On Nov. 20, Everett Community College's theater group will premiere its performance of Tony Kushner's comedy "The Illusion" in Baker 120.

The play, adapted from a seventeenth-century comedy by Pierre Corneille, follows the story of a father who seeks news of his prodigal son from an eccentric sorcerer. The sorcerer conjures three separate events from the young man's life. Each of the three sections of the play is different-the names of the characters change and the relationships shift dramatically. All the while the father is in the background helplessly watching as he waits to learn the final truth of his son's story.

Because of the nature of the play, many of the actors are playing three different variations of their character, and most are excited to get such an opportunity.

Dylan Olson, who has previously been in three plays here at EvCC, plays the primary antagonist, and is excited to go new places with his acting.

"I'm very excited. In this play I play more of the antagonist role, which I haven't really don't much in other plays. It's a comedy, but it makes you think about a few different issues-estrangement, love. You find out something about the human condition, I think."

When the subject of challenges in getting under way came up, Dylan noted the in-depth choreography he had to practice for the various sword fights in the play.

"I had to learn how to sword fight on stage, that's still taking a lot of practice."

Olson and the actor playing the protagonist, Noah Riordan, have been meeting every Thursday in Baker 120 for an event they humorously call "Fight Club." For the first few weeks, they were the actual basics of swordplay by director Beth Peterson, and then used the basic structure and move set to construct a believable stage fight.

Riordan is excited about the play, but hesitant about getting back into acting.

"I haven't done anything in theater in quite a few years, so it's pretty exciting to get back into it and try not to screw it up too badly. I think [the play] has got a good storyline, interesting characters and quite a few funny bits. [My character] is a bit of a cad, which is kind of fun for me. It's a different approach to relationships than I've had in my own life, so it's kind of fun playing that role."

Riordan noted that he's been having a good time at the practices, and enjoys spending time with the rest of the cast.

"[I've enjoyed] the spontaneous laughter and the ad-libs. When somebody says something unexpected, everyone just cracks up for five minutes."

Beth Peterson, the drama department director and director of the current production, it very excited about the different themes and acting styles that are explored in this play that haven't been in her previous projects.

"This is the first play that I think I've done that is in the neo-classic time period. I love this time period, because you get to use the fans, and it's very stylized. What you get to see is a presentational style that is different than what the actor is doing," Peterson said. "What we're seeing is something that was done in seventeenth century France, and to some degree, something that was done in the Restoration in England as well."

Peterson excitedly elaborated on the many virtues of staging a production in such a time period.

"It's kind of an artificial way of moving and presenting yourself. People would use fans to communicate, men would use handkerchiefs, they had a lot of ornate costumes. After this we had a lot of civil wars, because of it. It was aristocracy abusing their power, in a way. It signifies a time that needed to change," Peterson said. "I've never dome a play in this time period, and I'm just having a blast with it. Every time you have a time period like that, where a society tried to control its people, there's a lot of subversiveness about it. A sort of naughtiness comes out underneath. I'm doing a lot of experimenting with that."

Peterson is confident that people will like the play, extolling the benefits of something that is both entertaining and has depth on different levels.

"I think this play is entertaining and powerful on many levels. On a surface level, it's fun it watch and it's entertaining, but I think there are a lot of deep messages. It's all about the illusion, that things aren't always what they seem. And theater is a metaphor for that. We create these illusions to help us understand life, to learn from life, but they are just illusions."

Aside from the play itself, Peterson has had a great time working with the cast.

"The other day, I told a student to 'Go back to the part where you just finished climaxing, we'll go from there.' I think I'm the only person in the administration who gets to say those words in a classroom setting. "

Check back for a photo slideshow!