Since 2008, local playwright Lisa Sniderman has lived with a progressive muscle weakness disease called Dermatomyositis. She also has Common Variable Immune Deficiency (CVID), meaning she struggles to make antibodies, requiring her to avoid crowded public gatherings, especially recently during COVID-19.
As a result, she has really missed going to live theater, so she took it upon herself to write “The Grieving Project.”
“‘The Grieving Project’ is a story of four disabled artists performed by disabled artists who find their voices and thrive while navigating mental health, transformation, relationships, identity and grieving their illnesses,” Sniderman told WTOP. “We are trying to bring live theater experiences to those who can’t attend live theater. … I’ve been at home going, ‘I miss live theater. How can we bring live theater experiences to people like me?'”
The unique, multimedia, spoken-word musical is still a “proof of concept” being produced in phases from 2024 to 2026 by Open Circle Theatre. The D.C. company usually operates out of the Black Box Theatre in Silver Spring, Maryland, but recently landed a special a two-week residency at The Voxel in Baltimore from Feb. 26 to March 11.
“Open Circle Theatre has been around for about 20 years,” Director Suzanne Richard told WTOP. “We’re the D.C. metro area’s first professional theater company that integrates artists with and without disabilities. We have mainly done shows like ‘Evita’ and had actors with disabilities to show how that enhances the show rather than is an obstacle, then more recently we’ve been picking up the voice of artists with disabilities and sharing new works.”
Richard, who lives with Osteogenesis Imperfecta (also known as Brittle Bone Disease), directs a radically accessible production that is conducted simultaneously in person and virtual for an immersive, hybrid theatre experience. Rather than logging into Zoom, virtual participants will connect in a space called “The Meadow.”
“It’s a live experience either way, everyone is having a comparable experience,” Richard said. “You get to come in as an avatar … walk around the lobby, which looks like the lobby of the live theater, you can talk to other people in the lobby, you go sit down, watch the show, you have choices of cameras that you can look through. … You watch in community with the live audience, which is seeing our online audience on screens on either side of the stage.”
The live hybrid show will be performed in a trial run to a limited capacity, invite-only audience this Friday, March 8, and Saturday, March 9, at The Voxel Theatre in Baltimore. These test performances are not yet open to the public, but if you would like to attend the private showings, send an email to: director@opencircletheatre.org.
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