Voices Festival Productions Presents the World Premiere Of WHO CARES: THE CAREGIVER INTERVIEW PROJECT

Voices Festival Productions' (VFP) world-premiere story of evolving relationships within a multi-generational, caregiver support group will start performances on January 9, 2024.

Who Cares: ♥ The Caregiver Interview Project is a story of evolving relationships within a multi-generational, caregiver support group based on interviews with local colleagues in the theater community, elder justice advocates, and close friends whose lives have been disrupted - but also transformed - by unexpected caretaking for loved ones contending with memory loss. A fusion of verbatim testimony sprung-to-life to reveal dramatic confrontation, Sister Sledge dance breaks, and a group leader's journey to sustain the love of a valiant sister facing debilitating challenges, Who Cares is frequently funny, always intimate, and powerfully informed. Moving from church basement, to comedy club, to rock-star book event and beyond, this world premiere exposes fault-lines within some families, unbreakable bonds within others, and moving friendships between strangers forming newly generative communities of care.

The dynamic Who Cares ensemble cast features Kelly Renee Armstrong (Tempestuous Elements, Arena Stage), Lise Bruneau (Macbeth, Taffety Punk), Todd Scofield (Romeo and Juliet, Folger), Joelle Denise (Our Lady of Queens, 2024 Chelsea Film Festival), Kendall Arin Claxton (Letters To Kamala/Dandelion Peace, VFP), and British-American Laura Shipler Chico (Museum Pieces, Tristan Bates Theatre) making her U.S. stage debut, along with understudies Rachel Manteuffel, Llogan Paige, and Robert Bowen Smith.

The creative team includes David Elias (Stage Manager), Nora Butler (Assistant Stage Manager), David Smith (Lighting Designer), David Lamont Wilson (Sound Designer), Brandee Mathies (Costume Designer), Heidi Castle-Smith (Scenic Designer), Tyra Bell (Props Designer), and Robert Bowen Smith (Movement Consultant).

"From the moment we spoke about this project, I was intrigued by the subject matter," said director Kathryn Chase Bryer. "I have so many friends who are living this situation right now, caring for aging parents and family members. End of life is a part of the human condition that everyone experiences and yet there is very little support in this country for families dealing with these circumstances. Who Cares offers thoughts and the comfort of common experience while acknowledging the pain and the joy of taking care of our loved ones. I am humbled and in awe of our amazing cast and design team, who have jumped in with full commitment and love for each other, telling the stories that unite us all."

"Working on Who Cares, which includes moments of my personal story caring for my sister, has been an experience of crafting and sharing some of the most personal material that I have ever been involved in within the theatre," said co-writer and VFP producing partner A. Lorraine Robinson. "I wanted to create this piece, because unexpectedly becoming a caregiver is one of the most dramatic situations I have ever experienced in my life to date. And, yet, I have to say it also has been the most awe-inspiring time, when I was able to be of help to someone in my family and both give and receive a great deal of love and care."

"It's been a season to explore the contours of care in our community, with more than a few DC theaters, museums, and book events gathering authors, artists, and audiences to chronicle the landscape of caregiving," notes VFP Founding Artistic Director, Ari Roth. "It's one of our healthier post-pandemic developments: recognizing the importance of care. We all need it, and we're all, increasingly, being summoned to give it. The grist contained in these stories is the stuff of life; real pain, real tenderness, shared in vivid detail, revealing abundant richness. This project is both documentary based - venerating veracity of expression - and artful, imagining the dynamics of a support group where there was no group. We've created a new theatrical reality, and it's been a joy to shape that group's evolution."

The play's verbatim testimony adapted from interviews is complemented by original stand-up material from Jim Meyer and excerpts from the work of MacArthur "Genius" Award recipient Marie Therese Connolly and her book "The Measure of Our Age: Navigating Care, Safety, Money, and Meaning Later in Life." John Stoltenberg of DC Theatre Arts shared his thoughts on the play after an early reading: "The real theme of this piece seems to me to be our mortality. Caretaking frames it, illuminates it, points to it, but really this dramatic experience is an encounter with the common precarity of all our lives."

Who Cares: ♥ The Caregiver Interview Project, co-written by Ari Roth, A. Lorraine Robinson, and Vanessa Gilbert, and directed by Kathryn Chase Bryer will run January 9 - February 2, 2025 at Universalist National Memorial Church (1810 16th Street NW, Washington, DC), with Opening Night on January 13. For more information and tickets, visit voicesfestivalproductions.com.

Previews begin with two Pay-What-You-Can performances January 9 and January 10, and discounted preview performances through January 12 with $25 tickets. General admission for remaining performances through February 2 is $45, with discounts available for groups, patrons under 30, affinity groups, and artists.

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