LAB Series: One Who is Home

Cast & Creative Team

Written by Irie and Olivia

Poster, Set/Lighting/Sound/Costumes designed by Irie and Olivia

Run time: approx. 45 minutes

Creators' Notes

A Note from Irie: 

This play started last semester in Voice Release. Olivia and I were the only two students in the class. This gave much space to explore areas we were interested in. With the guidance of Lauren Roth, we made a little piece for our final, and that’s where this show started from. Though it has morphed over time, we started with wanting to create a story between two people trying to connect. Even as the plot has changed throughout the spring, summer, and fall, connection has remained a main theme for One Who is Home.

I have had difficulty in the past finding characters that feel well rounded and complex, that also share identities that I hold. I feel like much of the time, the character that has the most intriguing parts to them are rarely meant for me to inhabit. As a female theatre maker, I want for complex female characters. As a queer artist, I also want to see my experience reflected by the art I consume. Having characters that are people first and their identities second allows for nuance and discussion that at times, feels overlooked. Though this show has queer women in it, it is not a gay play; these characters just are. This is a story about people and their connection with the ones around them and themselves. I hope this story helps people who resonate with it feel seen. This show is not intended to portray a single universal experience, but if certain aspects ring true, we have made something that reflects the world. 

Olivia has been the best collaborator to work with. I have grown immensely as an artist and a person throughout this process, and most, if not all of that, is due to having someone to ask the right questions and explore the things I would have not thought to look at. We put many hours into this little world, and I am lucky to say I did it with a wonderful artist and a wonderful partner. 

Thank you for coming. 

-Irie

A Note from Olivia:

Last spring, Irie and I were all two of the students enrolled in a class called Voice Release, and we were fully introduced to Devising. Encouraged to use our own voices to express ourselves, it was there that we wrote the poems, monologues, and songs that later became One Who is Home. 

At the heart of our craft, Irie and I want to make stuff! We are both artistically inclined in multiple ways, so taking on this show as a team of two was a creative privilege as well as challenge. As the playwrights, performers, and designers, we got to wear a lot of hats, and we hope all the love we put into this story reaches you all from the stage. 

At the heart of this play, is connection.  Regardless of identity, we all want to feel loved. For Davie, the idea of someone loving her feels impossible, and actually letting them do so, an insurmountable task. Not because she’s queer, but because she doesn’t know how to connect. This is the part of the story that Irie and I were most interested in.  What happens when we shut out the potential for someone to turn on the light—to brighten our lives? And what happens when we decide that we have been in the darkness for long enough?

I am fortunate enough to have light in each and every day. 

To the first of many projects with my dear one, my home. 

-Olivia

Special Thanks: 

Lauren Roth, Curt Philips, Jon Brophy, Matthew Olsen, Katy Lacy, Tom Isbell, Jack Senske, Nick Wright

Land Acknowledgement

The Department of Theatre acknowledges that the Marshall Performing Arts Center is located on ancestral lands of Indigenous people, land that was cared for and called home by the Ojibwe people, before them, the Dakota and Northern Cheyenne people, and before them, other Native peoples from time immemorial. Ceded by the Ojibwe in an 1854 treaty, this land holds great historical, spiritual, and personal significance for its original stewards, the Native nations of this region.

UMD Theatre's Lab Series

The UMD Theatre Lab Series offers a platform for student artists to conceptualize and innovate theatrical opportunities in various stages of realization. Artists are challenged to step into new roles, go outside of their comfort zones, and commit to a process of learning through creative risk-taking. The Lab Series serves as an extension of the artist’s creative training and development, with the intention of cultivating opportunities for collaboration, discovery, and learning through doing. 

Thank you for joining us in this inaugural season!