OTHERWISE OCCUPIED - opens in San Antonio April 2nd

If you want to jump down to the Jump-Start theater in San Antonio this weekend, a very intriguing show is set to open on Saturday, April 2nd. Here's the word from one of the performers, Xelena:

"Next weekend I will appear in a play entitled Otherwise Occupied, which will be staged at the Jump-Start Theater here in SA. I will play one of three Palestinian women whose stories have been gathered from first person narratives/interviews. Since our country has played (and continues to play) a major role in Israeli/Palestinian affairs, I believe this piece of work is vital to our understanding of the conflicts occurring there and to the possibility of peace. Please attend if you can (the opening night will be especially fun!). The show times and location details are below, followed by a press release written by the playwright. Thanks for spreading the word.
peace, Xelena"

OTHERWISE OCCUPIED
By Dianne Monroe, in collaboration with Salwa Arnous
Directed by Latrelle Bright

"Otherwise Occupied" is a personal journey into one of the world’s most intense political hot spots. Built out of actual interviews with Palestinian women living in Gaza and the West Bank, this new dramatic work tells the human stories behind the headlines.

Opening: Saturday, April 2nd, 8 pm
Performance Dates:  April 2nd through 10th, Fridays & Saturdays at 8 pm, Sundays at 7 pm

Place:  Jump-Start Performance Co.
   Building ‘B’ in the Blue Star Arts Complex
   Corner of South Alamo and Probant
   San Antonio, Texas

Tickets are $12 general admission and $9 for students and seniors. Groups of ten or more are $7 per person. On opening night, April 2, there will be a reception featuring Arabic food. Naomi Nye and Marian Haddad will read from their poetry at the opening. Tickets for opening night are $20.

For more information and reservations call 227-5867


Artist Statement:
The creation of this work was itself a remarkable journey – accomplished with long-distance calling cards and email. "I wanted to know the stories that aren’t being told, to talk directly to people, to hear their hopes and fears, and to create a dramatic work that would share a reality seldom seen by the American public with San Antonio audiences," says writer Dianne Monroe, who conducted the interviews.  "It was a profoundly humbling experience to talk with women who live the daily experience of occupation. They were so willing and eager to share their lives, to have their words heard in this country."

Otherwise Occupied takes San Antonio audiences inside the lives of women who are both ordinary and extraordinary at the same time. A young woman finds love at a checkpoint. A wedding is held at a checkpoint because the bride, who has a Nablus I.D., was not allowed to cross the checkpoint into Ramallah, where her husband lived. A woman whose family has lived in Jerusalem for 800 years cannot spend the night with her husband, because with his West Bank I.D. he is only allowed to be in Jerusalem between 10 am and 7 pm.

These true-life stories are told with the humor and hope that have become a tool of survival in a situation that often resembles a badly written Theater of the Absurd Play. They reflect the resilience, strength and courage of people for whom, as one woman interviewed said, "Leading an ordinary life is a form of resistance".