Free Reading of SPARK Set for 11/11 at Stages Repertory Theatre

A free staged reading of Caridad Svich's new play SPARK will be presented on Sunday evening, November 11th at 7:00pm. The reading is a community partnership with The Women's Center and De Bakey Veteran's Hospital, and will be directed by Eva Laporte. Ms. Laporte first directed Caridad Svich's work ten years ago, with selections from her Alchemy of Desire/Dead Man's Blues, and acted in another of Svich's reading schemes, The Way of Water earlier this year. The reading cast will feature Timothy Eric Dickson (Main Street Theater: Woof), Florence Garvey (Landing Theatre: In the Blood), Michelle Ogletree (Classical Theater Company: Miss Julie), Brittny Bush and Wayne De Hart (Stages: Hank Williams: Lost Highway)

Caridad is thrilled for SPARK to have its Houston premiere reading at Stages Repertory Theatre. "It is truly an honor to be able to share SPARK with the Houston community, and Stages Repertory Theatre, who has a longstanding history of presenting new theatre. The lives of the families of our veterans, women in service and returning from service, and the ecology of the cities and towns in which we live are very much at stake, as we collectively come to terms with the wars in Iraq and the eleven years the US military has been in Afghanistan. Houston is a port city, where so many stories of empowerment, dispossession, power and class are brought to bear. On the gulf coast, battered as we have been by forces of nature and humans, the stories of war and aftermath live on our skins and soil. I hope that the evening of SPARK offers, through art, a little bit of spiritual healing."

This work, which is about a family of sisters who live in North Carolina, one of whom is a returning veteran from a recent war, is being made available for local presentations during the month of November (and selected venues in October) in time for Veteran’s Day and around the national US elections. The national script reading scheme has been developed to honor US war veterans, shed light on the plight of female veterans in particular, and to raise increased awareness for their stories, by NoPassport theatre alliance & press, an unincorporated collective dedicated to the advocacy, production and publication of works expressive of cross-cultural and aesthetic diversity in the arts.

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