This work is about the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon BP oil spill and its effects on human health and the environment in the US Gulf region. It is being made available for local presentations during the month of April (and selected venues in May) to mark the two-year anniversary of the spill and to raise increased awareness toward health and environmental concerns, by NoPassport Theatre Alliance & Press, an unincorporated collective dedicated to the advocacy, production and publication of works expressive of cross-cultural and aesthetic diversity in the arts.

An initial line-up of organisations that will present the 2011 American Theatre Critics Association Francesca Primus Prize winning playwright, Caridad Svich’s new play The Way of Water, has been announced.

Among the theaters that will be presenting the play are Alameda Theatre in Toronto, Canada; American Stage Theatre Company in St. Petersburg, FL; Atomic Age Theater Company in collaboration with Emerson College in Boston, MA; California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, CA; Cornell University’s Teatrotaller and Theatre Incognita in Ithaca, NY; EAST LA REP in Los Angeles, CA; Ensemble Studio Theatre in New York City; Atomic Age Theater Company in collaboration with Emerson College in Boston, MA; Halcyon Theatre in Chicago, IL; ion theatre company in San Diego, CA; Lark Play Development Center in New York City; Main Street Theatre in Houston, TX; Occupy Ashland, Oregon; Opera del Espacio in Los Angeles, CA; Scriptworks in coproduction with Hyde Park Theatre in Austin, TX; Teatro Paraguas in Santa Fe, NM; Vortex Theatre in Albuquerque, NM; Aberystwyth University in Wales/UK, Rose Bruford College in England/UK, Pat the Dog Playwrights Centre in Ontario, Canada, and venues in Berlin, Sao Paolo, Australia.

Over fifteen US universities, including Carnegie Mellon and UC-Davis, as well as the University of Pretoria’s Drama Department will present a play reading of the text.

The play was developed at the 2011 Winter Writers’ Retreat at the Lark Play Development Center in New York City, after Svich’s two years of extensive research on the subject. The Way of Water is a two-act play with four characters that focuses on poverty in America and the devastation of the ongoing health and environmental crisis in the US Gulf region.

Caridad Svich’s other plays include 12 Ophelias, Iphigenia…a rave fable, and The House of the Spirits, based on the novel by Isabel Allende. The dramaturgy team for the international reading scheme for The Way of Water are Philadelphia-based dramaturge Heather Helinsky and New York City-based dramatist & dramaturge R. Alex Davis. 

The Drama Department will also present Svich's Alchemy of Desire/Dead Man’s Blues as part of its participation in this year's Grahamstown National Arts Festival. 

Date of reading: 13 April
Venue: Lier Theatre
Time: 11:30

For more information about Caridad Svich’s The Way of Water, visit http://www.nopassport.org/wayofwater.

NoPassport Theatre Alliance and Press, e-mail: http://www.nopassport.org, website: [email protected].