Babes With Blades Theatre Company (BWBTC) launches into their 2022 season with Richard III, in partnership with the University of Illinois Chicago’s Disability Cultural Center and directed by Richard Costes, August 25 – October 15, at The Edge Theater, 5451 N. Broadway Ave, with select performances being live streamed. Previews are Thursday, Aug. 25 – Saturday, Aug. 27 at 8 p.m. and Sunday, Aug. 28 at 3 p.m., Thursday, Sept. 1 and Friday, Sept. 2 at 8 p.m. Press Opening is Saturday, Sept. 3 at 8 p.m. The regular performance schedule is Thursdays – Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 3 p.m. All performances are presented with open captioning and select performances will be live streamed. Tickets are $20 - $35 and will go on sale at www.BabesWithBlades.org Monday, Aug. 1.
The pandemic has brought many of the inequities that exist in professional theater center stage. Artists took the time during lockdown to protest and educate the professional theater community on a litany of ways it has failed members of their own community.
As one of the many identities underrepresented on American stages, actors with disabilities have had to prove themselves capable in auditions as well as in the everyday world, but their efforts are frequently unacknowledged by the general public. Perhaps it sparked a query with some theatre goers when Tony Award winner Ali Stroker, an actor who uses a wheelchair, had to wait backstage at the award ceremony in case she won because the venue lacked a ramp for her to access the stage. Some may have heard about La Jolla Playhouse, who brought on the leaders from the National Disability Theatre as their artists in residence for the 2019-2020 season and helped their audiences ask themselves, “why DON’T we see more actors with disabilities on stage?”
In spring 2022, American Lives Theatre produced “The Cost of Living” featuring two actors who use wheelchairs, and earlier this summer Olney Theatre produced “The Music Man” with deaf, hearing, and hard-of-hearing actors. BWBTC Shakespeare is proudly contributing to the movement towards a more equitable industry with their upcoming production of Richard III. “Shakespeare wrote this play as propaganda and the ableism inherent in the text doesn’t disappear. In 2022, we are morally obligated to battle outdated stereotypes. One tactic is to cast other disabled actors – and to be dramaturgically specific about the roles they are cast in,” states Richard Costes, the production’s director and a deaf artist. “For example, in our production, Elizabeth (one of the most othered characters in the text as a commoner elevated to nobility, as a woman, as a mother, and as the eventual architect of Richard’s downfall) is also disabled. By featuring two (or more actors) with disability onstage, in polar opposite roles, we can confront the trope of disability as a metaphorical mark of Cain.”
Costes’ directorial choice challenges the archaic notion that disabilities propagate evil or guarantee helplessness in people. It’s a timely challenge, given that, according to a 2018 study by the CDC, 1 in 4 adults identify as having a disability (making it the largest marginalized population in the US). If theater is supposed to reflect the communities for which it is produced, then artists with disabilities must be embraced and included in all areas of the process and production.
BWBTC Shakespeare: Richard III
By William Shakespeare
In partnership with the University of Illinois Chicago’s Disability Cultural Center
Directed by Richard Costes
Fight Direction by BWBTC Ensemble Member Maureen Yasko
Previews: August 25 – September 2 (Times TBA)
Opening: Saturday, Sept. 3 at 8 p.m.
Regular Run: Thursday – Saturday at 8 p.m., Sundays at 3 p.m.
All performances will be held at The Edge Theater, 5451 N. Broadway. Select performances will be available for live streaming. All performances will have open captioning
Aligned with their mission of representing marginalized voices, “BWBTC Shakespeare” specifically features actors of marginalized genders to provide an opportunity for audiences to perceive these classic stories through a new lens. For this production, BWBTC has partnered with UIC’s Disability Cultural Center to tell the tale of Richard of Gloucester’s rise to power. Casting both disabled and non-disabled actors and exploring disability beyond the role of Richard III, this production will not only examine stage combat as a storytelling tool, but investigate how storefront theatre can create a more inclusive and disability culture-informed theatre.”
