written by Darby Sherwood & Emily Stone
directed by Rebecca O’Neil

preview, October 17, 2024
performances, October 18-27, 2024
Thursday-Saturday @ 7:30 p.m.
Sunday @ 2:00 p.m.

Theatre4 @ the Armory Building, Seattle Center
305 Harrison St., Seattle WA 98109

Welcome to the Press Room:

A Lonely Realization

“I’m interested in believing survivors.
Especially when they can prove what’s happened.”

What is the difference between Losing your voice and being silenced?

l to r: Emily Stone as Tree and Darby Sherwood as Legs; screen capture from 2023 Script Development Festival

“Where do stories go when no one wants to hear them? Do they die lonely deaths? Or do they catch on to the echo of the world?”

A Lonely Realization is a play exploring institutional and individual responses to sex and gender based violence through an absurdist lens. It is an investigation of the impact of sexual assault in artistic and educational spaces and a search for ways to address harm and trauma that will allow us to promote healing and recognition and to galvanize all community members, including ourselves as as artists, to action.

Content Note & Resources

A Lonely Realization contains descriptions of sexual assault and the repercussions of being raped. Descriptions are not graphic, but are emotionally impactful. The play includes conversations about grooming and other inappropriate sexual behavior by teachers toward children and students.

The Shattered Glass Project has developed a list of publicly available resources for survivors of intimate partner violence, domestic violence, or sexual assault. Additional resources are included for anyone needing support or help with sexual abuse, mental health or bullying. For this list please visit our Spoilers and Support page.

l to r: Emily Stone as Mort, Legs as Legs, and Darby Sherwood as Hattie; screen capture from 2023 Script Development Festival

Dramaturgical Information for the Inquiring Journalist.

Themes

  1. Trauma from sexual assault and the abuse of power by people who should be able to be trusted is a repeated story and a repetitive theme throughout the play.

  2. Misogyny framed as belief or lack of belief in the stories that women tell about their own experiences, especially in negative framing, or negative portrayal of characteristics of how women tell their stories, is also a theme throughout.

  3. Silencing & Listening, Voice & Self-discovery: Silence is an embodied characteristic, especially for the central character of Legs, who exists only in part of her body. Listening is also embodied - the other people in Legs’ world are mostly creatures who have no visible ears. Voice = self-discovery: as voice is recovered or discovered by Legs and by the character Hattie, they find out who they are are and how they can move forward in the world.

Genesis of the Play

Seeds of  A Lonely Realization took root two years ago, when co creators Darby and Emily began meeting in a rehearsal room on the UW campus to process their experiences through an ad hoc writing and performance workshop. “The first time Emily and I created this play, we didn’t know what we were making,” says co-creator Darby Sherwood, “we just knew that we needed to process what we were feeling.” They shared their initial two-actor, 45-minute creation with an invited audience, and later took their piece to The Shattered Glass Project  (TSGP) for a developmental reading as part of TSGP’s 2023 Script Development Festival. The Shattered Glass Project, known for its role as an incubator for new works in Seattle, fostered the expansion of the piece into a full length play, with the support of TSGP board member and dramaturg Buddy Todd. TSGP selected A Lonely Realization as its 2024 mainstage show, with Artistic Director Rebecca O’Neil directing. The play now features three actors, including Sherwood, Stone, and actor Lexi Warden, as well as a full production team bringing elements of the play, including a life sized tree, a singing clock, and myriad puppets, to life. 

l to r: Darby Sherwood as Mushroom Actor, Emily Stone as Frog Actor and Legs as Legs; screen capture from 2023 Script Development Festival

Concept

The narrative follows multiple storylines to show the cyclical nature of harm and trauma, engaging many examples of bystanders to show how vast the difference is between being “neutral” while upholding the status quo and truly helping survivors heal.

As director, O’Neil is paying special attention to the point of view of survivors, seeking to bring the audience into their world through creating a disorienting, off-kilter environment where participants snatch at normality: “Nothing is straight or on the square, whether furniture or lights coming through the window. Things are too large or small, too short, long, high, low, or the wrong shape. Out of balance, matching the way a survivor’s world has been thrown out of balance.”

