productions: past and future
2011
Agoura Hills Library
Saturday, November 5
Agoura Hills, CA 9301
2010
Malibu Library , Malibu
Saturday, March 6, 3 pm
Malibu, CA 90265
2009
Fremont Center Theatre, So. Pasadena
Saturdays at 8pm and Sundays at 3pm,
March 14 to April 5,
and Friday, April 3 at 8pm
2008
Monterey, CA Public Library
May 21
2007
Jewish Museum of Maryland, Baltimore
2005
LA Teachers Assoc.
Camp Bravo Performing Arts Camp - Teachers Weekend
Long Beach City College
The Second Great Sonoma County Public Library Tour
2004
Minnesota Jewish Theatre
2003
Glendale Community College
California State University, Northridge
2002
New York City Fringe
Marymount College, Palos Verdes, CA
Harbor Community Adult School, CA
2001
Harbor Community Adult School, CA
Harbor College, CA
Nassau Community College, Garden City, NY
Temple Sinai, Denver
San Pedro Public Library
Anderson Senior Citizen Center, San Pedro
2000
Dramatists Guild, NYC
Edmonton Fringe, Edmonton, Alberta
Claremont McKenna College, CA
Huntington Library, Pasadena
Valley Cities Jewish Community Center (Malkin Becker performing Arts Series)
Temple Mishkom Tephilo, Santa Monica
Amelia Earhart Library
Ararat Home
1999
Edinburgh Festival Fringe (1999)
Workman's Circle & Arbiter Ring
Glendale Community College
California State University, Northridge
Long Beach City College
Theatre 40, Beverly Hills
1998
Bitter Truth Theatre, Los Angeles
West Side Jewish Community Center
Long Beach City College
The germ for this play began over ten years ago when I started teaching English as a Second Language to refugees and immigrants. As I listened daily to stories of war, deprivation, humiliation, and institutionalized sexual oppression, I discovered not only that I knew nothing of, and could never have dreamed these lives, but that many of us in America are bound together as refugees of varying degrees and share a sense of rootlessness, and that America as a nation of refugees forgets after one or two generations and needs to hear and re-remember. We forget because our families chose amnesia or silence, and silence creates amnesia. It is this silence that most disturbs me and that I address with this play.
The characters in Refugees represent a compilation of many stories told to me by many people over a five year period. Any resemblance to particular individuals is purely coincidental.
For booking information, please call Jeannine Frank at
Frank Entertainment
(310) 476-6735
jeannine@frankentertainment.com
or call the Refugees office at
(818) 904-1194
or email me at
stephanie@refugeestheplay.com
Read more about Refugees in Robin Rauzi's article in the Los Angeles Times
Most heartfelt thanks and gratitude to Anita Khanzadian for her direction, script development, commitment and friendship; to Jill Remez for getting me to finish this script; and to my husband Rick Friesen, without whose love, work and encouragement this project could never have seen the light. Much appreciation also to Leslie de Beauvais for her continued support of this project, The Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, Chris Gockel, the patron saint of printing, Jennie Ventriss, The Los Angeles Writers Bloc, Susan Merson, Bob Neches, Julie Davis, Diana and Bernadette Hale, Sandra Stanley, Interact Play Development Lab, Neal Marlens, Carol Black, Ella Naroditskaya, Zara Kulakhchyan, Jilla Benyamin, The English Department and Department of Humanities, California State University, Northridge, Linda Griffith and Peggy Renner of Glendale Community College, and the students of Levels 4,5,6, and teachers everywhere.
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