KISS ME OR CUT OFF MY HEAD Workshop Set for 11/23

A little more than two years after the space-driven Palawan, Philippines workshop of Kiss Me or Cut Off My Head, Theatre Makers Chris Carcione and Brooke M. Haney embark on a second workshop. The previously one-person show now incorporates 18 additional actors, most recreating true accounts that Haney collected, based on a series of interviews in New York and Kibera, Kenya. Shad Ramsey fight directs the piece, and Joshua Paul Johnson is the Director of Photography for all of the on-camera interviews. The goal of this workshop is to incorporate on-camera interviews, voice-overs and projections into the play to see what is compelling. The invite-only workshop, which is sold out, will be held at Sarah Lawrence College on Sunday, November 23rd, 2014.

"I feel like so much has changed in the last two years for me and for the piece" commented Adaptor and Actor Brooke M. Haney. "Interviewing survivors of rape, both here in America and in the the Kenyan slum, Kibera, and then incorporating those stories into this play has opened my mind both to the power of theatre and the importance of addressing rape culture here and now." Haney interviewed both survivors of rape and other people who spoke about their perceptions of rape and how they define it. "We've adapted these interviews and woven them throughout the play as a Greek Chorus, in a way" explained Director Chris Carcione. "Our goal for this workshop is to see what works textually both on stage and in the interviews, and how this media will interact with the story on stage."

Theater makers Brooke M. Haney and Chris Carcione have partnered with Shining Hope for Communities to develop the play Kiss Me or Cut Off My Head to raise money and build awareness for Margaret's Safe Place, a project of Shining Hope. The play, adapted by Haney from the poetry of Sheryl St. Germain and interviews with rape survivors, confronts rape culture in America and Kenya through the lens of the Medusa myth. An additional workshop, exploring the ability of this piece to transcend traditional performance space will happen in January at Most Wanted Fine Arts, an art gallery in Pittsburgh. The goal for the project is to present a full production in New York City in 2015 to benefit Margaret's Safe Place.