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DIVAfest 2007
April 26 - May 26, 2007
DIVAfest, an annual theater festival dedicated to creating new plays
and work by women writers. Produced by EXIT Theatre.
| PRESS PHOTOS | . |
DIVAfest 2007 featured the mainstage premiere of Crystal Daze by Deborah Eubanks, a Sassy & Seductive DIVAfest Cabaret, readings of Alchemical Fragments by Diane di Prima, Workshop Productions of four plays-in-progress and the art of Kristen Tradowsky
CRYSTAL DAZE, HUMAN HANDS, AN AFFAIR OF HONOR, OBSSESSED, THE OTHER CHOICE, ALCHEMICAL FRAGMENTS, DIVAfest CABARET
WATERCOLOR BY KIRSTEN TRADOWSKY
CRYSTAL
DAZE
by Deborah Eubanks
Co-directed by Michelle Talgarow
& Deborah Eubanks
DIVAfest Mainstage Premiere
Crystal Daze, the methamphetamine seductress, weaves her way into the lives of two young women and challenges their mothers for possession of their daughters. Based on true stories, Crystal Daze, explores the world of teens who turn to this drug as the perfect coping method. Featuring Christina Augello, Sadie Lune, Lizzie Sell, Cheryl Smith & Joelle Wagner; set & light design Amanda Ortmayer, sound design Jack “Applejack” Walroth, choreography Jessica Fudim, costumes Lisa Eldrige.
PHOTO: LAURIE GALLANT
hosted by Sean Owens with Don Seaver
Featuring newly developed material including Legs As Smooth As Glass, One Way ATM and Revolving Door by Bay Area singers and songwriters Alison Bloomfield, Lua Hadar, Mia Paschal, Janet Roitz, Amy Tobin, Diane Valory and poetess Pireeni Sundaralingam. Original musical compositions by Don Seaver at the piano and Otto Huber on percussion. MC’d by the ever sassy & seductive Sean Owens.
F
PHOTO: KENT TAYLOR
WORKSHOP
PRODUCTION SERIES
Four new plays from idea to finished script, developed over a 6 month period.
Presented to the public twice. Join us and watch them grow. Discussion &
Refreshments follow each reading.
by Kerry Reid
Sarah McKereghan director/dramaturge
In an otherworldly cafe run by Mary Mallon (aka “Typhoid Mary”) the proprietress tangles with her latest customer: Ignac Semmelweis, the Hungarian doctor who, in 1840’s Vienna, discovered the link between hand-washing and the prevention of disease in hospitals. As the two spar, scenes from their past lives illustrate their common isolation as foreigners, and the ongoing struggle for humans to strike the balance between collective safety and individual liberties.
PHOTO: LAURIE GALLANT
by Lee Kiszonas
Adriana Baer director/dramaturge
The story of Julie D’Aubigny, a cross dressing sword fighting opera diva forced to fight in Parisian taverns for francs until she is discovered by Philippe Duc D’Orleans who takes her to Marseilles to sing in the opera. There she meets and falls in love with Bette, who believes Julie is a man. Ultimately she is unmasked and the horrified Bette runs away and joins a convent. A gender bending plan to spring Bette from the convent backfires as Julie is challenged to a duel to the death from the betrayed Bette.
PHOTO: LAURIE GALLANT
by Maria Rokas
Laura Ellen Smith director/dramaturge
When seventeen-year-old Zoe asks her parents for plastic surgery as a high school graduation gift, Mom and Dad can’t make sense of it. As they sift through an environment filled with reality TV, tabloid journalism, and the Internet for someone or something to blame, they’re faced with just how much the world has changed since they were Zoe’s age.
PHOTO: LAURIE GALLANT
By Carrie Kartman & Jennifer Berry
Jayne Wenger director/dramaturge
As two writers living side-by-side pursue their dreams, their lives spin off in opposite directions. Kate, high strung, artistic, and slightly scattered has a career beyond her wildest dreams, but the family she always envisioned has not materialized. Susan, pragmatic and fiery, sees her once-promising writing career disintegrating when she stays home to raise twins, soon followed by a third baby.
PHOTO: LAURIE GALLANT
Diane di Prima
Beat poet Diane di Prima never practiced laboratory alchemy but her interest goes back to 1965 when she first came across the work of Paracelsus. Over the past forty years, alchemical poems have “arrived” in her notebooks. Diane will be reading from this unpublished manuscript, from excerpts of some of the great alchemists of the past and share other poems of hers that are rooted in the study and practice of Western Magick, followed by Q&A.
PHOTO: DAVID SHORT
Kirsten Tradowsky, DIVAfest's 2007 visual artist, is a painter and recent graduate of the MFA program at The California Collage of the Arts. She will be exhibiting a new collection of her oil and watercolor paintings. These painting entwine past and present traditions found within theater history and its female icons. A true lover and gazer of the actress, her work is inspired by vintage photographs, dreams, and interactions with theater. Painting will be shown at the EXIT Theatre venues during DIVAFest and she is the designer of this year's artwork.
EXIT Theatre and DIVAfest are partially funded by San Francisco Grants for the Arts, San Francisco Art Commission, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Phyllis C. Wattis Foundation, National Endowment for the Arts, Mary Wohlford Foundation, LEF Foundation, Zellerbach Family Foundation, the Bernard Osher Foundation, Hilton Hotel, Gerbode Foundation, and Dramatists Guild Fund and individual contributions.