MediaRites' Theatre Diaspora is selling tickets for the world premiere production of "
Here On This Bridge: The –Ism Project" (by Josie Seid, Samson Syharath, Yasmin Ruvalcaba, Heather Raffo, Bonnie Ratner, Roberta Hunte and Dmae Roberts) directed by Catherine Ming T'ien Duffly.
Performances will be January 24-27 and February 7-10, 2018 at Portland State University’s Boiler Room Theatre, Lincoln Hall, 1620 SW Park Avenue, Portland, Oregon.
Tickets prices are multi-tiered suggested donation between $10-20, with $5 Arts for All and Student tickets. The first four shows are are part of the Fertile Ground Festival in Portland. There are only eight shows total in a 60-seat intimate house.
https://theismproject.brownpapertickets.com,
Born of a desire to bridge divides in Oregon communities by creating art that would inspire community dialogues, TheatreDisaspora brought the finest director, writers and actors together on an artistic mission to find a common thread of intersectionality of race with gender, orientation and national origin and bring much needed empathy with these monologues:
"Being Me in The Current America" by Josie Seid
"See Her Strength" by Samson Syharath
"Carmelita" by Yasmin Ruvalcaba
"Lockdown Drills" by Heather Raffo
"That Diversity Thing" by Bonnie Ratner & Roberta Hunte
"Harvest" by Dmae Roberts
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| Josie Seid |
Josie Seid is a member of the LineStorm Playwrights collective and has produced several works in partnership for their Portland in Play 2016 and 2017 productions, she wrote the short plays Jordan’s Wisdom and The Portland Colored School: A Lesson in Reading Between the Lines she also wrote the short play, Overdue for the Short and Sweet short play festival in 2017. Her plays This is Message 13 and Stand By Me have also been featured in Profile Theater’s 24 hour short play festivals in 2017 and 2018.
Her full length play Petite Dames was highlighted by both the Reading Parlor and 2017 Fertile Ground and was a Kilroy List nominee. Look for her newest play, The Great God of the Dark Storm Cloud as a reading in this years Fertile Ground at Artists Rep. in February.
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| Samson Syharath |
Samson Syharath is a multidisciplinary artist, producer, instructor, and administrator focusing on visibility of Asian-American artists and under-served communities. After receiving a B.A. from the University of Arkansas - Fort Smith, Samson trained at the Portland Actors Conservatory where he is currently Associate Artistic Director. He was part of the Theatre Communications Group Rising Leaders of Color Cohort in 2017 featured by American Theatre Magazine and was the recipient of the Portland Civic Theatre Guild's Leslie O. Fulton Fellowship that same year. Samson is also a founding company member of MediaRites' Theatre Diaspora (Oregon's only professional Asian American/Pacific Island theatre company) and a company member at Theatre Vertigo. www.samson.actor
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| Yasmin Ruyalcaba |
Yasmin Ruvalcaba, a graduate from Williams College, has been a strong advocate for increasing diversity, representation, and engagement in the theatre community. As a director, writer, and community organizer, she continues this work through various roles at Advance Gender Equity, Bag & Baggage, Milagro, PCS, and other theatre entities
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| Heather Raffo |
Heather Raffo is an award-winning playwright and actress. Her first play 9 Parts of Desire, which The New Yorker called “an example of how art can remake the world”, ran off Broadway for nine months and has played across the U.S. and internationally over the last decade. More recently, her libretto for the opera Fallujah, was heard at the Kennedy Center’s International Theater Festival and at New York City Opera. And her most recent play NOURA just finished a run in D.C., Abu Dhabi and at Playwrights Horizons in NYC. www.heatherraffo.com.
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| Bonnie Ratner |
Bonnie Ratner’s plays can be seen on several Portland stages this theatre season: Look for Hazardous Beauty, PassinArt: A Theatre Company, and Cop Out: Beyond Black, White and Blue, August Wilson Red Door Project. Bonnie is honored to be part of the world premiere of From Here on This Bridge!
Dr. Roberta Hunte is an educator, facilitator, researcher, mother, and cultural worker. She is an Assistant Professor in Child, Youth and Family Studies at Portland State University and facilitates trainings on equity, diversity and inclusion. She is a collaborator on the play We are BRAVE, My Walk Has Never Been Average, and the short film Sista in the Brotherhood, the later two projects are informed by her research on Black tradeswomen. Her focus areas are women of color feminisms, equity and inclusion, and reproductive justice.
Dmae Roberts has received two Peabody awards, the Suzanne Ahn Civil Rights/Social Justice award (Asian American Journalists Association) and is United States Artists Fellow. Her plays are published in Temple University and Alexander Press. Picasso in the Back Seat which premiered at Artists Rep, won the Drammy and Oregon Book Award. Janie Bigo, Breaking Glass, Mei Mei, Lady Buddha, and Forbidden Dreams, were produced in Portland, Seattle, Los Angeles and NYC. She is MediaRites’ executive producer and Theatre Diaspora. Her book is The Letting Go Trilogies: Stories of a Mixed-Race Family.
The ensemble of actors involved in performing the monologues include Shareen Jacobs, Samson Syharath, Sofia Molina, Dre Slaman, Shelley B. Shelley, Jane Vogel, and Larry Toda.
The Portland production was made possible with support from Ronni Lacroute, the Regional Arts and Culture Council, Multnomah County Cultural Coalition, The Collins Foundation, Reed College Theatre Department, and Portland State University College of Arts School of Music and Theatre.
