Yale Cabaret: UDO

A Note from the Cab Team

Our last production of Black History Month celebrates the cultures and traditions that have inspired the beauty of those who belong to the African diaspora. Even further, this story resonates with all of those who made the best of the time away from the theater space, who gained understanding of the global population and the richness of humanity. This emergence demands an empathetic desire to reconnect, and a new focus on building paths towards the future. The Nigerian characters you will see in this play have this desire, and though defiant in their cultural upbringing, carry the same values that we carry today, the same values that make the global feel so intimate. We’re so excited to end this month with Udo , which translates to “peace,” and we hope that as you leave you will be reminded that Black history is World history, and it deserves to be shared.

-Jason, Kayodè & Ashley

A Note from the Playwrights

This play came about at the peak of the pandemic. Nomè and I were sitting together trying to figure out what the hell to do next. We are inherent storytellers, and, at the time, there were little to no opportunities to do the thing we love the most. We couldn’t just sit idle. We are Nigerians that is completely out of our vocabulary, for better or worse, so we wrote a play.

Our hope is to bring forth the foundation of ritual, tradition and spirituality that lives so deeply in the hearts of our people. We are also challenging our ancestors. We are challenging generational curses. We are challenging cultural expectations. We are challenging our parents and our elders. This play lives as both our liberation and our protest. These humans are not us but live so closely to us and those that came before.

Nigerians believe wholeheartedly in community, and we wish to commune with you. You are as much a part of this experience as the bodies on stage. We invite you in. Our door is open. Welcome!

A Note from the Dramaturg

-Abigail C. Onwunali and Nomè SiDone

In 2021, Abigail and Nomè shared their initial ideas for a new play they wanted to write and develop. With excitement, this outstanding company, crew, and creative team get to share this moving story with you today. Set in a cramped studio apartment, UDO unravels and absorbs us into a world that invites us all to explore three of life’s most essential themes - our capacity to love, forgive, and find a way forward together. With its fusion of humor and theatricality, I see this piece as a ritual, an experience, and an illuminating journey. From the stage to the seat you’re sitting in, you will feel the ripples of emotions and empathy that resonate both physically and emotionally. I am glad you are here supporting and engaging with this new work!

-Andrew G. Rodriguez

UDO

By Abigail C. Onwunali & Nomè SiDone

PRODUCED BY

Tyler Cruz

CREATIVE TEAM Director Bobbin Ramsey

Assistant Director Roman Sanchez

Stage Manager Colleen Rooney*

Scenic Designer KimKim Juhee

Assistant Scenic Designer Silin Chen*

Lighting Designer Jasmine Moore

Costume Designer Whitney Andrews

Sound Designer Bryn Scharenberg

Technical Director Sky Pang

Dramaturg Andrew G. Rodriguez*

Intimacy Director Andrew Aaron Valdez

Show Sponsor Eric M. Glover

CAST

Abigail C. Onwunali

Nomè SiDone

*Yale Cabaret Debut

Special Thanks

Yale School of Architecture, Megan Birdsong, David DeCarolis, Joan MacIntosh, and Awoye Timpo

Mission

Yale Cabaret 55 is a transition; a space to place your art and watch it transform. We do not suggest that your art begins or ends with us, but it will change with us. We invite our community to take risks with us. Failure is not an option; it is an illusion. Like Pantone Color of the Year: Very Peri, we know that “as we emerge from an intense period of isolation, our notions and standards are changing, and our physical and digital lives have merged in new ways.” We seek to be a holding space to explore these changes. Cabaret 55 is a shared experiment of what it means to come back to theater.

Values

• The Cab is a studio

• The Cab is a space for trial and error

• The Cab is a space for fellowship

• There is no utopia, only risk and commitment

• There are no assignments, only invitations

Land Acknowledgement

The state of Connecticut and Yale University occupy the traditional, ancestral, and unceded lands of the Mohegan, Mashantucket Pequot, Eastern Pequot, Schaghticoke, Golden Hill Paugussett, Niantic, Quinnipiac, and other Algonquian speaking peoples. We honor and respect their continued relationship with and stewardship of this land, and we acknowledge that Yale University, Yale Cabaret, and those affiliated have benefited from the oppression of these Nations.

