Upcoming interview on Wednesday April 3rd with Michelle Carraway about The Courtesan Prince Play.

As someone who has an incredible love of the theatre and of speculative fiction, I have always been interested in portrayals of the speculative on stage. I was very excited to hear from Lynda Williams that her novel The Courtesan Prince was being converted into a stage performance by Michelle Carraway. It is with great excitement that Michelle  Carraway was willing to do an interview with me and provide me with insights on all of those little elements of theatre that I miss from my years on stage.

Michelle is both writing the theatrical adaptation of The Courtesan Prince as well as directing it, allowing her creative vision that came out of reading Lynda Williams’ work to be shaped on the stage.

Here are a few sneak peaks about our upcoming interview on Wednesday April 3:

Michelle Carraway:  “Courtesan Prince reads like a classic fairy tale and translating it into a play has been a very pleasurable experience. It is a rags to riches story about a noble prince who was stolen away by the machinations of  royal intrigue.  Forced into humiliation, the prince is always noble and his true nature shines forth despite  his situation. Courtesan Prince  is filled with the joy of restoration of position and wrongs being righted.  These are all traits that fit well with format of a play.”

Michelle Carraway: “I was inspired to have other people see the stories in the same light as I was seeing them.”

Michelle Carraway: “The actors and actresses that I have selected so far are all uniformly passionate about their craft and enthusiastic to the telling of a beautiful story.”

Michelle Carraway: “The Courtesan Prince  play is much like a creative collective rather than a Broadway play.”

Michelle Carraway:  “As the actors meet each other and start to read together they have found some great chemistry…. As everyone becomes friends their ability to interact with physical comedy and force improves as well and provides flavor and validity to the scenes.”

Michelle Carraway: “As with any production a lot of what will make it all come together is a lot of creativity and hopefully some good luck.”

Michelle Carraway: “Costumes are going to be a group effort.  As many of the styles are a sort of fantasy Restoration era there will be a lot of corsets and fancy dress for women and men both.”

Michelle Carraway: “I think that you could tantalize audiences with nearly all speculative fiction transformed into a live performance.”

This interview was very appropriately timed as I found out about Michelle Carraway’s adaptation of The Courtesan Prince after accidentally stumbling across a radio play that I directed on Trent Radio many years ago when flipping through radio stations. My nostalgia for my theatre years was heightened and I couldn’t believe that I had the opportunity to hear about Ms. Carraway’s process as she adapted and directed this work of Speculative Fiction.

Check out Speculating Canada on Wednesday, April 3 for our full interview and I will make sure to keep you informed of Ms. Carraway’s adaptation as it develops. Hear about her use of special effects, the quirkiness of interactions between actors, and the excitement of adapting a novel for the stage.