CRAP tries to get their tale of Pride and Prejudice ready for the stage.

DETAILS

Austentatious presented by Forte Musical Theatre Guild
Engineered Air Theatre
Tuesday, March 2 - Saturday, March 13

More in: Theatre

Clinking cups, muted conversation and the soft tinkle of laughter greets visitors as they enter the back door of the Good Companions Activity Centre. Near the front of the room stands a rented three-tiered silver fountain with trickling water.

It’s a gathering of the Jane Austen Society, Calgary Chapter, here to celebrate the author’s birthday. “There is a sort of kindred spirit about Austenites,” chirps Calgary co-ordinator Margaret Crichton, “it crosses all ages from 20 to 80, mostly women but a few men.”

Calgary’s Austen society has been in operation for 10 years and boasts a core membership of about 40 people, with guests often swelling that number to 60. Naturally, the society started in Britain, and spread to North America where there are now over 4,000 Jane Austen Society of North America (JASNA) members.

But it’s not all tea and crumpets in the world of Jane Austen these days. Austentatious, a musical comedy about the Cochrane Ranch Amateur Players (CRAP) working on their own production of Pride and Prejudice is making its Canadian debut in Calgary.

Helped by the rabid devotion displayed by the members of Jane Austen societies, Austentatious, co-written by Calgarian Joe Slabe, has seen successful runs in Philadelphia, New York and London. “The Jane-ites are in the blogosphere,” says Slabe. “We got a big bump in Philadelphia from the Jane Austen Society who encouraged their members to come out and see it and talked it up when they were in New York.” The Calgary chapter has the event on its website.

So, who are these people? To find out, it was necessary to infiltrate the Calgary group’s tea party and discover what compels them.

The event started with a very British spread of tea and cheese scones. By the time the trifle was brought to the table, 26-year-old English major Emma Spooner was preparing to give a short talk about the history of the Georgian Spa. One of the most popular is in Bath, where Austen no doubt went to “take the waters.”

“I am doing my masters on Jane Austen and popular culture,” says Spooner. “I love Jane, and think she is so funny in a dry kind of way.”

Spooner finds it amusing that a woman whose culture and society was so far removed from us could be so popular today. She points to recent movies, such as the Bollywood film Bride and Prejudice, as well as Pride and Prejudice zombie books (with a soon-to-be-released movie), and even an Austen-themed Marvel comic series. There’s also an Austen action figure.

The writers behind Austentatious, who penned the play while working on their own master’s degrees, didn’t necessarily share the unconditional love of Austen’s work. Sure they enjoyed it, but it wasn’t about Austen at the beginning. “Truthfully, when we were looking for something for our fictional group to adapt, we didn’t want to have to worry about rights,” says Slabe. “So we were looking at what’s in the public domain.”

After working on the script, however, Pride and Prejudice became the perfect vehicle, infecting the life of the main character and snaking into many aspects of the production.

Although Slabe and his co-writers may not be addicts, the dedication to Austen in the Calgary group is remarkable. Samantha Adkins, a 33-year-old elementary teacher, has just self-published Expectations — A Continuation of Pride and Prejudice, which began as a short story birthday present for her sister.

Twenty-nine-year-old Michelle Agopsowicz, who works mostly with disabled youth as a counsellor for MacMahon Youth Services, has been a JASNA member for five years. Agopsowicz recently heard Phyllis Ferguson Bottomer speak at Vancouver’s 2008 Austen conference, which helped sustain her interest. On top of being an Austen devotee, Bottomer is a speech pathologist.

Her book, So Odd a Mixture: Along the Autistic Spectrum in ‘Pride and Prejudice,’ proposes that Austen, a keen observer of human behaviour, unknowingly described characters with autistic traits. It is connections like this, between Austen’s world and the present day, that keeps Agopsowicz hooked.

Next meeting for the Calgary Jane Austen Society is March 20, exploring the topic Bad Girls in Jane Austen. Saucy. For those who just can’t wait to get a little more Austen in their lives, the fictional group CRAP attempt to bring Pride and Prejudice to life a little sooner.