Orphan Sea
Performances: November 30-December 6 at 8pm (Saturday 2pm & 8pm; Sunday at 2pm) at the Janet Kinghorn Bernhard Theater on the Skidmore College Campus
The Skidmore College Department of Theater is pleased to announce the
premiere of a multilingual version of The Orphan Sea by Caridad Svich, 2012 Lifetime
Achievement OBIE award winner. Director Eunice Ferreira, Skidmore theater professor,
innovatively infuses the play with multiple languages, song, poetry, film and dance to invite
audiences on a metatheatrical journey.
SYNOPSIS: The Orphan Sea is a multimedia theater experience that weaves the myth of Odysseus
and Penelope with global stories of migration. With the playwright’s permission, Ferreira and a
diverse cast of actors created the multilingual version in rehearsal. As playwright Svich describes,
“This is a story of us, here, now, and also of who we were once. It is a story of those that cross
rivers and seas and those that wait for them, of a lover who searches for one lost years ago, and
of someone called Penelope, who may be waiting for someone called Odysseus.”
FROM THE DIRECTOR: In rehearsing The Orphan Sea, director Eunice Ferreira asks: “How do we
respond to global crises of displaced people and environmental threats on our Facebook news
feed? What does it mean to cross digital, linguistic and physical borders?” Born to parents who
immigrated to the United States, Ferreira explains that the play evokes notions of migration, exile,
diaspora, refugees and border crossings. “While riffing on the myth of Odysseus and Penelope,
we hope to take audiences on a multilingual, metatheatrical journey across time and geographies
of space using installations of song, poetry, film and dance. The Orphan Sea draws on myth to
bring the global past, present and future into collision.” Ferreira’s research centers on global
performance and identity. In addition to directing, she teaches a range of courses that engage
theater with history, translation, theory, race/ethnicity, and culture.
ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT: Caridad Svich is an internationally celebrated playwright and translator. Her numerous awards include the 2012 Obie award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theater. Svich has been closely involved with this production, collaborating with Ferreira and the cast in rehearsal to bring this production to life. Svich delivered a public talk to the Skidmore and Saratoga Springs community at the Tang Museum in October. On Thursday, December 1st she will participate in a post show discussion. “I have always been intrigued with the plays of Caridad Svich and by her impassioned writings on art and activism,” explains Ferreira. “I knew that I wanted to work with multiple languages to diversify and expand the global scope of theater making at Skidmore. The first playwright I contacted was Caridad Svich.”
Tickets: $12 general admission and $8 for students and senior citizens. To reserve seats, call the Skidmore Theater Box Office at (518) 580-5439, email boxoffice@skidmore.edu or find us online on Facebook or at skidmore.edu/academics/theater/.
**Photos by Sue Kessler