Everything occurring on the stage is not only bounded within the community and institutions where we live and work, but is visibly layered with the elements of our individual and communal responses to bad or confusing behavior. A minimalist aesthetic based on found objects allow costume, scenic, lighting and properties design to visually support the interconnectedness of our personal narratives in response to harm but also to point up the fact that stories of sexual assault don’t always need to be gritty and terrifying. Sound design explores the voicelessness of sexual assault survivors through devoicing assailants, among other audible support of the narrative of self-discovery each of the characters may (or may not) be engaged in.

Why this show? Why now?

The board and staff of The Shattered Glass Project are dedicated to bringing stories to the stage that are unique and which have been selected for telling by theatre artists whose voices have been suppressed.  Created by Seattle theatre makers Darby Sherwood and Emily Stone, A Lonely Realization is the product of two artists processing the aftermath  of sexual assault and its reverberations in their community with imaginative storytelling.

With absurd humor alongside a searingly personal story, the creative team hopes to both entertain and invite audience members  to reflect on their own role in making communities safer for survivors and more resilient against harm. Director Rebecca O’Neil remarked, “Our natural reaction to seeing someone else in pain is to cringe or turn away; to deny it exists or to resist being a part of that harm.” Through this play, however, “We hope to be a radical space of refuge for survivors,” says co creator Emily Stone, “When survivors are safe, everyone is more safe, and able to thrive. That is the world we hope our play contributes to growing.”

Cast

Darby Sherwood - Actor 1: Legs, Mushroom Actor, Stage Manager, Hattie, Daisy, and Buhring

Emily Stone - Actor 2: Frog Actor, Mort, Nadezhda, Gatsby

Lexi Warden - Actor 3: Tree, Mr. Baum, Blade of Grass, and Clock

  • Darby Sherwood (she/her)

    Playwright | Actor 1

    Darby Sherwood is a playwright, librettist, and teaching artist! She’s thrilled to be working with The Shattered Glass Project again after being part of the 2021 Incubator/Mentor Cohort and developing A Lonely Realization. Darby’s work has been performed by Seattle Opera, Horizon Theatre, University of Washington School of Drama, Aspire Repertory Theatre, and more. Darby holds a degree in Drama from UW and has taught with the Museum of Pop Culture, Seattle Children’s Theatre, Seattle Opera, and Seattle Rep.

  • Emily Stone (she/her)

    Playwright | Actor 2

    Emily Stone is an artist, teacher, and community activist who loves striving to make art that is activism. That theater can be a space for sharing joy, abundance, and truth is what brings her back again and again! She moved to Duwamish land, Seattle, in 2021 to pursue her MFA in Acting at the University of Washington. Since moving here, Emily has performed at the University of Washington, On The Boards, Macha Theatre Works, and workshopped her original show with The Shattered Glass Project. She is a teaching artist at Seattle Children’s Theatre and the Seattle Repertory Theatre, serves on the board of The Shattered Glass Project, and has recently become a supporting member of Dunya Productions.

  • Lexi Warden (she/her)

    Actor 3

    Lexi Warden is a theatre artist, educator, and advocate based in Seattle. She is so honored to be involved in this project and work with such a talented team of collaborators. Recent credits include Ozzie in Damn Yankees (Reboot), Lil Mama u/s in Stew (ACT), Intimacy Choreographer for Legally Blonde at Village Theatre KIDSTAGE, and Choreographer for Comedy of Errors at Seattle Shakespeare Company.

Creative Team

  • Rebecca O'Neil (she/her)

    Director

    Rebecca O'Neil is the founding artistic director of The Shattered Glass Project. She is thrilled to be entrusted with directing A Lonely Realization and collaborating with a fabulous team of theatre makers. Recent projects include producing the Incubator/Mentor 2024 New Works Festival (with the added bonus of directing The Uterine Files: Episode 1 by Jourdan Imani Keith); performing in Through the Window (& Into the Cabin); and plotting world theatrical domination. If anyone is producing Pericles, you may cast her as Dionyza now, thank you. She also sweeps the floors. Forever and always, thanks to Peter for being my rock.

  • Buddy Todd (they/them)

    Dramaturg | Intimacy Coordinator

    Buddy is a multidisciplinary theatre and film artist. Specializing in comedy and otherworldly stories, Buddy thrives on facilitating safe, collaborative, creative working spaces where artists and audiences learn the value of human connection. They hold a BA in Theatre, an MFA in Arts Leadership, and finishing an MA in Theatre and Performative Practices at University College Cork. Buddy sits on the board of directors for The Shattered Glass Project.

