Below is the final installment in Sarah Wozniak’s epic journey to raise money for The Pearl’s Arts in Education program. Thank you Sarah for all your hard work…and congratulations!

Sarah running towards the finish line.

Two hours and thirty eight minutes.  Thirteen miles.  53 degrees and sunny.  I’d have to say that with numbers like that, Sunday was a success.  I attribute this to my incredible network of supporters…and Chariots of Fire.

My story can really only be told through an iPod playlist, which was especially created for Sunday’s NYC Half-Marathon.  Without further ado, here is an arts aor your listening pleasure…

Chariots of Fire-Vangelis

This started my run and also made a comeback around mile 9, as my lungs started to burn.  There’s nothing quite like setting your pace at the starting line to the dulcet tones of 80s synthesizers, staring at the stretch of land you’ll need to cover, on foot, in less than three hours.  Sure, there wasn’t sand (there were trees), I wasn’t running to overcome religious intolerance (for arts in education, which is no less noble) and I’m not a British/Scottish dude, but it still set the tone for valiant running effort.  Not to mention making me feel like a big deal.

Glee-The Music, Volumes 1 & 2-Various

Glee, by its very definition, is about opening yourself up to joy.  While I wouldn’t say I was perpetually joyful as a traveled the hills and valleys of Central Park in the first 8 miles, I definitely kept my head high and a strong smile on my face as I passed each split.  This is because of Glee. “Hate On Me” and “Gold Digger” gave my just enough grit to dig in when my legs grew tired; “Bust a Move” and “Don’t Rain on My Parade” provided snappy encouragement with a touch of show choir; and “And I Am Telling You” is just an awesome song, how can you not run your heart out?  Plus, as I plodded down 7^th Avenue into the heart of Times Square (without tourists?!) having my faithful musical theatre blasting into my ears was just the right gas to keep me going.

Mercy- Duffy

By mile 10, Duffy said it well as she belted out “I’m begging you for mercy”; I really was.  I hit the proverbial wall, and my, what a wall it was.  To be brief, imagine that your limbs are attached to several machines on opposite sides of a roadway.  Now imagine that your legs are being propelled up and down at alternating frequencies, making your hips crack, crunch and snap after each rotation.  Now imagine each vertebrae has a band around it, shooting off to an invisible crank at varying angles away from your body and as you move forward, those cranks spin out of control, jamming, rubbing and yanking their spine every which way while your middle and lower back muscles jerk in pain.  And finally, imagine a line sewn into your lungs, that’s then tied to your shoulders and then to our aforementioned roadside machines.  Then imagine with each breath your lungs contract, making air scarce from your chest all the way up through your head.  Multiply that by 10 and you’ll have a pretty good idea how I felt.

Forever- Chris Brown

I’ll admit, this wasn’t actually on my playlist, but it was playing around mile 11, so it counts.  As I swore, cried, gasped for air, and questioned my sanity, this little ditty floated into the air from a nearby D.J. stand.  My immediate reaction was to begin emulating the JK Wedding Dance video (don’t judge, you’d do the say thing).  This was comical, terrible and wonderful, all at the same time.  Though the physical pain I felt made my movements look more like a seizure than a dance move, my resolve returned and the smile that disappeared at mile 10 began to creep back.  Chris Breezy redeemed me…sorry I can’t return the favor.

Eye of the Tiger

I saw the sign that read “800 meters to go” and the awesomeness that is Survivor’s staccato, methodic strumming started in, and I rose up to the challenge of my rival…the course, that is.  The road narrowed as the meters shrank and I could see the finish line; the glorious, incredible, sweet release finish line.  I turned to my incredible running partner(and boyfriend) and said, “Race ya!”.  As I Rocky’d (yes I made it into a verb) my way across the finish line I’m not quite sure if I was laughing in delight, pain or disorientation, but I know I was smiling because I finished.

I feel in this one race (or rather, 13.1 miles in 2 hours and 38 minutes, in case I haven’t said it enough already), we proved that The Pearl is willing to go to any lengths to ensure that NYC students get the arts education they deserve and need.  So if one person will go a 13.1 mile distance to further our arts in education program, imagine what the entire staff of Classics in the Classroom could do…

Spearheaded by Sarah Wozniak (The Pearl’s Artistic Administrator and unofficial baker), The Pearl’s “Classically Trained” team will run/walk/ skip/saunter its way through the NYC Half-Marathon on Sunday, March 21, 2010, and work to raise money to support Classics in the Classroom. Below are Sarah’s thoughts as the big day nears.

Times Square

Give my regards to Broadway, because I’m going to run so quickly through Times Square, you’re going to start calling me Mercury.

Ok, now that I’ve psyched out the course, I’m going be honest with you: I’m terrified.  I know I’ve trained well, I know that I have incredible supporters (you could be one of them, details below), I know I have the best running partner a girl could ask for, but I’m still terrified.  You might ask why, and I’d be happy to elaborate.  I did a training run two weeks ago, to prove to myself I could finish the race, to see how my body would react and to test what foods and beverages helped and hindered my efforts.  For this reason, I am terrified.

