2013-2014 Season Brings Original Production and Two Regional Premieres
Looking for Lilith Produces Work By Two Contemporary Women
with Idiosyncratic Voices
For our 2013-14 season, Looking for Lilith Theatre Company is excited to produce not only one of LFL’s most-loved original scripts, but also two contemporary women playwrights with unique and original voices, Annie Baker and Catherine Filloux. All three scripts absolutely live into LFL’s mission to examine history and interrogate today from women’s experiences. . .frequently lifting up unheard or underheard voices.
We kick off our season with a revival of Looking for Lilith’s oft-requested original Class of ’70, which hasn’t been seen in Louisville since its premiere in 2004. Class of ’70 is a powerful, fun, challenging play that celebrates the living history of women who came of age on college campuses 1966-1970 during the second wave of feminism. During this time, a spirit of liberation gripped the youth of America, and movements such as the Civil Rights Movement and the protest of the war in Vietnam were flourishing. Women were very involved in these political movements, and through fighting to liberate others, women began to seek liberation for themselves. Inspired by the consciousness-raising groups of that time, who believed in the power of sharing stories, LFL collected stories about the exciting personal, social and political changes these women experienced. Audiences described the show as important, awesome, excellent and tremendous and in New York City and in Louisville they nodded their heads, fell laughing out of their chairs, shook their heads with sorrow, tapped their toes to the music and jumped to their feet at the end! Class of ’70 is once again relevant as political and social dynamics clash with those freedoms and advances for which our mothers, aunts, and friends stood up.
Looking for Lilith’s 2014 Women’s History Month production is Catherine Filloux’s Luz, which received its world premiere in 2013 at LaMama Experimental Theatre Club, NYC. Ms. Filloux has a long tradition of using theatre to address human rights and social justice issues, and her more than twenty plays have been produced in New York and around the world. As East Village Arts’ review says, “The best theater is the vehicle for a message that cannot be communicated any other way. Though words are powerful, they’re not all encompassing… Luz expresses issues of multinational and individual contention more elegantly and emotionally than lectures or articles on the subject could hope to.” Luz exposes the global scale of gender-based violence and the collusion between human rights and corporate law practices. From the garbage dump in Guatemala City, to the tent cities in Haiti, to the toxic oil ponds where birds expire, Luz, Helene and Zia search for hope in the unlikeliest in-between places. This is a play that is at once volatile and tender, entertaining and surreal. Artistic Director Shannon Woolley Allison is “delighted that we are producing a contemporary woman playwright whose work lifts up unheard voices, like those of the women with whom Looking for Lilith works with in Guatemala.”
LFL’s May show is Body Awareness by Obie award-winning NYC playwright Annie Baker. In this warm edgy smart comedy, it’s Body Awareness Week at Shirley College in Vermont. The non-traditional household of Shirley College professor Phyllis, high school teacher Joyce and their possibly autistic adult son Jared, is shaken to the core by the visiting photographer of female nudes, Frank, and his ‘male gaze.’ Sexuality, identity, body image, relationships, feminist critique, role modeling and political-correctness get stirred up in this important script, which, states examiner.com, is “brimming with just as many heartfelt moments as hilarious ones.” Ms. Baker’s plays have been workshopped at the Sundance Theatre Institute where, says Lab Artistic Director Philip Hamburg, Ms. Baker’s generation of emerging playwrights has one claim…“The intellect is really, really sharp, yet it’s not cynical.”
Once again, Looking for Lilith will offer pre-season flex passes, $50 for three shows if purchased by September 1. Individual tickets will be $18 for adults, $15 for students and seniors, with rates for groups of ten or more at $12 per ticket. Exact dates and locations TBA. For more information about Looking for Lilith’s original productions, previous seasons, and extensive outreach programming – including in Guatemala – go to www.lookingforlilith.org
The Kentucky Arts Council, the state arts agency, provides operating support to Looking for Lilith with state tax dollars and federal funding from the National Endowment for the Arts.