Above you will see my treasures; an incredible cast of strong individuals, each an artist in their own right. We began making this work over a year ago and quite similarly to the social climate of our country, it has been a struggle. And its for certain about struggle. And its about all of the things we can not say about this kind of struggle, which is where the walls we push against began. It is where our dance began as well. It is why in the end, we did not need literal walls to feel it.
My original ideas were highly theatrical. It involved set pieces and large visual elements. It created an environment of conditions set to push against. All of these barriers and walls would live with us as objects of opposing forces creating movement by necessity. And eventually one by one, early cast member by early cast member, set piece by set piece, it all began to fall away. What was left was the us that remained and that we needed each other. And what endured in my mind was a remaining intrigue about how we defined our selves, how we defined our tribe … because we became one. Even amidst all of the division, all of the polarization, we became more cohesive and found a deeper bond. And suddenly the movement started to become more human, more about what we needed rather than what we were up against.