|
|
Power! is a play about electricity.
In its earliest incarnations, electricity was a kind of magical force, something to be exhibited at the sideshow to curious awestruck onlookers. But it quickly became an essential part of daily life, something now taken for granted by almost everyone in the industrialized world. At its most fundamental level, what it does is give us light and heat when it is dark and cold. That is, electricity liberates humanity from the constraints of nature and contravenes the ordering of day and night. The power that travels through poles and wires is an invisible yet vital force that connects us each to the other. Power! is about the way in which electricity is generated and distributed. The way decisions about the generation and distribution of electricity are made affects us all.
Power! is a play about power.
greta bond, robin bond, rosie carnahan, peter currie, michael cusdin, cameron delaney, katherine mitchell, myfanwy moore, hilary unwin, david williamson
producer: peter falkenberg
director: sharon mazer
set design: mark mcentyre
sound design: roy montgomery
costume design: anna mulholland
lighting design: david whybrew
g.w.c.s.n.: myfanwy moore
construction worker: gary carsel
promotions: rosie carnahan, myfanwy moore
choreography: simon ellis
dance captain: rosie carnahan
additional text: peter currie, sharon mazer
banner: blair morton
front of house: sarah carnahan
graphics/poster: kirsty gregg
administration: pam niskanen
24 November 1886. Reefton. Walter Prince - showman, entrepreneur, mediocre electrician - links an electrical generator to a brewery's steam engine and lights the bars of Kater's, Williams's, Stevenson's, and Dawson's hotels with electric light.
1888. The Reefton Electrical Transmission of Power and Lighting Company, Ltd. provides the first public supply of electricity in New Zealand. One hundred thirty lamps are connected to the mains at a charge of 1 pound each, and electricity is provided to the citizens of Reefton at a charge of 3 pounds per light per year. This charge applies whether or not the light is switched on.
1889. Wellington's streets are lit with electricity.
1891. Robert Hays designs the world's first electricity-powered dredge for the Sandhills Gold Mining Co.
1899. Christchurch Hospital switches on 400 electric lights.
1900. Dunedin begins operation of an electric tram. Over the next 14 years Wellington, Christchurch, Wanganui, Invercargil, Gisborne, Napier, and New Plymouth all install electric tram services.
1913. The Christchurch Electrical Supply Empowering Act is passed, permitting the city's electricity department to lend money to consumers to pay for appliances and wiring.
1914. The Government completes construction of Lake Coleridge power station. Its success leads to a Government programme of dam-building to convert the country's abundant resources of flowing water into hydro-electricity.
1914. Alexander Wyllie Roger comes us with the ideal of electric power boards as a way of ensuring that people living in country areas have the same opportunity to benefit from electricity as city dwellers.
1918. The Government passes the Electric Power Boards Act establishing a fundamental framework for the generation and distribution of electricity in New Zealand. Today 99.8% of the homes in New Zealand have access to electricity.
4 August 1988. One hundred years after Walter Prince sold Reefton its first electric lights, a large number of electrical corporation officials, the energy Minister and other dignitaries join the citizens of Reefton to commemorate a century of public electrical supply in New Zealand. Prominent at the festivities is John Fernyhough, Chairman of Electricorp.
1990. Auckland University publishes a paper which concludes that 67% of Business Round Table policy recommendations have been positively adopted by the Government.
1992. The Business Round Table submits its Energy Sector Reform Bill. The Government passes the Energy Companies Act.
March 1992 to March 1994. Christchurch domestic power users face an increase of 23%.
December 1994. Power New Zealand, a North Island power supply company, issues 180,000 shares to its customers. Mercury Energy buys as many of these shares as it can in an attempt to gain a controlling interest. Power New Zealand spends well over $2million defending itself.
1995. Southpower profits reach 16 million dollars.
February 1996. Of the 180,000 original shareholders in Power New Zealand, only 6000 remain.
February 1996. Mercury Energy will be increasing its domestic prices by up to 17%.
February 1996. Christchurch City Council owns 87.6% of Southpower shares.
April 1996. Electricorp will increase supply costs to Southpower by 5%.
Established in 1935, the Federal Theatre Project was the first and only effort by the United States Government to create a national theatre. It was founded by the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration as part of the Works Progress Administration in order to take theatre workers and others off the unemployment rolls. While the Federal Theatre Project created and presented original American plays, it also offered a wide range of classical plays, often in startling new versions.
The Living Newspaper was the Federal Theatre's boldest experiment. As developed by Hallie Flanagan, director of the Federal Theatre Project, with Elmer Rice, one of America's best-known playwrights in the 1920s and 1930s, each production offered its audiences an in-depth exploration of a crucial issue: housing, farming, unionisation, syphilis, and race relations. The staff of the Living Newspaper was set up like a large city daily, with an editor-in-chief, managing editor, city editor, reporters and copyreaders. Living Newspapers were very popular, opening simultaneously in cities around the US, although some productions were so controversial that they were forced to close before opening. The Federal Theatre Project was closed in 1939, primarily because of its perceived radicalism.
Power! was written by Arthur Arent with the Newspaper Guild of America. It featured some 185 actors, and as part of its celebration of electricity's potential, its set was primarily cinematic projections of scenery and facts onto screens. It was one of the most popular living newspapers. Hallie Flanagan estimates that 60,000 people bought tickets to Power! before it opened on 23 February 1937 at the Ritz Theatre in New York City and ran for five months. Subsequent productions were equally successful in other major cities around the United States.