Central Park

Firstly, one should never drink an entire bottle of Gatorade immediately prior to undertaking 13.1 miles of running.  It hydrates all right, but then it’s got to go somewhere; I’ll leave the “somewhere” to your imagination.  Secondly, there aren’t enough bathrooms in Central Park—this is related to my first point.  Thirdly, there are a lot of hills in Central Park.  Fourthly, there’s a lot of horse poop in Central Park.  Fifthly, there are a lot of runners who are a heck of a lot better athletes than I am in Central Park.  Finally, there’s been such an incredible outpouring of support for my run; I don’t want to let them (you) down.  If I was a little less crazy, I’d probably be terrified I’d irreparably damage my body, but I am crazy.

But I am reassured as well.  I’ve found a running product that gives me a boost of energy at crucial times during my runs that tastes, get this, like Gummy Bears.  Candy breaks during my run?  Yes, please!  I’ve bought snazzy running pants that, though feel a bit like shoving my thighs into sausage casings, really improve the efficiency of my leg movement and make me look like a real runner.  But the coup de grâce is the course.  There’s nothing better than touring New York on a gorgeous, sunny morning…except touring New York through the heart of Times Square in the aforementioned weather conditions.  I mean, seriously?!  Bounding through an iconic landmark with 10,000 of my closest, well, strangers, to the sounds of hundreds of fans singing along to classic songs with Broadway stars on 44^th Street?  Be still, my Gleek heart!  I should probably be excited that I’m embarking on a Herculean athletic feat that will prove my mettle, but there’s a sing-along!

I’m scared and exhilarated for the events that will unfold on Sunday, but despite all the myriad of emotions I’m experiencing, I know it’s all worthwhile because more people know about The Pearl’s Classics in the Classroom Arts in Education program, and an incredible number of people have committed themselves financially to ensuring the health and continuation of that program.  An enormous thank you goes out to them.  You thought The Pearl (and me) worthy of your support; I plan to make you proud!  If you’d like to donate, click here!

If you’re free Sunday and want to be a “part of it all”, here’s the course map (click on it to download a .pdf version).  I’d love the cheers!

Click to download. Courtesy of nyrr.org.

To donate to the 1/2 marathon and The Pearl’s Classics in the Classroom Arts in Education program, please click here.

J.R. Sullivan

There was a great blog post about, and interview with, Jim Sullivan (The Pearl’s Artistic Director) posted on Friday on The Clyde Fitch Report.

In a conversation with Sullivan, who directed the Pearl’s current production — Stephen Jeffreys’ adaptation of Charles Dickens’ Hard Times, running through March 28 — he revealed himself less armed with his own answers but disarmed by own questions; he knows only time and patience bestow wisdom and foresight. Equally fortunate, Sullivan is one of the most widely experienced, gifted journeyman directors in the country. Prior to succeeding Sobel, he was associate artistic director of Utah Shakespearean Festival; he also ran his own company in Illinois from 1972 through 1994. Even including scores of productions around the nation (including five at the Pearl), however, doesn’t mean that New York and the era itself aren’t different animals. . .

By programming The Subject was Roses, are you nearing a redefinition for “classic”? If a person asked, “When is the Pearl going to get away from dead white male authors?,” what would you reply?
We all have a general notion about “classic” because of our schooling. It’s sort of Shakespeare, sort of Restoration. It’s all European. It’s, by and large, by dead white guys. We can’t do much about what we’ve received in the canon and how it got there and the centuries-old bias over who was suitable to be a writer. What we do with it now is the question. But I have no agenda in this at all — and hopefully no prejudice. To me, I’ve been thinking a lot about this and I’ve talked in other interviews, obviously, about it. What is a classic? I’m not about making a new definition. But I am about what it is to be a “classic” at the Pearl and what it means to be a “classic” for the Pearl’s audience. What is “classic” for me? I guess I would say it has to do with looking at those works that are of the great tradition of the theater — expanding the view to include non-European works and being open to the present. And, by the present, I mean trying to step beyond what is generally regarded as the “classic.” How, from earlier centuries, it refers specifically to works in the American theater, for example, that had a hand in changing how the theater was going at the time, what new directions it took, what new views became possible. These were people who, like Shakespeare, were riding the crest of a wave and did the work that brought about change: what O’Neill represented in the 1920s; what Miller and Williams represented in the 1940s; what Albee represented in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

–and does today, too, as Mr. Albee would tell you.
He would. It’s about how the theater of derision in Europe was melded into the Off-Broadway movement. That, to me, has relevance in the classic sense.

Would the Pearl do a Shepard play?
I would think so. A work like Buried Child or Fool for Love or some of the seminal Shepard.

How esoteric, then — not that Shepard is esoteric — can “classic” be for the Pearl? Can the Pearl do a Susan Glaspell play? The American canon is still largely neglected beyond, say, what the Mint has done. Would you do a Tom Eyen play?
It would have to be an especially advantageous fit in the way the rest of the season was constructed, let’s put it that way. Somehow the theme and the concerns of those plays would work into the canon of the rest of the year and would also work individually, and would carry forth a relevance that the rest of the season was establishing to the audience.

Click here to read the full interview.