Production Team

  • Clair Kaminski (she/her)

    Stage Manager

    Clair Kaminski is a recent transplant in the Seattle theatre community. Her recent credits include Seattle Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night the Musical (assistant stage manager), Seattle Shakespeare’s Wooden O production of The Tempest (crew), and Strawshop’s Passage (stage manager). Clair studied Technical Theatre and Design at Northern Michigan University, where she received a BFA. Clair is so proud to have worked on this play and hopes the audience enjoys it as much as her.

  • Hana Oh (she/her)

    Assistant Stage Manager

    Hana Oh is a teaching artist at Seattle Children’s Theatre and Studio East and spends most of her time encouraging young students to explore their imagination. Alongside teaching, she has been part of different projects with Macha Theatre Works, The Shattered Glass Project, ArtsWest, and Washington Ensemble Theatre. Hana loves making theatre, and she is grateful to be part of The Shattered Glass Project team once again.

  • Lara Kratz (she/her)

    Costume Design

    Lara Kratz is a Seattle-based graphic designer with a career that spans over 20 years of work with major Seattle-area brands, but also has a background in theatre, including Ferndale Repertory Theater, and Redwood Curtain Theatre in California, participating as an actress, stage manager, and in both costume and scenic design. She served on the TSGP board from 2019-2020. Lara is proud to be a part of The Shattered Glass Project, because she firmly believes in advocating for the increased representation of women in the theatre world, both on stage and behind the scenes.

  • Cami Taliaferro-Barber (she/her)

    Lighting Design

    Cami Taliaferro-Barber is thrilled to participate in A Lonely Realization! Hailing from Snohomish, she is a recent Summa Cum Laude graduate of Cornish College of the Arts and of Seattle Rep’s Professional Arts Training Program, working to build up her portfolio as a Seattle lighting designer. She’d like to thank her family, friends and partner for all of their support on her journey!

  • Alicia Crowley (she/her)

    Alicia Crowley is a Seattle-based artist and actor, with backgrounds in drawing and painting, theatre, martial arts, dance, and home renovation. She holds a Bachelor of Arts with majors in Drama: Performance and Interdisciplinary Visual Arts from the University of Washington. Alicia is currently performing in Theater Northwest’s Dracula, painting by commission, and is delighted to contribute her creativity and hands-on design and construction skills to The Shattered Glass Project’s A Lonely Realization.

  • Kyleigh Archer (she/they)

    Scenic Design

    Kyleigh Archer is a director, playwright, designer, and theater teaching artist. They are currently the director and designer for Seattle Opera’s Youth Project and a teaching artist at STG, Seattle Children's Theatre, and Seattle Rep with programs that are trauma-sensitive and inclusive. Drama should not only create access for people with little-to-no-support systems to see themselves on stage, but those plays should generate tangible opportunities for community members to learn and benefit from. At risk youth and carbon-reduced design are top priorities in Archer’s art on stage.

  • Alison Kozar (they/them)

    Sound Design

    Alison is a multidisciplinary theatre artist facilitating brave storytelling through directing, stage management, and sound design. Recent projects: Bethany Sees the Stars (Copious Love,) and All New Cells (The Shattered Glass Project.) Other selected projects: Intiman's The Mystery of Irma Vep and The Events, dani tirrell's Black Bois, WET's Is God Is, MAP Theatre's Year of the Rooster. Alison believes in healing the world, feminist science fiction, radical self-worth, and antifa. professionalmomfriend.com

  • Breanna Strobele (they/them)

    Electrician

    Breanna is from Redmond, Washington and currently resides there. This is their second show with The Shattered Glass Project. They also work as a technician with Encore, Bellevue Lighting and R90. In their free time, they can be found searching for the nearest geocache or spending time with their cat.

  • Carolynne Wilcox (she/they)

    Carolynne Wilcox is a Seattle-based actor and playwright whose plays have been produced both locally and regionally, including virtual productions of Clytemnestra, virtual productions with TSGP of Loom and A Series of Small Cataclysms (co-written with Jen Smith Anderson and also produced IRL pre-pandemic). She recently appeared at Book-it as Adele in In The Time of the Butterflies; other favorite roles include Ana in The Clean House, Carmen in Juan Palmieri, and La Muerte in Blood Wedding. Carolynne is an Associate Artist with The Shattered Glass Project.