Performing Hillsville, Part Two

Abstract

"Performing Hillsville: A Rhetorical Update of Frank Levering's Shootout Plays" illustrates a new portrayal of the shootout that includes four "spectacular moments" in the plays that causes empathetic moments of rhetoric to happen with the audience and actors. These moments break the fourth wall between audience members and actors. The chapter starts with an analysis of the historic courthouse where the actors perform the play to demonstrate the contrast of it as a site of memorial and public memory that evokes the dangerous hillbilly stereotype to then contrast the play that evokes empathetic emotions towards the characters involved. These empathetic "spectacular moments" are analyzed to demonstrate the exchange that happens between the play and audience members, which creates a new retelling that allows for healing.