06/07 Season
November 16 - 26
Black Box at the Rose
| NOVEMBER 2006 |
| SUN |
MON |
TUE |
WED |
THU |
FRI |
SAT |
| |
|
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16
8pm |
17
8pm |
18
8pm |
19
2pm
5:30pm |
20 |
21
|
22
8pm |
23 |
24
8pm |
25
8pm |
26
2pm
5:30pm |
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|
|
|
|
|
FACING EAST is a world premiere parable for our place and time by noted LDS author Carol Lynn Pearson.
August Miller/Deseret Morning News |
Ruth and Alex McCormick are an upstanding Mormon couple reeling from the suicide of their gay son. In FACING EAST, they are stuck between the comfort of their faith and the unfamiliarity of their new reality when they encounter their son’s partner, Marcus, for the first time.
The world premiere of FACING EAST features Jayne Luke (AEA, Plan-B’s ANIMAL FARM), Charles Lynn Frost (Plan-B’s THE LARAMIE PROJECT) and Jay Perry (Plan-B’s RADIO HOUR, TRAGEDY: A TRAGEDY). Ms. Pearson will be present at all performances of FACING EAST and there will be post-show discussions following the performances on Friday, November 7, Wednesday, November 22 and Friday, November 24.
Chris Detrick/The Salt Lake Tribune
STATEMENT FROM THE PLAYWRIGHT:
A couple of years ago I was taking a weekend playwriting seminar, and the teacher surprised me with his very first instruction. "Pick up your pen and write down the subject of a new play you want to write and list the reasons you are not writing it. You have two minutes." I hadn't come for that. I had come to do more work on a play I had already written. Quick. What is a new play I want to write? I put pen to paper and without thinking wrote, "Mormon family confronts suicide of gay son."
August Miller/Deseret Morning News |
Dramatic. Important, urgent even. Clearly in line with my life's work. My Mormon temple marriage to a gay man and subsequent events had filled my life with a realization of how badly we—society and especially religious communities like mine–deal with homosexuality, and how condemnation and hopelessness too often drive gay people to suicide. The suicide attempt of a gay man who had become a dear friend still haunted me. And I knew that Utah's statistics on suicide—now placing the state first in the nation for suicides of men 15-24—was itself a cry for help.
What is better equipped to answer that cry than drama? Nothing I know of has the immediate magic that invites one person into the heart of another like theatre does. Soon three characters began to speak to me. And before long they had a story in FACING EAST. I am deeply grateful to Jerry Rapier and Plan-B Theatre for creating a home for this work. - Carol Lynn Pearson, Playwright
| Playwright: |
Carol Lynn Pearson |
| Director: |
Jerry Rapier (SSDC) |
| Stage Manager: |
Jennifer Freed (AEA) |
| Costume Designer: |
Jerry Rapier |
| Lighting Designer: |
Cory Thorell |
| Set Designer: |
Randy Rasmussen |
| Sound Designer: |
Cheryl Ann Cluff |
FACING EAST coincides with the 20th anniversary of Pearson’s seminal book Goodbye, I Love You, the story of her life with her gay husband Gerald, their 12-year Mormon temple marriage, four children, divorce, ongoing friendship, and his death from AIDS in her home, where she cared for him. Pearson’s new book, NO MORE GOODBYES: CIRCLING THE WAGONS AROUND OUR GAY LOVED ONES, will be available at performances of FACING EAST. Copies of the script of FACING EAST will be available for sale in the lobby following each performance, as well as other books by Ms. Pearson.
Listen to KUER's Radio West inverview here.
Rave Reviews for FACING EAST
The Salt Lake Tribune
Deseret Morning News
