SOLO VOICES WORKSHOP:
A DIGITAL FESTIVAL
Building solo shows in the age of social distancing
Curated by RTE Member Kristen Osborn
Wednesday April 29 – Saturday May 2, 2020
ABOUT THE FESTIVAL:
Originally conceived as an in-person new play festival of one-woman shows, Rivendell Theatre Ensemble presents a digital pivot of its inaugural Solo Voices Workshop: a celebration and exploration of the development process of four new one-woman plays written and performed by Chicago artists. Over the course of the digital festival, online audiences will explore process-generated content from digital workshops of four new plays–When Given the Choice, Bleed by Kimberly Dixon-Mays, Tidy by Kristin Idaszak, Aping Jane by Aurora Real de Asua, and The Inside by Lydia R. Diamond.
Thanks to Elizabeth F. Cheney Foundation for generously funding this project.
Hungry to watch the plays? Rivendell will be hosting a public reading of all of the Solo Voices plays when we’re able to gather in the theater once again. Until then, we appreciate you engaging with the artistic conversations that took place during our digital workshop. Get the latest updates from the Solo Voices projects! CLICK HERE to sign up!
Take a peek!
FESTIVAL LINEUP
Aping Jane
Written and performed by Aurora Real de Asua
Directed by Brenna DiStasio and Paul Michael Thomson
In collaboration with The Story Theatre
Take a peek into the process!
Digital content to be released Wednesday, April 29th at 5pm
How was it that one untrained secretary was able to communicate with a species overlooked by an entire scientific community? Much has been said about the brilliance behind Jane Goodall’s work, but this new play seeks to illuminate an often overlooked factor of this extraordinary woman: her outrageously courageous compassion. Using a mixture of clowning, puppetry, and animal work, Aping Jane takes you through the jungle and back to unearth the heart behind one of the 20th century’s most influential scientists.
Tidy
by Kristin Idaszak
Directed by RTE member Kristen Osborn
Performed by RTE member Paula Ramirez
Take a peek into the process!
Digital content to be released Thursday, April 30th at 5:00pm
A struggling detective novelist recently read a self-help book about how to be happy. Actually, it’s about how to tidy. As she cleans her house, the novelist excavates her own personal history, and the history of the planet. Tidy examines the holes in our lives that we try to fill through consumption, and how we decide what to keep and what to leave behind. Who and what will survive the sixth mass extinction? And will it spark joy?
When Given the Choice, Bleed
by Kimberly Dixon-Mays
Directed by Rashada Dawan
Take a peek into the process!
Digital content to be released Friday, May 1st at 5:00pm
In this solo, five-character play, four Black women of different ages and eras encounter a trace of blood. In each ordinary moment, the women realize they must decide who or what to leave behind, like those blood traces, to live the lives they choose. As the women’s times and spaces seep into each other, their decisions unwittingly stain the others with consequences. Blood follows these veins closely, questioning why such consequences dirty their hands instead. This play reminds us that some stories of Black women’s heroic survival flow from everyday choices in tiny drops.
The Inside
by Lydia R. Diamond, adapted by Tasia A. Jones and Amira Danan
Performed by Amira Danan
Directed by Tasia A. Jones
Take a peek into the process!
Digital content to be released Saturday, May 2nd at 12:00pm
An intellectually savvy, and emotionally vulnerable African-American college graduate finds herself at yet another “painfully liberal, post-collegiate, anti- establishment, artistic event.” The Inside, written by Lydia R. Diamond and adapted and re-imagined by Tasia A. Jones and Amira Danan, wanders through the landscape of a Black woman’s mind and soul as she comes to terms with her position as an outsider.