East Vancouver’s cultural hub presents Jackie Sibblies Drury’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Fairview as the opener to its 50th anniversary season.
Fairview asks audiences to lean into the play through its use of hyper theatricality in its pursuit of having a challenging, sometimes complicated and emotional conversation about race.
Drury’s examination of race and surveillance tells the story of the Frasier family, who are getting ready for Grandma’s birthday party, but things keep going wrong. Beverly wants everything to be perfect, but nobody is cooperating. And while everything is falling apart around Beverly, maybe nothing is what it seems.
A co-production between Vancouver’s The Search Party and Toronto’s b current Performing Arts, Ghanaian-Canadian director Kwaku Okyere will join The Search Party’s artistic director Mindy Parfitt to bring Fairview to The Cultch’s Historic Stage.
“Often conversations about race can happen in silos with people who have similar lived experiences rather than cross-culturally,” says Okyere and Parfitt in a joint statement. “Our collaboration aims to model what the play is doing, which is to ignite conversation across differences.”
Running concurrently with the production of Fairview, The Search Party will host three workshops, a panel discussion, and one community gathering to enhance the play’s underlying themes while offering a nurturing environment for Black and BIPOC artists in Vancouver.
“Fairview asks audiences to lean into the play through its use of hyper theatricality in its pursuit of having a challenging, sometimes complicated and emotional conversation about race,” says Okyere and Parfitt. “We were drawn to how Jackie Sibblies Drury uses storytelling modes ranging from poetry and absurdism to stylized costumes and dance to create a unique and singular theatrical experience that we are excited to bring to Vancouver audiences.”
Fairview plays The Cultch’s Historic Theatre from September 27 through October 8. Visit thecultch.com for tickets and information.