The kitchen and long table that form the central set of The Matter of Taste are anything but props: They are key to this exploration of food and memories, as well as the social redefining of what might be considered “good” and “bad” taste.

Set to open May 19, this is an interactive production in which the players cook and reminisce, and the audience plays a role, too (for example, audience members will have an opportunity to taste the food that is being made on stage).

Live music accompanies the show, and, after each performance, this music will continue outside, for dancing. Also, food connected with the show will be available for purchase.

So, as you can see, this is indeed a unique performance and food event, as described by the Department of Theatre and Dance.

The Matter of Taste also is unique to the performers — who contributed food memories and stories and other autobiographical material. Spring quarter Granada Artist-in-Residence Anna Fenemore facilitated the development process and is directing the show.

“I’m asking (the performers) to present themselves, perhaps to tell us things they should only really tell their friends, to bring their cultural and social individualities together,” Fenemore said. “I want to squeeze all this into a theatre, and see what happens when an audience with their (own) food memories and experiences is also thrown into the mix.”

Professor Peter Lichtenfels is responsible for bringing Fenemore to UC Davis. He said he asked friends in the British theatre scene to identify the most interesting new practitioners, and an entire chorus replied, “Anna Fenemore!” — referring to the artistic director of the Manchester-based Pigeon Theatre, an internationally renowned experimental physical performance company.

“I got excited and researched her unique work,” Lichtenfels said. “Everyone is in love with her. She creates such fun — cooking, playing while learning and devising a show.”

Fenemore’s inspiration came from the structures and methods of domestic cooking and the rituals of the family dining table.

“I’m very fond of George Eliot’s statement that ‘One can say everything best over a meal’ and Federico Fellini’s statement that ‘Life is a combination of magic and pasta.’”

In 2000, Fenemore combined food and performance in her first production at Pigeon Theatre: The Housekeeper, in which performers cooked for the audience.

At first, this act of “doing something for” and “giving something to” the audience was merely a strategy for attempting a certain kind of intimacy between performer and spectator — based on her belief that sharing food with another human being is an extraordinarily intimate act.

But Fenemore quickly realized that the food was doing far more than connecting all the different people in the room at that time. In addition, the food was connecting all of these people with others who were not there — mothers, grandmothers, fathers, daughters, lovers, friends.

She saw the act of sharing food not just as an act of intimacy, but also charged at one time or another with obsession, seduction, memory, shame, joy and, perhaps most important, pleasure.

“The act of feeding people began a process of remembering for audiences and of re-embodying these potent expressions of human feeling that were fascinating to me, and I have subsequently strived continually to make work that ‘moves’ audiences in this way,” Fenemore said.

“Taste and smell are significant in our construction of memories. When Proust wrote about madeleines (small, shell-shaped cakes) in Remembrance of Things Past, it wasn’t the madeleine itself that was important; the madeleine merely served as a strategy to explore the shifting value of memory.”

Similarly, The Matter of Taste includes such foods as Will’s mother’s German chocolate and snail cake, Won’s mother’s birthday soup, Avila’s grandfather’s artichoke and chicken soup, and Paige’s grandmother’s shrimp and cabbage salad — all important, but not more so than the stories and memories and people and bonds behind the food.

Sodexo, the university’s food management company, and Campus Catering are providing food for the production, and the Department of Food Sciences and Nutrition has contributed much expertise, as have a number of chefs and other food professionals. Several downtown Davis restaurants are also involved.

In serving as stage manager, Todd Harper, an undergraduate who is majoring in dramatic art, mastered the art of pseudo restaurant management. “I now know how to keep foods at specific temperature levels, to chop onions in ways I never knew were possible, and ensure that every dining surface is sanitary and fit for consumption.”

Todd said he thinks the audience will appreciate the sheer honesty and humor in the performance. “Of course, the chaos involving 16 people cooking in one kitchen, each with several interpersonal relationships, conflicts and reactions, and each with so many stories to tell, adds quite a farcical element to the performance sure to encourage much laughter.”

The graduate and undergraduate performers are enjoying Fenemore’s development process.

Jennifer Adler, a double major in music and dramatic art, said: “The Matter of Taste has opened up new theatre perspectives for me. It was hard to get used to not following a script, but I have learned a lot from this. I now realize the theatricality in everyday activities like cooking or navigating a kitchen. I've learned how to turn memories into a work of art.”

Dramatic art major Jason Masino also has learned important lessons through acting in this production. “Anna has taught me not to get too attached to ideas that you bring to the table. If you hold on to something too long and decide that it doesn't work or doesn't benefit the show in the way you'd like, not letting go can damage the process of creating a piece of theatre, or art for that matter.”

Daniel Jordan, another dramatic art major, explained his new acting insight: “Anna’s given me another view of character. She's really into being a person on stage and not an actor, or what we perceive to be acting. It's very liberating.”

The ensemble also includes three Master of Fine Arts acting candidates: Michael Davison, James Marchbanks and Avila Reese.

Besides Harper, the production team includes John Zibell (assistant director), Glenn Fox (scenic-lighting designer) and Sarah Kendrick (costume designer), all M.F.A. candidates, and David Lutheran (properties designer), an undergraduate who is majoring in dramatic art.

About the director

Manchester, United Kingdom-based Pigeon Theatre, of which Fenemore is the artistc director, is an all-woman, experimental physical performance company, creating site-specific work in England and abroad.

The theatre's central research concern is the formal structures of space, environment and architecture, and their effect on the audience experience.

Fenemore is also program manager and a lecturer in BA (Honors) in Theatre and Performance at the School of Performance and Cultural Industries, Leeds University, United Kingdom, specializing in practice-as-research, physical performance, contemporary devised performance, site-specific theatre and the politics of performance.

Her research interests are spectating embodiment, performer bodywork training, multisensory immersive performance, performance and phenomenology, theories of performance space-place, and performance and death studies.

Fenemore performs regularly for the anateresa project, The Chameleons Group, Plane Performance and in her own solo work. She has collaborated on telematic performances with Paul Sermon and Steve Dixon.

Reporting by Janice Bisgaard, publicity director for the Department of Theatre and Dance.

AT A GLANCE

WHAT: The Matter of Taste, directed by Granada Artist-in-Residence Anna Fenemore and devised in collaboration with UC Davis students. Production includes food tastings for audience members, and post-performance sales of food connected to the show. Also, the show’s live music continues after the show, for outdoor dancing.

WHERE: Wyatt Pavilion Theatre

WHEN: 8 p.m. May 19-22 and 2 p.m. May 23

TICKETS are available through the Mondavi Center box office: (530) 754-2787 or (866) 754-2787, or mondaviarts.org.

Production blog

Read a student's account of her participation in The Matter of Taste.