FESTIVAL OPENER: Exhaustion: Dancin’ Trees by Fran A.
Directed by Lyndsay Burch
OCTOBER 1st 7pm IN-PERSON PERFORMANCE (and streamed live) at The Sofia in Sacramento, CA
Three friends escape into the Santa Cruz mountains in search of a place to swim and BBQ. They packed for the beach without realizing they had a treacherous hike down a ravine. Once at a waterhole the unexpected consumption of some shrooms sets the stage for a cosmic, prehistoric adventure.
FRAN
They/Them/Theirs | Elle/Elles
Fran is a director, dramaturg, and writer. They love collaborating on new and developing works. Their hope is that they will help curate a future our descendants deserve and our ancestors would be proud of. Fran works toward their goal by continuously seeking to work alongside those who are asked to assume a role of silence and kindred spirits who enjoy exploring the nuances of identity and perception. They uphold that if "all the worlds a stage," then we need to ensure that the world we represent on our stages insights action for the world we need and not the world we need to leave behind.
"The first thing I make sure to mention on a first date: I went to clown school." -Fran A
Selective Credits:
Ensemble in California Scenarios Dir. Ramón Real (Prospect Theatre Project) | Assistant Director of the world premiere of Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley Dir. Meredith McDonough (Marin Theatre Company) | Assistant Director, dramaturg and Ensemble Glass Closet Dir. Ramón Real (In The Margin) | Sherwood in Robin Hood (Missoula Children’s Theatre) | Osgood in The Tortoise and the Hare (Missoula Children’s Theatre)
CABIN 12 by Leo Grierson
OCT 2 (virtual) 8pm PT
OCT 7, 7pm PT in-person watch party
Summer is winding down at Camp Snowflake and the girls of Cabin 12 are hosting the end of camp Jubilee. They can’t wait to share a fun night of s’mores, skits and songs with you - their fellow campers. But with trouble and strife brewing between this tight-knit group of friends, will they make it through the night without falling apart?
Leo Grierson is a Southern Oregon Based Theatre Artist who relishes in digital possibilities and creates youth theatre for adults. They are the Artistic Director of The Juvenilia Collective and a Producer for In The Margin. Projects include: Cabin 12 (Rogue Festival, Oregon Shakespeare Festival Midnight Project, Oregon Fringe Festival), The American Girl Cycle (Oregon Fringe Festival), Oedipus (Isolation Theatre Co.), Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret (Oregon Fringe Festival), Dry Land, Horse Girls (Southern Oregon University).
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Juana y Carmen by Meme Garcia, directed by Sara Porkalob
Tuesday Oct 5th at 7pm PT (Virtual)
Monday Oct 11th at 7pm PT (Virtual and Live Watch Party at The Sofia, Sacramento, CA)
SUMMARY: On the border between Arizona and Mexico, deep in the Sonoran Desert, something stirs en la noche oscura. Juana can’t remember how long they’ve been wandering or where they’re going until a mysterious stranger appears who seems to have all the answers to Juana’s questions except one: who are you? Can Juana piece together the mystery before the desert swallows both of them whole? Or will they both be cursed to wander the land as ghosts for the rest of eternity?
Meme García (they/he/she) is a trans playwright and actor originally from El Salvador. They are a Fulbright Scholar and graduated with a MA in Classical Acting from the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. They hold degrees in Theatre and Women and Gender Studies from Seattle University. Their first play "house of sueños," was produced last winter with Seattle Shakespeare Company. As an actor, they have worked for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, American Shakespeare Center, upstart crow collective, Seattle Shakespeare Company, Seattle Repertory Theatre, ACT Theatre, Strawberry Workshop Theatre, and Book-It Repertory Theatre. "juana y carmen," is their second play, and they are currently working on a brujx coming of age TV show inspired by la original chachinbona herself, la siguanaba.
La Demanda por Margarita A. Cacho y Réal Vargas Alanis
Directed by Brenda Luz Orellana
Wednesday Oct 10th at 7pm PT (Virtual)
Saturday Oct 9th at 8pm (Virtual and Live Watch Party at The Sofia, Sacramento, CA)
Summary:
When a group of factory workers are fed up with the daily cruel treatment from the higher ups, they hone in on their collective power to bring change through unity and community. Their goal? Justice. Based on true events— this piece informs the general public on the life threatening working conditions of food processing plants while following the lives of employees navigating life threatening conditions.
Production History:
ITM held a series of workshops with Central Valley agricultural workers that have become the dramaturgical foundation for La Demanda. The workshops outlined to workers what their rights are under state and federal law. In the process of facilitating the workshops, workers shared testimonies on the working conditions they were experiencing. The play is inspired by their testimonies and the journey they are undergoing to overcome and combat the systemic oppression they are subject to. ¡Unidos unidos tenemos poder, sin nosotros no pueden comer!
