MSU Department of Theatre Presents: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

The MSU Department of Theatre's production of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest was performed at the Wharton Center's Pasant Theater. It opened on November 17th, 2009 and ran through November 22nd, 2009.
The play was adapted from the novel by Ken Kesey, in which a new inmate to the asylum, McMurphy, subverts the authority of Nurse Ratched and changes the lives of his fellow inmates. The production posed several interesting challenges to the cast. As the play is set in an asylum, the actors did a significant amount of research on the problems specific to their characters, and also researched what life in the asylum would be like. The actors worked with professionals in the psychology field to create case studies for their characters and attended individual and group therapy session in character in order to prepare for their roles.
Another challenge emerged with the complex makeup required for the show. Many of the characters had special makeup requirements, such as cut wounds, scars, and burns. The students in the Problems in Theater Design class designed the character's makeup and made prosthetic pieces using foam latex, liquid latex, and a variety of other materials. This required a very long, tedious process, and many days of experimentation, but the result was incredibly realistic burn scars, cut wounds, and acne that helped bring the story to life.