Minneapolis' Mixed Blood Theatre Will Stage Broadway Hopeful History Play ROE By Lisa Loomer

In the wake of Justice Kennedy's retirement from the Supreme Court and the fragile longevity of Roe v Wade, the Mixed Blood Theatre Company has announced a run of the new history play ROE by Lisa Loomer in its 2018-19 season.

The title is optioned for Broadway and Mixed Blood is the only regional theatre in the country that has been given permission to produce it this season.

ROE, a theatrical survey of the complicated and fiery underpinnings of Roe v. Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that established a woman's right to an abortion. Roe precisely illustrates the fractured and fracturing history of one of the most polarizing social issues of the modern era.

Sarah Weddington was a 26-year-old lawyer when she argued Roe v. Wade and accidental heroine Norma McCorvey was a 22-year-old poor, hard-living lesbian bartender seeking to end her third pregnancy when she first agreed to be the plaintiff under the pseudonym "Jane Roe," decades before she renounced her involvement in the case and became an anti-abortion advocate. ROE is an historically sweeping rare play that takes this inflammatory American issue head-on. Lawyer's and plaintiff's subsequent journeys mirrored the American divide.

ROE was commissioned by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in 2012 as part of its American Revolutions Cycle. It was developed at the University of Texas and The Kennedy Center (as part of DC's Women's Voices Festival) as well as at OSF's BLACK SWAN Lab before it played for 70 performances in Ashland and then had runs in Washington, DC (Arena Stage), Berkeley (Berkeley Rep), and Sarasota (Asolo Rep).

Lisa Loomer is a playwright and screenwriter who has written for stage, film, and television. Roe is the fourth play Mixed Blood has produced penned by Lisa, preceded by Maria!MariaMariaMaria, Living Out, and Distracted. Her plays have been produced at The Roundabout, Second Stage, The Vineyard, INTAR, The Public, Mark Taper Forum, South Coast Rep, Seattle Rep, Denver Center, Cornerstone, Trinity Rep, La Jolla Playhouse, and Missouri Rep, among others. Lisa wrote the screenplay for Girl, Interrupted and has written comedies, dramas, and pilots for HBO, CBS, Fox and Showtime. Her awards include the American Theater Critics Award, Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays Award, Lurie Foundation Award, Edgerton Foundation New American Plays Award, Imagen Foundation Award, Jane Chambers Playwriting Award, and the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize.

Seats are available now for Members. More information on the season and on how to become a Member is available online at mixedblood.com

Single tickets go on sale August 15, 2018 at 10 am and can be obtained two ways: First, through Radical Hospitality, admission is FREE on a first come/first served basis starting two hours before every show. Or advanced reservations are available online or by phone for $35 per person.

Visit mixedblood.com or call 612.338.6131 or boxoffice@mixedblood.com for more information. All Performances in Mixed Blood Theatre's Alan Page Auditorium, 1501 S. 4th St., Minneapolis, MN 55454.

Mixed Blood Theatre has invited the global village into its audience and onto its stage for its unique brand of provocative, inclusive, and predictably unpredictable theater since 1976. Using theater to illustrate and animate, Mixed Blood models pluralism in pursuit of interconnections, shared humanity, and engaged citizenry.