My co-host A-lan Holt and I are both fans of young Bay Area playwright Star Finch. She had a terrific show with Campo Santo last year called H.O.M.E. (Hookers on Mars Eventually), an Afrofuturist play about Oaklanders getting gentrified out of their neighborhoods and moving to Mars.
Now, Finch has a new play developed with Marin’s little Alter Theater called Bondage, an Afro-surreal tale about a mixed-race American slave. Alter Theater artistic director Jeanette Harrison says she was blown away when Finch came into the company’s playwright residency program. “She may be the smartest person I’ve ever been in the room [with],” Harrison told us. “Her use of language is so magical, and powerful, and simple and elegant all at the same time. This is a woman to watch.”
A-lan says the play looks to be a haunting piece about betrayal, sex, slavery and what it takes to imagine a new and better world for women of color. Finch’s Bondage is paired in repertory with Santa Monica resident Larissa Fasthorse’s comedy about the county fair cow pie bingo circuit (that’s a real thing). “The main thing that ties the plays together,” Harrison says, “is these are two amazing women writers, writers of color writing from very specific backgrounds. And both of these plays are about young people who are learning about people who are not like themselves.” Details here.
