Columbia Stages to Present New Folk Opera VESTIGE, 5/7-17

Columbia Stages and Brooklyn art space Cloud City present the new folk opera VESTIGE, created by the physical-musical company 3 Sticks. With music and lyrics by Andrew Lynch, direction by Eric Powell Holm and movement and design by Katie Melby, VESTIGE is a story about choices - once we make them, what is left behind?

VESTIGE opens in New York City, 1966. Paul Bradley, an idealistic young writer, is cooped up in his apartment dreaming up a new novel. But when he travels to Colombia on assignment to cover a burgeoning social movement, Paul discovers an intoxicating new world of excitement and truth that is seductive, but also frightening. When the journey ends and he returns home, Paul learns that his choices might have consequences that he never anticipated, in this lyric story that is both personal and epic.

3 Sticks has created work both nationally and abroad, and has been called "rich in musical abundance" by the New York Times and "imaginative and energetic" by Time Out New York. The company that brought you Paper Plane combines innovative staging and daring music to create theatre that moves and inspires audiences. VESTIGE began with Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale The Shadow, in which a man's own shadow betrays him. Explorations into this fable have transformed into a dark and beautiful story, told through music, which looks at what we leave behind when we choose one path over another - the shadows of our choices.

Directed by Eric Powell Holm (Paper Plane, Rise and Fall), music direction by Brian Cavanagh-Strong, scenic design by Katie Melby, costume design by Josh Allen (Dream I Tell You), lighting design by Michael McGee (Early Plays at The Performing Garage), technical direction by Taylor Riccio, and Cloud City management by Ben Gansky. Stage managed by Jill Woodward with assistant stage manager Garrett Rollins. Produced by Alexandra Lalonde.

VESTIGE is performed by Ashkon Davaran* (Natasha, Pierre & the Great Comet of 1812), Katie Hartman (creator and performer of the one-woman folk opera The Legend of White Woman Creek), Andrew Lynch (composer and performer, Paper Plane), Katie Melby (Le Gourmand, or Gluttony!, 3 Sticks founder), Stanton Nash* (Wicked, Chicago), and Anna Reichert* (Tribes, Guthrie Theater).

*Appearing courtesy of Actors' Equity Association.

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