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AmericanMYTH: Crossroads directed & created by Jerrell L. Henderson
November 11 @ 2:00 pm - 3:30 pm
An event every week that begins at 2:00 pm on Thursday and Friday, repeating until November 10, 2023
An event every week that begins at 2:00 pm on Saturday, repeating until November 11, 2023
Presented through Free Street’s In/House Series, and created and directed by Jerrell L. Henderson, AmericanMYTH: Crossroads is a visually stunning take on the mythologies that have shaped North American culture. Using shadow puppets, live music, and highly physical performance, AmericanMYTH asks audiences to consider what stories have shaped our sense of who belongs in America. What’s a myth? What’s a folktale? And where do our histories fall on the spectrum of true, false, or something altogether different?
“So much of who we are and how we see ourselves as Americans (and ALL of what that can mean), often resurface in the stories we tell of ourselves. Themes of idealism, resilience, hope, dignity, and perseverance saturate our sense of national identity and yet, so do themes of injustice, selfishness, indifference, and cruelty,” says Henderson, who both wrote and directed AmericanMYTH. “This performance creates a moment in time for collective investigation in order to determine if there’s a smarter, more humane way to define ourselves so that we can move forward together. United.”
MEET THE PRODUCTION TEAM:
Jerrell L. Henderson (director), Nina D’Angier (Set & Projections Design) Chio Cabrera (Puppet Design), Gregory Graham (costume design), Fred Jackson Jr. (lead musician and performer), Florence Borowski (sound design), Heather Basarab (lighting design), Quinn Chisenhall (production electrician), Raine Saari (stage manager), Donna Gary (assistant stage manager).
MEET THE PERFORMERS:
Jo Schaffer, J. Wade, Lexy Weixel, Darius Stubbs, and Marcellus Burt.
SPECIAL EVENTS:
Openning (October 20th); Industry Night (November 6th)
ABOUT FREE STREET: Founded in 1969, Free Street is a femme-led arts and culture organization that centers original performance work by Black, Brown, and Immigrant communities; queer artists; youth artists; and work that is committed to the thriving and well-being of people on the South and West Sides of the city. We believe in the theater as a space to uplift joy and justice, especially racial, economic, and environmental justice in Chicago.
ABOUT IN/HOUSE: Free Street’s artist-in-residence program incubates the work of new and emerging arts, with a focus on BIPOC, LGBTQIA+ and Chicago-born artists. This three year program builds the self-producing, artistic and administrative skills of these artists, ending with a fully-supported production of an original work of their own. Applications for In/House artists open typically in May.
ABOUT TICKETS:
All tickets at Free Street are pay-what-you-can. All tiers of tickets give you access to the same seating options. Ticket sales go right back to our artists: paying to hire Chicago artists to tell their stories, and build the sets and worlds for their stories to live on. Tickets are available at the door day of for free/pay-what-you-can.