The 2008 Words Afire Festival will premiere plays by national award winners in UNM’s Dramatic Writing Program. This year’s Festival includes Greek tragedies and comedies told through a New Mexico lens, stories of a search for redemption, longing for connection in outer space, struggle to find justice in genocide, a send up of the use of land grants and panic on Central Avenue. All performances will be in UNM’s Rodey Theatre and Experimental Theatre, Center for the Arts, April 17-27.
Adaptations of classic Greek plays include “Pajaros de Mi Sangre: My Blood Birds” by Don Garcia, based on Aristophanes’ “The Birds;” “The Medea Complex” by Patricia Crespin, based on Euripides’ “Medea;” “Aurora: an Adaptation of Alcestis” by Leonard Madrid; and “NUMUNU WAIIPU – THE COMANCHE WOMEN” by Terry Gomez, based on Euripides’ “The Trojan Women.”
There is an evening of one act plays: “Connect: Unravel” by Kamarie Chapman, “April Disappears into Thin Air” by Shannon Rogers and new work by Marz Mráz, “The Feather,” which follows the life of a young man from New Mexico who survives a siege during the Vietnam War through the magic of a feather given to him by his wife.
“PANIC” (the Central Street Project) by Amber Cannon, Theodore Jackson, Magdalene Gallegos and Danae Lopez, marks the first time the festival has commissioned a project. “PANIC” is being written by a group of playwrights who are building an evening off of a common theme.
Special guests for the 2008 Words Afire Festival are directors Scott Vehill and Sheila Tousey and designer Justin Townsend.
Tickets are $15 general, $10 faculty and seniors, and $8 UNM staff and students for performances in Rodey Theatre and $10 general, $8 faculty and seniors, and $7 UNM staff and students for performances in the Experimental Theatre.
Tickets are available at the UNM Ticket Offices, unmtickets.com or 925-5858. For a schedule and more information visit theatre.unm.edu or call 277-4332.
Media Contact: Sari Krosinsky, (505) 277-1593; e-mail: michal@unm.edu