New Nostalgias

Written by Sophia Heinecke
Directed by Tatiana Baccari

STAGED READING

Wow Cafe Theater, July 2019

Set in Forks, Washington during the height of the Twilight craze in 2012, New Nostalgias moves through the day with Lara: a Quillyute diner waitress, Serena: a lonely fridge fixer who thinks she’s in a film noir, and a genderless Blockbuster Employee who also happens to be a vampire. An interactive play that utilizes music, projection, and sensory stimulation of memory, New Nostalgias explores the complexity of memory tied to media and asks whether man and nature will always be at odds.

Stage Manager Rachel Denise April

Technical Director and Associate producer Madeline Wall

Performed by Natalie Blessing, Gabriel Rodriguez, Daniel Cabrera, Cindy Keiter, Magda Cychowski, Karsten Otto and Johanna Lee. 

Produced by Wednesday Derrico of Experimental Bitch Presents

Photos by Elle Simone

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FROM THE PLAYWRIGHT, SOPHIA:

"New Nostalgias explores collective memory in a time when formative moments of life often have more to do with media than actual lived experience. The play is comprised of three intertwining stories that overlap in a Blockbuster Video Store, a diner, and a living room.

The stories explore the difference between “good” nostalgia and “bad” nostalgia. I believe the difference has far less to do with the actual content of our remembered autobiographical past than with our expectations about what memories can do for us. It is not the past itself, but rather our attitude toward the past, that makes all the difference."