CAMBRIDGE, MASS.: Central Square Theater has announced the Brit d’Arbeloff Women & Science Theater Festival, a month-long virtual festival at the intersection of art and science created to amplify underrepresented voices. The inaugural festival is a program of Catalyst Collaborative@MIT, the nation’s oldest ongoing partnership between a professional theatre company and a research institution. The festival began this week and runs through April 27.
In addition to streaming theatre performances, the festival will feature panels on equity, diversity, and inclusion in science; playwriting; the representation of science in theatre; youth in science; and environmental racism.
The first streaming performance will be Melinda Lopez’s Young Nerds of Color (working title), a new play in development. Inspired by over 60 interviews with established and emerging scientists, the play weaves together scientists’ passions, inspirations, challenges, and successes. Directed by Dawn M. Simmons, Young Nerds of Color runs April 8-11.
The festival commission In the Play Lab, a collection of 10-minute plays, streams April 15-18. The series features eight plays with strong female characters engaging with real science. The playwrights will host panel discussions April 19-20.
The final streaming work will be Kia Corthron’s Splash Hatch on the E Going Down, April 19-25. The play follows Thyme, a 15-year old straight-A student who is pregnant and does not notice that her husband, 18-year-old Erry, is suffering from lead inhalation from his construction job. Lyndsay Allyn Cox will direct.
Central Square Theater is dedicated to the exploration of social justice, science, and sexual politics through theatre. Catalyst Collaborative@MIT, a collaboration between Central Square and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, opens the door between art and science and pushes us to expand our vision of the future.
