LCC Theatre Company presents winter show, debuts newest members
Lapu, the Coyote that Cares Theatre Company will perform its winter show, “The Future, the Present, and the Rest is History…,” starring first-year molecular, cell and developmental biology student Julianna Remo (left) and fourth-year history student Nathan Guzik (right).
(Owen Emerson/Daily Bruin)
By Salus Kim
March 3, 2015 1:03 a.m.
A homeless drunkard and a stockbroker meet and reveal secrets of their pasts to eventually follow a path of self-acceptance.
This is one of three student-written and produced scenes that the UCLA theater group Lapu, the Coyote that Cares Theatre Company will present in its winter show, “The Future, the Present, and the Rest is History…,” funded by the Undergraduate Students Association Council. The performances will take place Tuesday and Wednesday at the Jan Popper Theater in Schoenberg Hall.
Mark Quintos, a fourth-year film student and co-producer of LCC Theatre Company said the scenes are connected through the theme of time and will host improvised comedy in between. The group is celebrating their 20th anniversary and the show will also debut the group’s 14 newest members, Generation 20.
Julianna Remo, a first-year molecular, cell, and developmental biology student, is a member of LCC Theatre Company’s 20th generation and will play Emily, the homeless alcoholic, in the show’s first scene, “Multitudes.”
Remo said Emily is the character she relates to the most because she is also a science student who wanted to be a doctor.
“‘Multitudes’ deals with flashbacks and also the difference between the past, the present and the future – how you can get over what you did in the past (to) better the person you are in the present,” Remo said.
Quintos said the group has been practicing for approximately 10 hours a week since the beginning of the quarter. Students submitted scripts for scenes and collectively chose which three they wanted to perform.
The other two scenes are “Emotional Fluffer” and “An Unknown History.” The latter is about three students in class who have to do history homework, but get distracted with their misunderstandings of what really happened in history.
“It goes from the French Revolution and talks about the invention of the guillotine, except it just makes fun of it, (to) the invention of the railroads (and) the Titanic sinking because of a silly bet made between the Titanic’s inventor and its captain,” Quintos said.
“Emotional Fluffer” is a short film that LCC Theatre Company produced for Campus MovieFest and then adapted for the stage. It is about a contractual “friends with benefits” relationship.
“There are clauses … the man wants Taco Tuesdays where every Tuesday, they have to get tacos, and the woman, for her, she needs help getting groceries,” Quintos said. “(‘Emotional Fluffer’) is nice because it touches on the need to be with someone and how much being lonely can kind of suck.”
In January, the Original Generation, which included actor Randall Park, accompanied the group on their annual retreat to bond with new members.
John Phan, a third-year psychology student and marketing director for LCC Theatre Company, said Park, who has acted in “The Interview” and currently stars in ABC’s “Fresh Off the Boat,” was astounded at how large the company had grown.
“It was just amazing to meet one of our founders, especially when he recently just got so big, because we weren’t expecting him,” Phan said. “But for him to show up and take the time to see what he’d created, it meant a lot to us.”
Quintos said that although LCC Theatre Company was initially intended for Asian American students who wanted to perform original writing, the group has changed over the years.
“We’ve broadened the demographics … but we’re still trying to put forth things that come from students and people who feel like they might not have the space,” Quintos said. “Everything we do here is completely run by us. It’s all very homegrown.”
Phan said in addition to the winter show, LCC Theatre Company will host another show spring quarter and is expecting to perform more improvised events for other campus organizations.
“I’m always telling myself never to settle as a creative and to put forth the best thing possible and that’s the attitude shared by so many other people in the company,” Quintos said. “A lot of the times, there are things we can really identify with because it’s coming from our peers and that (is) coupled with the young uninhibited ambition of being a student-creator.”
