PL AYBILL EURYDICE
EURYDICE sarah ruhl }{
approximate running time: 90 minutes. there will be no intermission
ARTIST NOTE: MICHELLE MONTEITH
Our lives are our stories. We see ourselves in stories. Arguably, it is why we come to the theatre or why, as Eurydice says, she reads books: it makes you a larger part of the human community. As I have been thinking about what I’d like to share with you, my mind has been swirling with the play’s themes: love, loss, letting go, holding on, surrender, memory. However, I keep coming back to the fact that Sarah Ruhl wrote this play for her father after he died. This truth has been my guide as I navigate through the world of this story. Four weeks into rehearsals with this extraordinary company, and Eurydice for me, right now, is about reconnection. A second chance with someone who has died. What would you do if you had one more moment with that person? What would you say? And then it hit me: I would simply BE with them. That would be
enough because being present is all that really matters; it’s all our children need, all our spouses want, or our family and friends want. And perhaps, that’s all you need from us as storytellers: to be present, to bring our most authentic selves to the story. This play gently demands that from us. Through love, through loss, through awareness of our own impermanence, both in life and on stage, we can be reminded how to live, how to cherish, how to celebrate this very moment. It is in fact, all there is.
michelle monteith Eur ydice in Eurydice