New Horizons: Original Works Festival Kicks Off With "City of Light"

“The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul on fire.” ~Ferdinand Foch

Each season, Florida State’s School of Theatre introduces new, riveting stories at New Horizons: Original Works Festival. The festival is designed to connect the directors, actors, and audience in a unique experience of creation and discovery. This season, the festival is kicking off with a tale of courage and the power of the human spirit, City of Light.

Senior Danielle Wirsansky’s powerful musical shows us the importance of history and the everlasting significance of one of the most tragic events in human history: The Holocaust.

Danielle had this to say about her show:

“World War One was the first war with air dropped missiles and took place during the advent of radar. The French were terrified of the German Gotha bombers that ruled the skies. The French government, in a top-secret project, endeavored to build a fake Paris so as to lower the true Paris’s chances of being bombed. An Italian electric engineer was hired to design the fake city. The light was what was most important because the German Gotha bombers flew by night—it was the illumination of the fake city that was so vital.”

“However, the war ended before the fake city was finished being built. The government decided to keep the fake city standing and a secret in case they needed it in the future. It wasn’t torn down until 1961, after its technology became obsolete. Then the government let the information sit in a 50 year declassification process before the files on it were released to the National Archives in France. So almost no one knew it had ever existed!”

City of Light is the story of two young escapees of a French internment camp trying to make their way to Paris for safety, finding themselves in the wrong city. Meanwhile, the situation grows more dire as the Nazis begin their occupation of the real city.

Image via: Danielle Wirsansky

This story first came to light in 2011, when Danielle first came across the article on the fake city.

“I thought this was such an interesting story and I really felt drawn to write about it, but the era of history that I study is WWII, as a history minor and a future history graduate student,” Danielle said. “France and Paris in particular has such an interesting WWII/Holocaust history that I wanted to connect the two time periods and make parallels between them as well as the two Paris’.”

Even though this is Danielle’s first experience creating and directing a musical, her passion for writing and theatre has a much deeper history.

“My two majors have always been theatre and creative writing, ever since the 4th grade. I was lucky to have found what I love to do at such a young age, and I really cannot imagine doing anything else,” Danielle said. “I think English and theatre go hand in hand. It’s all about story telling for me and making connections with the audience, so as long as I can do that—whether I’m writing, directing, acting—then I will continue to do so.”

After reading the article on the fake city of Paris as a senior in high school, Danielle started drafting the first scene of the play version before allowing the story to sit for some time. It wasn’t until her sophomore year at Florida State when Danielle joined the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program and delved into the studies of WWII alongside Dr. Nathan Stolzfus that she found herself able to pick up City of Light, dust it off, and prepare it for the stage once again.

During the summer of 2014, Danielle traveled to Paris after being awarded a research grant to do firsthand research on the fake city. Upon her return, she wrote the entire script for the play and spent the fall semester developing City of Light into her undergraduate thesis project, which was passed on April 6!

Image via: Danielle Wirsansky

“I also think that the way that we’ve used City of Light as a platform for education and social reform is also very unique. We are twisting the preconceived notions that people already have about what a musical should be and subverting it,” Danielle said. “It sounds almost ironic to say that it’s a Holocaust musical, like we are being disrespectful about the topic, when that couldn’t be farther from the truth. We felt that using music helped to transcend the words and make the points we were trying to make universal. What music evokes in us is universal, more than words can ever be.”

With that being said, City of Light is something greater than a stage performance or a project. It’s a story of human courage and strength in the face of utmost violence, terror and adversity. If we’ve learned anything from the story of the Holocaust, we’ve learned how dark our actions can be and how dangerous the seed of hate can be when provoked to grow.

“It’s a topic that I think is so important, so incredibly meaningful, and so relevant for audiences today. It’s about more than preventing anti-Semitism. It’s about stopping hate, ignorance, and being afraid of what we don’t understand, of what is different than us,” Danielle said. “My cast laughs, but I cry pretty much every time they perform the finale. If the show can move or enlighten even a single audience member, then we’ve achieved something by doing this show.”

Image via: Danielle Wirsansky

City of Light runs April 13-14 at 8 p.m. in the Lab Theatre at FSU, which is located at 502 S. Copeland Street. Tickets are $5 for students and $10 for adults.