Ilana Lydia's DROPPIN' JOHNS Opens July 14th at SIC Sense

Ilana Lydia is an Arizona-based playwright and director. Her new play, Droppin' Johns is produced by B3 Theatre Company and premieres at SIC Sense July 14th and runs just two weekends, closing on the 22nd. The play is clever and shocking, funny and profoundly sad, but reading it didn't leave me crying - I was chuckling and shaking my head.

I sat down with Lydia in Historic Downtown Glendale at A Shot of Java, the area's only independent coffee house, owned by Brooklyn New York transplant Lisa Dowd. The place is cozy and has an atmosphere of casual urbanity - an oasis in a sea of corporate coffee shops.

Lydia's husband of only two years died last August. She explained that he was sick when they met, and his illness defined the nature of their relationship. We talked about her writing since his death, and how it helped her recover from the grief and loss, and also about the difficulties that arise when we direct our own writing. The conversation took interesting turns - I told Lydia that her work strikes me as buoyed up by comedic wit, despite the darkness of her material, and that makes reading it a delightful - if unsettling - experience. Lydia laughs easily and is a generous subject and a pleasure to interview.

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In the second installment, Lydia elaborates on the tensions between her deceased husband's expectations of her as caregiver and her struggle to retain her identity as, among other things, an artist.

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This next video gets to the part of the conversation where we delved into Lydia's process - and I was and remain enthralled. She becomes brightly animated when sharing the experience of writing her plays. She speaks to the nitty gritty nature of her gifted (my word) creativity.

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In the final, brief installment, Lydia talks about another of her new plays, True Believer, that opens November 10 and runs through the 18th at SIC Sense.

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B3 Productions Presents: Droppin' Johns, written and directed By Ilana Lydia

Performances July 14, 15, 21 & 22 at 8pm, July 16 at 2pm. Get tickets here.

Cat Girl, a young woman in the disguise of a superhero, finds she is trapped in her own mind where her self-perceived heroism allows her to incapacitate the Johns who visit her, but she discovers that these predatory men are the least of her worries. Full of metatheater and heart, this dark feminist comedy may not be appropriate for all viewers.

CAST
Cat Girl . . . Juliet Rachel Wilkins
Questioning Element . . . Caitlin Dhuse
Woman . . . Megan Olsen
Rationalizing Element . . . Cliff Williams
Man . . . Devon Mahon
Alexandross and Male TV Personalities . . . Michael Sean LeSueur

PRODUCTION AND DESIGN STAFF
Director and Writer . . . Ilana Lydia
Fight Choreographer . . . Devon Mahon
Set Designer . . . Paul Filan
Costumer Designer . . . Carolyn Platt McBurney
SM . . . Frankie Cerne
Sound Designer . . . Emma Walz
Props Designer . . . Bertha Alicia Cortes
Hair/Make-up Designer . . . Bertha Alicia Cortes
Mask Designer . . . Bertha Alicia Cortes
Costume Assistant . . . Sarah Underwood

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