MARGARITA ALANIS CACHO
MARGARITA is a social justice advocate, fighting for equal labor rights for food processing employees and migrant workers. Margarita is from Jacona, Michoacàn, and currently resides in Winton, CA (Yokut) where she operates her food business: Sexii Tacos (where the tacos are sexii) spreading Sexiiness Awareness a taco, torta, or Sexii Weenie at a time. Margarita has worked in collaboration with the Labor Council of Latin America Advancement, Northern Valley Labor Federation, San Francisco Video Project, Teamsters and International Longshore and Warehouse Union, IATSE Local 154, and the Southern Oregon Central Labor Chapter under the Oregon AFL-CIO. Margarita is a catalyst for protests throughout the Central Valley and her efforts have gained the attention of state officials with demands and concerns heard at the State Capital.
Selected Credits:
Actor California Scenarios (Prospect Theatre Project, ITM) | Actor Inocencia (ITM) |
RÉAL VARGAS ALANIS
Réal Vargas Alanis: P'urhépecha | (They/Them | inde/ima | Elle/Elles)
Ramon Real Vargas Alanis is a multifaceted-indigenous-queer-community organizer-humanitarian-artist-entrepreneur-curandera from the barrio of what is currently known as Winton, CA (Yokut). Réal focuses on new works centering social justice uplifting marginalized stories and artists (pero like, via a mystical rave leaning into joy). They have had the privilege of training and working both nationally and internationally. Réal is the current Artistic Director of In The Margin: An Arts and Advocacy Organization, leading an ensemble of intersectional and interdisciplinary QT,BIPOC artists. They are among the inaugural cohort of NNPN’s Bridge Program Producing Cohort and BIPOC artists cohort, producing The New American Theatre Festival developing 10 new works. Réal is part of Bay Area Native Theatre Artists (BANTA) and Bay Area Accountability Workgroup, taking part in reshaping the bay area theater field. Réal works in tangent with The Red Cross, Labor Council of Latin America Advancement: Sacramento Chapter, Northern Valley Labor Council, the San Francisco Video Labor Project and 99 Rootz; uplifting at risk communities upholding labor rights for food processing employees and migrant workers. Réal also co-runs their family business Sexii Tacos (where the tacos are Sexii).
<3 IG: @realvalanis | IG: @inthemargin_ITM | IG: @SexiiTacos
“Leadership is to uphold and be of service to our team. To do more than listen and take proactive action to meet the needs of employees and community--regionally, nationally and globally--actively contributing to the social change we need both inside and outside of our organizations.” - Real Vargas Alanis
Selected Credits:
Associate Director Missing (Anchorage Opera) | La Demanda Co-Playwright | Dramaturg IS SEX (ITM) | Playwright RAGE: A Rave Play (ITM | B St.) | Producer New American Theatre Festival (ITM, B St., NNPN) | Actor RPG: Video Game Play (San Diego Rep's Amigos del Rep) | Director InstaNovelas (ITM & B St.) | Producer Dear Kitty… Querida Ana (In The Margin) | Assistant Director The Copper Children (Oregon Shakespeare Festival) | Assistant Director Between Two Knees (Oregon Shakespeare Festival); Residency Between Two Knees (Yale Repertory Theatre) | Bilingual Teaching Artist (Oregon Shakespeare Festival) | Creative Producer (Latino Theatre Company); Playwright/Associate Director Braided (Theatre of Yugen | workshopped with: Theatreworks | Cal Shakes); Playwright La Demanda (ITM, B St., NNPN) | Playwright American Girl Cycle: Josefina y el Dolor (Juvenilia Collective) | Director Mamágua (Campfire Theatre Festival) | Co-founder of Central Valley vs Covid19 Coalition IG: centralvalleyvscovid
Edessa of Baghdad by Dalia Ashurina
OCT 7th, 7pm PT (Virtual and Live Watch Party at The Sofia, Sacramento, CA)
OCT 16th, 8pm (Virtual)
Playwright: Dalia Ashurina | Composer: Avi Amon
Summary:
1958 Baghdad, Iraq. The sun is shining and opportunity is in the air as this "new" country forms an identity of its own. A young girl, Edessa, gets her first chance in the spotlight and can't look back. Her mother, who runs the busiest shop in the bazaar, has other plans for her family’s future. Society is changing all around them - but they must look to the past and the future to find out who they really are - and who they want to be. With a score infused with Middle-Eastern sounds and a pop sensibility, EDESSA OF BAGHDAD, shines light on an unknown part of Iraq’s fabulous past.
