From the Archives – Pierrot in Love

Touchstone’s street work (see our previous postcard) sparked an interest in gestural theatre, as working outside made clarity of movement and size of gesture of crucial interest. And the need to create work that could reach across language barriers was still an unsolved challenge. By evolving our movement and mime technique, we could expand our technical skills as performers, reach all of our audiences no matter their native language (we hoped), and be more commercially viable — in the late 70’s and early 80’s, mime was quite the fashion (until the streets became glutted with unskilled performers and Woody Allen came along and ridiculed it…)  And with Lorraine coming from a dance background, it provided common ground for the two of us to work.

This clip, produced under the name of B&B mime, now a part of People’s Theatre Co., features an introduction by Bridget George, Bill George as Pierrot, Lorraine Zeller as Columbine, Set Design by Peter Ruhf, Costumes by Mildred Greene, and music by Larry Lipkis, Composer in Residence at Moravian College. I don’t believe Bridget is quite right saying the music was composed for us. Larry had created Pierrot in Love (four movements, this being an excerpt from the final movement), and we decided to create a pantomime story to it. Larry’s creation came first. This video was taken by Professor James Eppes. Professor Eppes retired as a professor of mechanical engineering at Lehigh University in 1973 and had served for many years as acting head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering. His house was full of old video equipment, and he and his wife were angels, helping us to our feet as a company.

— Bill George