Labor Acknowledgement

Yale University does not exist independently from the centuries of forced labor and economic extraction of enslaved people, primarily of African descent, on which this country was built. We are indebted to their labor and their unwilling sacrifice, and we must acknowledge the ongoing violence inflicted on Black and brown people and the resulting impact and generational trauma still felt today.

Leadership Team

Executive Artistic Director

Jason Gray

Graphic Designer

Mikayla Johnson

Website Designer

Kayodè Soyemi

Producing Artistic Director

Kayodè Soyemi

Production Managers

Producing Artistic Director

Ashley M. Thomas

Leo Surach & Cameron Waitkun

Collaborators

Community Engagement a.k. payne

Marketing Associate

Roman Sanchez

Anchor Spa x Yale Cabaret

Chef Kendall Thigpen

Cabaret Assistant(s)

Ramona Li

Maya Shed

Advisory Board

Stage Management

Nakia Avila

Theater Management

Fanny Abib-Rozenberg

Dramaturgy

Lily Haje

Playwriting

Danielle Stagger

Sound

Evdoxia Ragkou

Scenic

Cat Raynor

Projections

John Horzen

Acting

Lucas Iverson

Technical Design

Eugenio Saenz Flores

Lighting

Jiahao (Neil) Qui

Directing

Garrett Allen

Costumes

Kyle Artone

Board of Directors

Chair

Wendy Davies

Jacob Basri

Samanta Yunuen Cubias

Eric M. Glover

L.T. Gourzong

Doug Robinson

Linda-Cristal Young

About the Cab

In 1968, the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale students established a basement performance venue in the former home of the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity at 217 Park Street. Envisioned as an alternative outlet for drama school students’ creativity and experimentation, Yale Cabaret became a forum for our expanded New Haven communities, whom we invite to gather around food, drink, conversation, fellowship, and artistry.

Since its founding, the Cabaret has remained in continuous operation, including pivoting to virtual performance during the 2020/21 season. The Cab has produced hundreds of plays, old and new, alongside musicals and musical revues, comedy shows, dance, performance art, and genre-defying performance.

Our supporters have made this storied history happen. With their partnership, we continue this tradition into 2023 and beyond.

Our Supporters

Honorary Season Producer ($7,500+)

Indira Etwaroo & The Benevity

Community Impact Fund

Parachuter ($5,000-$7,499)

Santino Blumetti

Brian Tyree Henry

Champion ($2,500-$4,999)

Wendy Davies

R. Lee Stump

Partners ($1,000-$2,499)

Nina Adams & Moreson Kaplan

Joan Channick

Eric M. Glover, PhD

James G. Hood

Bennett Pudlin & Ann Judd

Bill & Sharon Reynolds

Elaine Ring

Show Sponsors ($500-$999)

Audrey Conrad

Betty & Josh Goldberg

Jim & Eileen Mydosh

Anne Renner

Enthusiasts ($250-$499)

James A. Bundy & Anne Tofflemire

Sarah Cain

Pamela C. Jordan

Corby S. Kummer

Erin Rocha

What’s Next OUR FINAL THREE SHOWS

Cab 10

March 2-4th

Dr.Ride’sAmericanBeachHouse

By Liza Berkenmeier

Proposed by Rebeca Robles

It’s 1983, the evening before Dr. Sally Ride’s historic space flight. Hundreds of miles from the launch, a group of women with passionate opinions and no opportunities sit on a sweltering St. Louis rooftop watching life pass them by. Their uncharted desires bump up against American norms of sex and power in this intimate snapshot of queer anti-heroines.

Cab 11

March 30-April 1st

EveryBrilliantThing

By Duncan MacMillan

Proposed by Malachi Beasley & Alexis Woodard

“You’re seven years old. Mom’s in the hospital. Dad says she’s ‘done something stupid’. She finds it hard to be happy. You start a list of everything that’s brilliant about the world. Everything worth living for.”

Cab 12

April 20-22nd

Tobie

Proposed & Adapted by Lily Haje

An adventure-romance of quasi-Biblical proportions. A Symbolist fever dream. A poetic celebration of object performance. Freely translated and adapted from Maurice Bouchor’s 1889 puppet play, Tobie is a story of growing up, of falling in love and finding yourself, and of defeating the fish demon trying to sleep with your girlfriend.