In the printed program, Nicholas Perez-Hoop’s bio accidentally includes information about another performer due to a bad cut and paste (and proofing) job. Ignore all that stuff at the end about him being from Panama City and married and all that. 🙂
Also, an old headshot of Kathryn Huettel was run instead of her current one. The one here to the left was what she sent in.
Joy Cadman served as Assistant Lighting Designer, but joined the team after the program went to print.
We apologies for the omissions!
My plea to the viewer:
First of all, we are all so thankful to have you in our home. This 105-year-old play, which has been incomplete ever since the ending was lost after Federico García Lorca’s death, has had a long journey to the stage as you see it now. This thing is now equally all of ours: it belongs to the cast who created it from the ground up, to our composer and choreographer who worked with me to define and shape a theatrical ritual, the designers who created the lush aesthetic and built the world you are in. This is ours, this is theirs, and this is about to be yours.
I want to make sure that everyone understands this is not a literal play about bugs. Symbolism was the cornerstone of García Lorca’s style, he uses these insects to get at much deeper, extraordinarily human themes. Many of the symbols are polysemous, capable of multiple competing meanings — for instance a butterfly can represent both love and death. The ambiguity — in particular how this show ends — is intentional and we’ve intentionally tried to create space where YOU can ponder these things and arrive at your own conclusions. Resist the urge to try strapping this play down into a chair and forcing a confession out of it. That’s not the point, it isn’t a test to get the right answers on. This isn’t an argument to win in the comments section. Your interpretation really can’t be wrong, and honestly I’d love to hear about every possibility.
I hope you’ll simply open yourself up and be swept away. Turn your phone off, ignore the people you came with — there’ll be plenty of time to talk to them about the show once it ends (and we really do hope it inspires conversation after).
Tune out everything on the other side of these four walls if for just the 70 or so minutes’ traffic of this thing we conjured up out of dust for you.
I feel strongly to have the best experience with us that you should breathe in deep with us as we begin, joining us, immersing yourself in the rich language and ideas of Spain’s greatest poet.
What follows is no longer a director’s note, but context for what this show means to me and why I hope it matters to you, too.
“What Ever Happened to the Dreamers Inside Us?”
What ever happened to the dreamers inside us?That was the tagline to a pretty iconic Jobsite show, The March of the Kitefliers (2005, 2007). Those were much different times for a lot of reasons. We were all a lot younger. Some of us aren’t here any longer. Some are still with us, but got married and had families or simply went down other paths. Those can all be seen not just as endings but as transformations. Transcending, or simply moving on, from one stage to another (not to be too on the nose with the Butterfly metaphor).
The support we needed wasn’t under attack at every level (it’s crazy I’m over here pining for the days of W). Of course, audiences *were* more curious back then in the general. Between all that and the fact that for most of us it wasn’t about getting paid, it allowed us to be a lot more experimental and develop new work like Kitefliers.
“What Ever Happened to the Dreamers Inside Us?”
I’ve been at this a long time, 27 years of making here, and I’m not sure I’ve been more down about the general state of the world. My anxiety and existential dread has been at an all time high since last fall. We’ve done a lot of really good work this season, don’t get me wrong, but it’s hard sometimes to keep going while silently screaming at every moment worrying if people are going to show up, if the money is going to last, if my house is going to make it through a storm, if our democracy is going to totally fail …
It’s been hard to find my Dreamer.
I grew up without many friends, but my family always encouraged my creativity. I played alone in the woods by our house in Oceanway, doing voices just for the owls and the trees. I made “robots” out of shoeboxes and cardboard tubes with light-up gizmos Frankenteined out of broken electronics. The OG Boba Fett figure (May the Fourth Be With You) I sent away for — before you could even buy one in a store — got run over by my grandfather’s lawnmower because I left him in the “Great Pit of Carkoon” I’d made in the front yard. Yeah, I’ve always been a little “out there.” It’s never lost on me I’ve been lucky enough to go from making believe to MAKING believe.
My Dreamer hasn’t been totally extinguished, I’m not suggesting that. There have been flashes, even if they feel sometimes to appear further and further apart.
We put off THE BUTTERFLY’S EVIL SPELL last year for of a lot of practical reasons — real and potential. When we lost $100k in funding for this season between the state cutting all funding and a foundation going on hiatus, I almost did it again.
Thankfully, the Dreamer in me prevailed.
The past 4 weeks have been invigorating. To be in that room with this group of 15 collaborators has been a welcome distraction, and it’s been so satisfying to watch each of them shine and come together to give this thing a beautiful, delicate beating heart and soul.
As I watched our final run of tech weekend I said to myself, “look at these gorgeous, glorious fucking Dreamers and this thing they’ve made.” I always want to leave tech Sunday with the belief “we have a show,” and we do.
I’m so excited to have an audience to share this with. If you are reading this from your seat — thank you for being here.
If you’re just reading this online and you’re anything like me when it comes to *all this* as I wave about generally, I hope you find the time by June 1 to escape into our little dewdrop meadow. To laugh, to be transported, to ponder Very Big Things through the many eyes of these very small creatures. To find your Dreamer who’s been sitting in that dark waiting room hoping you’d show back up.
These bugs, oddly, may very well help the two of you reconnect. They have for me.
Also, an old headshot of Kathryn Huettel was run instead of her current one. The one here to the left was what she sent in.
We put off THE BUTTERFLY’S EVIL SPELL last year for of a lot of practical reasons — real and potential. When we lost $100k in funding for this season between the state cutting all funding and a foundation going on hiatus, I almost did it again.
