'The Simpsons' meets UNC opera in this course on music and drama

This upcoming spring semester, the Department of Music at UNC is offering students the opportunity to act, sing and perform all for class credit.

In this course, entitled UNC Opera (MUSC 212), students will produce and prepare Anne Washburn’s popular dark comedy, “Mr. Burns, a Post-Electric Play,” throughout the semester for their final performance at Memorial Hall in April. 

But this is not an ordinary class or audition process — there’s a twist with this production. 

Students who will be performing in “Mr. Burns: a Post-Electric Play” had to first audition for their role in the production, and then enroll in this course for the entire semester. 

David Navalinsky, director of undergraduate production and overseer of the Kenan Theatre Company in the Department of Dramatic Art, worked with Marc Callahan, UNC Opera Director, and Jason Tyne-Zimmerman, the production's director, to create this musical production. 

Navalinsky and Callahan both expressed the intentions of having courses that would be a collaboration between the music and drama department, but MUSC 212 is currently the only one offered at UNC. 

“Just proximity wise, the drama department and the music department are so far apart, but we have so many of the same goals,” Callahan said. “We love it when we have students that cross over into both because they’re inextricably linked.”

Callahan said drama and music frequently go hand-in-hand and that voice lessons can help stage actors with their projection and on-stage presence, which is why the "Mr. Burns" production will be a combination of the music and drama departments. 

“We’re really trying to build a better connection and support those students who are interested in musical theater,” Navalinsky said. 

Navalinsky said this course will combine the enjoyment of performative arts with the educational experience of performative training, so students who want to perform for fun, as well as students who want a career in theater or music, are welcome. 

This year’s production, “Mr. Burns: A Post-Electric Play,” was chosen not just because of its incorporation of the iconic characters from the Fox TV series, “The Simpsons,” but because of its contemporary relevancy and important themes, Navalinsky said. 

Navalinsky said the play was selected because it is not an intense musical and only becomes a musical operetta in the third act, which is good for students just entering the musical theater scene. He said the play incorporates themes of oral storytelling of pop culture. 

“Especially with something like 'Mr. Burns,' where there’s a lot of great themes and the messages are so powerful and there are also ideas about environmentalism as well, it feels important and really cool,” sophomore Sam Bible-Sullivan, the actor playing the role of Sam, said. “To be working on something you feel is important and to put that out into the world is probably the biggest reward.”

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