Stage Preview: 'Firebugs' rises from ashes at Bricolage

Friday, September 19, 2003

Somewhere, at this moment, it's likely someone is discussing the purpose of art. Maybe it's in a classroom. Maybe there's a heated debate over funding. Maybe it's just a bunch of artists sitting around shooting the breeze. They'll talk about education, entertainment, perhaps about community and morality. Often forgotten is that art can sometimes heal.

Jeffrey Carpenter, founder and artistic director of Bricolage Theatre Collective, isn't likely to forget. During preparations for the company's first production, "Wild Signs," a fire claimed his house and almost everything he owned. The Pittsburgh theater community rallied. A benefit was held at City Theatre and donations poured in.

Carpenter found the support somewhat overwhelming and is hard-pressed, even a year later, to put his gratitude into words. He shakes his head in disbelief as he lists the much-needed provisions that filled his temporary housing but, even more, he recalls how the concern increased his commitment to Bricolage.

"It was an immediate testament to the fact that what we're doing is a really good thing," says Carpenter. "I never thought, 'Let's pack it in.' I thought, 'We're just getting started.' "

More important than the realization that his work mattered so much to others was the recognition of the importance of theater to his own well-being.

"If I wasn't in the middle of the show, I don't think I could have bounced back as quickly," he says. The work required his thorough attention and he found strength in being surrounded by friends who cared about him and the production at hand.

As Carpenter began to piece things back together, ideas for how Bricolage should further develop took shape. Piecing together became a significant part of the company philosophy. The goal is to create a sort of "found art" theater; "making artful use of what's at hand" is how Carpenter puts it. "Our mission statement is to use the distinct resources of the Pittsburgh region to create event-oriented theatrical productions."

Max Frisch's "Biedermann and the Firebugs" is Bricolage's second full production and it's a distinctly Bricolage project. In a way, the script itself is a found object. Carpenter came across a copy at his friend David Turkel's house while the two were working on "Wild Signs." He was taken by the story of Beidermann, who's at first duped by and later complicit in his own destruction at the hands of gleeful arsonists. That copy, picked up as a diversion, was lost in the fire. If elements of the play hit too close to home, Carpenter found them cathartic. The first reading took place last summer, four months after the fire, in the surviving basement of his old house.

Beyond his personal relationship to "Firebugs," Carpenter enjoys the multipurpose life the play has had. It was born as one thing and became another. Frisch initially wrote "Firebugs" to be performed on the radio, adapting it several years later, in 1958, as a stage play.

Carpenter, who directs, has tried to marry the two forms. His production depends on an intricate soundscape and the actors are shown recording the shows to be broadcast on radio. Traditional blocking mixes with old-time radio, from microphones to wind machines. "I've done a lot of rehearsing with my eyes closed," says Carpenter, who hopes the style will engage the audience's imagination.

Many of the sound props, like the antique wind machine and the air raid siren, came from KDKA, bits of Pittsburgh radio history. Lots of companies piece together props and sets from wherever they can, but it's especially important to Bricolage and Carpenter to use items that hold special significance to the city.

Included in that category is the performance space, Engine House 25, an old fire station in the Strip District fully and beautifully restored by its current owner, photographer Duane Rieder. Bricolage tries to perform in spaces that in some way connect to the production. For "Firebugs," Carpenter immediately thought of Engine House 25, where he'd previously done a shoot for a print ad.

In fact, he'd like to tour the production to other local fire houses. Firefighters get in for half price and he wants to generate interest in using the show as a fund-raiser for some of the more than 150 volunteer fire departments in Allegheny County. It's the kind of community relationship Bricolage hopes to foster.

As Carpenter discusses the company, it sounds like a kind of melting pot -- of ideas, of artists from many disciplines and of audience members of varied interests and backgrounds.

"Biedermann," Carpenter says, "loses his soul piecemeal." Carpenter certainly understands how easily things can come apart. Is it any wonder he focuses on bringing them together?