, CTM Producing Artistic Director, in her first time directing one of her favorite plays; one she describes as not only a modern classic, but also an edge-of-your-seat thriller. A play that poses difficult questions and impossible dilemmas for its cast of culpable, compromised characters, but which also challenges the conscience of an audience both individually and collectively.
The sudden, escalating paroxysm of suspicion, fear, paranoia, bigotry, violence, petty and vindictive hostility, and creeping terror that famously gripped the town of Salem in the 17th Century (and which Miller drew inspiration from to reflect on the McCarthy hearings and Red Scare of his own day) might fuel the play thematically and help keep it recurrently in the repertory. But the combination of that civic tumult with the personal, domestic drama at its heart brings the thriller truly alive for Boyett, puts the questions squarely in our laps, and adds to what she points to as the communal complicity the play examines.
You can hear her comments and conversation with me in the audio below, and find tickets and more at the CTM website here.
Also online are tickets for the February 10th and 11th cabaret, “Through the Grapevine,” which celebrates the Best-of-the-60s musically, as part of CTM’s ongoing series of monthly musical cabarets.