DALIA
She/Her/Hers
Dalia Ashurina is a theatre director who focuses her work on the highest intersection of both stark honesty and explosive theatricality. She aims to create theatrical experiences that you can see, hear, feel, and taste, all while lifting the voices of womxn and those of Middle Eastern descent. She currently serves as the Resident Director for Broadway’s Phantom of the Opera. Her most recent new play development work has been seen at Dixon Place and Access Theatre in NYC, and heard on the Parsnip Ship Radio Theatre Podcast. She recently completed the Allen Lee Hughes Fellowship in Directing at Arena Stage and before that, assisted at Center Theatre Group and Cornerstone Theatre. University of California, Irvine.
AVI
He/They
Avi Amon is a Turkish-American composer, sound artist, and educator. Recent credits include: THE COPPER CHILDREN (Oregon Shakespeare Festival), THE FISHERMAN (HBO Films), THE BLACK HISTORY MUSEUM with Zoey Martinson (HERE Arts Center), PAUL SWAN IS DEAD AND GONE with Claire Kiechel (Civilians), WE WERE EVERYWHERE with Shariffa Ali (Princeton), SALONIKA (Berkeley REP) and THE WHITE CITY with Julia Gytri (Yale Institute, O’Neill NMTC), RATED BLACK with Kareem Lucas (New York Theater Workshop). His sound installations in a 100-year old grain silo with Buffalo, NY-based Torn Space Theater were featured at the 2019 Prague Quadrennial. In development: INSHALLAH/MASHALLAH - a 3-D-audio opera re-imagining of the 1,001 Nights (Target Margin Theater), and scores for several films. He is a Jonathan Larson Grant winner, Thom Thomas awardee, a Dramatists Guild Fellow, and has been in-residence with Exploring the Metropolis at JCAL, Hi-ARTS, Judson, New Dramatists, and Weston Playhouse. Avi is the resident composer at the 52nd Street Project and teaches a variety of collaborative art-making courses at NYU Tisch.
THIS BITCH!
Playwright Adrienne Dawes
Music by: Eric Johnson
Lyrics by: Adrienne Dawes, khattieq & Lope de Vega
OCT 15 7PM PT (Virtual)
OCT 17 3PM PT (Virtual and Live Watch Party at The Sofia, Sacramento, CA)
When Diana, a ruthless and power-hungry Pilates influencer, learns her social media manager Teodoro is hooking up with her makeup artist Madeinusa, it sparks bitter jealousy. Even though it would be social suicide for her to date someone with zero followers, Diana finds herself falling madly in love but if she can’t have Teodoro . . . no one can!
THIS BITCH: ESTA SANGRE QUIERO is a big, bawdy, bilingual Gen Z comedy inspired by Lope de Vega’s Golden Age epic “El perro del hortelano” and set in Tulum, México.
Adrienne Dawes (she/her) is a writer, producer, and teaching artist originally from Austin, TX. Her full-length plays have been produced by Salvage Vanguard Theater (Austin, TX), Sacred Fools (Los Angeles, CA), and American Theatre Company (Tulsa, OK). Adrienne has recently developed new work with Teatro Vivo, Salt Lake Acting Company, Queen City New Play Initiative, Workshop Theater, the Fire This Time Festival, and B Street Theatre. Adrienne is a 2020 MAPFund grantee and current resident artist with ColtCoeur. She is a member of the Dramatists Guild, ScriptWorks, and a company member of Salvage Vanguard Theater and In The Margin.
Follow her online at www.adriennedawes.com or @heckleher
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SINCERELY, GORDA by Angelina Moles (She/They)
OCT 8th at 7pm PT Live performance at the Sofia
Living in a fat body all of their life, Gorda has a couple questions for...well, everyone. Oh, and yes, please call her FAT, not curvy or thickk or chunky or big or plus size or obese, please don’t call them OBESE. Call them by her name, Gorda. Follow along with a journey of questions and movements that invite you to play with fat.
COMFORT by Joyce Torres (She/Her)
OCT 13th at 7pm PT
A clothesline is a news forecast to neighbors passing by, displaying both good times and bad, and Lola Rosa is airing out her truth for the very first time. In this story, we examine the life of a comfort woman, whose story is anything but. Comfort is a one-woman show based on the true story of Maria “Rosa” Henson, who at the age of 16 was taken by the Japanese forces in the Philippines during the height of World War II. Comfort resonates with the power that can only come from sharing a deeply personal story, breaking the silence that has been quietly sitting for years.
IS SEX by Jean Carlo Yunén Aróstegui (He/Him)
OCT 23rd at 7pm PT
IS SEX is a queer coming of sex play that follows Cristiano, a PhD candidate, through a sex trip through Europe after his tumultuous relationship with his on and off boyfriend ends in a train station in Rome. Encouraged by his friend Alma, Cristiano follows cheap thrills and excitement until he falls into the arms of Enzo, an Italian physicist that forces Cristiano to go deep within himself and take action within his own relationships.
