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Kit Runge and Kristé Belt star in Arizona Onstage's production of "Sunday in the Park With George."
Tim Fuller / courtesy of Arizona Onstage Productions
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The story
"Sunday in the Park With George" is a fictionalized version of Georges Seurat's experience painting the oversized "A Sunday on La Grande Jatte — 1884."
It imagines his lover is the woman with the monkey in the painting, and she is continually frustrated at how consumed he is with his art, instead of her.
It brings to life the many characters in the painting, as they comment on the odd Seurat, his mistress and the cityscape that surrounds this small island in the Seine, just west of Paris. There are also small intrigues, affairs and friendships among the subjects of the painting.
The second act takes place 100 years later, in America, when Seurat's descendants struggle with art in the late 20th century.
The play by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine won a Pulitzer for drama in 1985, and was nominated for 10 Tony Awards that year, taking two home.
The 2008 revival has been nominated for nine Tony Awards, including Best Revival of a Musical.
The painting
"A Sunday on La Grande Jatte — 1884" is a massive — 6 feet 8 inches by 10 feet 10 inches — oil on canvas by the French Post-Impressionist painter Georges Seurat.
It is set on La Grande Jatte, an island in the Seine, and contains 48 people, eight boats, a monkey, butterfly, baby carriage, three dogs, nine parasols and a French horn. Not to mention great detail of the flora of the park.
It took two years and many, many sketches to make.
While painting this piece, Seurat developed the pointillism technique, which uses small, distinctive dots of primary colors that seem, at a distance, to blend to create another color.
The painting, now considered Seurat's masterpiece, was widely disparaged in his lifetime. He died at 31 without ever having sold a work.
"A Sunday on La Grande Jatte — 1884" is in the collection of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Source: The Art Institute of Chicago
If you go
"Sunday in the Park With George"
• By: Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine.
• Director: Kevin Johnson.
• When: Preview, 7:30 p.m. Thursday; regular performances, 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays through June 29.
• Where: Pima Community College Center for the Arts Black Box Theater, 2202 W. Anklam Road.
• Tickets: $27.50, with discounts available.
• Reservations: 270-3332, or www.arizonaonstage.org.
• Cast: Kit Runge, Kristé Belt, Jacob Brown, Liz Cracchiolo, Rob Fuller, AuBrie Ann Goettsche, Charity LaPonsie, Brian Levario, Todd Luethjohann, Olivia Marhefka, Chris Pankratz, Corina Riggs, Ina Shivack, Tom Spencer, Greg Sweet, Daniel Tenney and Martie van der Voort.
• Running time: 2 hours, 35 minutes, with one intermission.

Accent

'Sunday' was a long time coming

By Kathleen Allen
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 06.13.2008
It's 1983 in San Antonio. Kevin Johnson, 15, and his best friend carry out an elaborate plan:
Johnson tells his parents he is going to New York City with his friend — we'll call him Fred — and Fred's parents.
Fred tells his mom and dad he's going with Johnson and his parents.
Then they hop a plane by themselves and set off for the Big Apple and a week of theater.
"When we landed in New York, our parents were on the phone and the police were waiting for us," recalled Johnson. "Our parents said we could stay and be on lock-down for a year, or come home right then."
They stayed. How could they do otherwise? They had tickets to see Liberace at Radio City Music Hall.
And Johnson had tickets to see a workshop of a new Stephen Sondheim play called "Sunday in the Park With George."
"At the time, it was just Act One," said Johnson, who directs Arizona Onstage Productions' "Sunday in the Park With George," opening next week. "It was a very simple set, and Mandy Patinkin and Bernadette Peters were in it.
"I was incredibly moved. I knew that I looked at things differently, and so did the characters in this show."
Johnson, now 42, never forgot the play. And returning a year later (with his parents' permission this time) and seeing the original Broadway production just reinforced his passion for the piece about Georges Seurat and the painting of his masterpiece "A Sunday on La Grande Jatte — 1884."
"It's about artists not only wanting to create, but needing to create, despite the financial costs, or losing someone in your life that you love," said Johnson.
"I had a lot of connections with the play emotionally, and the score is one of the finest and one of the most challenging written for the theater."
A few years ago, Johnson started plotting a production for Arizona Onstage, which he founded.
He put a deposit on the rights to produce it. When he saw that it was being staged in London to rave reviews, he figured it would be coming to Broadway.
That meant he had to scramble and pay the full amount for the rights before it was announced it was coming to New York. Otherwise, he would have to delay his production until the Broadway show had closed — it's rare that rights are given to a play while it's playing on Broadway.
He scrambled, raised the money, and is staging "Sunday" at the same time it's on the New York stage.
"I put down all the royalty money and they cashed the check," said Johnson. "That's a binding contract."
He says this with relief in his voice. He doesn't hold back when he talks about this show.
"One of the things I love about this is it's full of so many surprises," said Johnson. "It changes tempos and keys every few moments, and it totally excites me because it's not predictable."
Directing the musical has given him even more appreciation for the piece.
"Every note is for a reason," he said. "Each one furthers the characters and the emotional depths of the show. . . . There's also humor in the music. It's never boring. As soon as you think he's established one feel, it shifts into a totally different gear."
Johnson's passion for this piece is so intense, in fact, that he's committing a budget that's hefty for the small, struggling company — $30,000.
That money will go toward paying for such items as eight musicians playing 14 instruments, a sound designer, an animator and a cast of 18.
"We won't break even, and we knew that from the beginning," said Johnson. "The costs are high. To break even, we would have to sell out every performance at $39 a ticket, and our tickets are $27.50."
But, he said, it's worth it.
"Sometimes it's your responsibility as an artist to bring something to the community that means something."
● Contact reporter Kathleen Allen at kallen@azstarnet.com or 573-4128.
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