For more information, tickets, and live performance streaming information, please visit www.babeswithblades.org.
ABOUT RICHARD COSTES, DIRECTOR OF RICHARD III
Richard Costes is a deaf artist of color who has also worked as an actor, director, playwright, and accessibility consultant. Richard grew up near Youngstown, Ohio where he graduated from Kent State University with a Bachelor of Arts in Theatre Studies. His professional career began in Chicago, where he fell in love with the storefront theater scene and its continued work towards diversity and inclusion. Since 2014 he has performed at Steep Theatre Company, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, Red Tape Theatre, Redtwist Theatre, Broken Nose Theatre, Porchlight Music Theatre, Rasaka Theatre Company, and many others. Richard is a 2017 recipient of a 3Arts Make a Wave grant. He has presented at Gallaudet University’s symposium on Visual Shakespeare and was a member of the 2019 Deaf Theatre Action Planning Session hosted by HowlRound at Emerson College.
ABOUT UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS CHICAGO DISABILITY CULTURAL CENTER (UIC DCC)
As one of the first Disability Cultural Centers in the country, the UIC DCC is committed to building community around disability experience and anti-ableism. It centers disability issues as social justice issues, exploring intersectional identities, developing disability culture, fostering a sense of belonging, and imagining radically different futures. Most UIC DCC programming is open to everyone--students, staff, faculty, and community members--and nondisabled allies are welcome to join; the Center also hosts intentional spaces for disabled people to find community. The UIC DCC's programs include public lectures, discussion series, arts-based workshops, and one-on-one support.
ABOUT BABES WITH BLADES THEATRE COMPANY
Babes With Blades Theatre Company – for over the past 20 years, and moving into the future – strives to develop and present scripts focused on complex, dynamic (often combative) characters who continue to be underrepresented on theatre stages based on gender. Babes With Blades Theatre Company uses (and will continue to use) stage combat to tell stories that elevate the voices of underrepresented communities and dismantle the patriarchy.
In each element of their programming, they embrace two key concepts:
1) Folks of marginalized genders and underrepresented communities are central to the story, driving the action rather than responding or submitting to it.
2) Everyone is capable of a full emotional and physical range, up to and including violence and its consequences.
The company offers participants and patrons alike an unparalleled opportunity to experience every person as heroes and villains; rescuers and rescuees; right, wrong and everywhere in between: exciting, vivid, dynamic PEOPLE. It’s as simple and as subversive as that.
BWBTC’s 2022 programming is partially made possible by the kind support of The Gaylord & Dorothy Donnelley Foundation, a grant from The Illinois Arts Council Agency, a CityArts Grant from the the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs & Special Events (DCASE), and the support of the Small Business Alliance Shuttered Venue Operators (SVOG) grant program.
LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT STATEMENT:
Babes With Blades Theatre Company produces theatre in venues located on the traditional homelands of the Council of the Three Fires: the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations. Many other tribes such as the Miami, Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Sac, and Fox also called this area home. This region that we now commonly refer to as “The Chicagoland Area”, has long been a center for Indigenous people to gather, trade, and maintain kinship ties. Today, one of the largest urban Native American communities in the United States resides in Chicago. Members of this community continue to contribute to the life of this city and to celebrate their heritage, practice traditions and care for the land and waterways.
Babes With Blades Theatre Company presents "Richard III," the cast includes:
Top row: (L to R) Kristen Alesia, Kim Fukawa, Marianna Gallegos, Aszkara Gilchrist, Madison Hill
Second row (L to R) Jo Hoch, Leah Huskey, Alison Kertz, Kayla Marie Klammer, Jillian Leff
Third Row: (L to R) Jen Mickelson, Izis Mollinedo, Emma Norville, Lauren Paige, Elizabeth Quilter
Fourth Row (L to R) Pat Roache, Xela Rosas, Genesis Sanchez, Symmone Still