23ANDME by Gabriela Ortega
Directed by Michelle Bossy
OCT 23rd at 8PM PT
*CLOSING SHOWCASE*
In-Person performance at The Sofia
Camila, a Dominican immigrant aching for her own spotlight, decides to celebrate her ten year anniversary in Los Angeles by staging a one-woman show around her 23andme results. However, an unexpected guest and a deep secret turn this search for laughs into a search for meaning.
ANGELINA MOLES is a Critical Fat Studies theorist and performance artist with a Master of Art's degree in Communication Studies. They use both she/her/hers and they/them/theirs pronouns when being referred to. Angelina is a fat activist whose work is centered in critiquing/unpacking thin privilege, ableism, and the medical industry for their creation and contribution to fatphobia and anti-fat stigmas. She is currently working on a creating a website dedicated to discussing fat liberation and is dipping their toes into burlesque dancing. Angelina is a performance artists who creates pieces that discuss and focus on the fat body and the way it is policed in a thin society. They have performed all over the Bay Area as well as San Diego, CA, Boise, ID, Seattle, WA, and Evanston, IL. Along with performing, Angelina is a plant parent who loves fat art, reality tv, and chocolate covered pretzels.
JOYCE TORRES is a storyteller, actorvist, and artist born and raised on the island of Guam. She has a BA in Fine Arts: Theatre with a minor in Political Science from the University of Guam (2014) and attended the Stella Adler Art of Acting Studio Professional Conservatory Program (2018). Based in Los Angeles, Joyce is a Jill of many trades. When she’s not writing, directing, or exploring new ways to tell stories, Joyce is a vocalist and cajon player in "Friends With
Instruments,” an all-girl acoustic island pop trio. In 2018, she premiered “Comfort,” a solo show
honoring the life of Maria “Lola Rosa” Henson, the first Filipina to publicly talk about her time as
a comfort woman during WWII. Joyce is an advocate for original works and enjoys creating
spaces that encourage diversity, inclusivity, and empathy. She believes the best theatre
connects strangers, starts conversations, and provides opportunities to listen and heal. Some of
her favorite roles have included: Vanda (Venus in Fur), Kendra (Gloria), and Caliban (The
Tempest).
JEAN CARLO YUNÉN ARÓSTEGUI (he/him) is a multi-medium, Spanish-Lebanese artist from the Dominican Republic. He is currently based out of Los Angeles, California where he serves as Associate Producer for the LATC (Los Angeles Theatre Center). As a celebrated award-winning photographer, Jean Carlo loves to explore the use of technology in his directing to create immersive virtual experiences. He’s in the process of producing a web series he co-created titled “Hello! We Are Ethnically Ambiguous!” which draws on people’s mislabeling and misconceptions of his identity while residing in Los Angeles. Jean Carlo is also set to co-direct a full production of an AR, immersive theater show for the fall of 2021 titled, “A Favored Nation.”
Education:
MFA Theatre dir. University of California, Los Angeles
Selected Credits:
Assistant Director, Destiny of Desire by Karen Zacarías
Cincinnati Playhouse | Assistant Director, Macbeth by William Shakespeare Oregon Shakespeare Festival | Co-Director, La Víctima By El Teatro de la Esperanza
Los Angeles Theatre Center + Community Tour
GABRIELA ORTEGA is a multi-disciplinary artist from the Dominican Republic. Gabriela is a writer/director of the Lena Waithe created “Rising Voices” initiative. Through the program, Hillman Grad Productions and Indeed produced Gabriela’s short film Huella which premiered at Tribeca in 2021. She is a Sundance Lab, Nalip Latino Media Market and HBO Tomorrow’s filmmakers today alum and most recently she was awarded best director of a live action short at LALIFF for her short film In Case I’m Next.
As an actor and writer, Gabriela is passionate about collaborating with fellow latine and artists of color in new play development. She originated the role of Diana in Liliana Padilla's Susan Blackburn award-winning play How to Defend Yourself since being part of an early workshop at the Ojai Playwrights Conference. Her solo show, "23nMe '' was originally conceived during the 2021 IAMA under30 lab and will be further developed through the inaugural Sundance Institute Interdisciplinary fellowship under the direction of award-winning director Michelle Bossy. Theatre credits include: How to Defend Yourself (Lincoln Center Theatre, Humana Festival 2019), Electricidad in Luis Alfaro's Electricidad (Center Theatre Group), Las Mujeres del Mar (Playwright's Arena), Member's Only (Los Angeles Theatre Center), Lovesick (Victory Gardens Theatre). She is a graduate of the University of Southern California's BFA acting program, and a proud ensemble member of In the Margin.