By the time Ann Citron conceived “The Democracy Plays,” she had done the all the civic-minded political things: she’d marched in the protests and made the phone calls and sent the postcards. Still, the Rosendale Theatre’s theater arts director felt she should be doing more. “I’m a theater artist, so I thought, why not put on plays?” Citron says.
The result is “The Democracy Plays: A Short Play Festival for Our Times,” an 80-minute program of original works by Hudson Valley playwrights Darrah Cloud, David Simpatico, Danielle Frimer, Ivy Meehan, and Brian Petti. Directed by Citron, the festival runs September 17 through 20 at the Rosendale Theatre, with five short plays, music, and a spoken-word battle between Supreme Court justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Antonin Scalia.
Citron invited the writers to create plays lasting 10 to 12 minutes but gave them broad latitude in approaching the theme. What came back ranges from local government and immigration to reproductive rights, political exhaustion, and the commercialization of tragedy.
The evening opens at the municipal level with Cloud’s “Town Board Government.” Set during a supervisor’s final meeting, the lyrical piece introduces the public officials whose daily work keeps a town functioning, including a clerk, planning board member, and police officer. Citron, whose husband once served as Rosendale town supervisor, attended her share of board meetings and understands the machinery behind local government. “So much really can be done locally,” she says. “Everything starts there.”
Simpatico’s “Carpe Denim,” originally written to be performed on Zoom, follows three advertising executives attempting to build a campaign around the unrest in Los Angeles following the killing of George Floyd. Their objective is disconcertingly simple: How can the images of a national tragedy be used to sell jeans? Citron describes the piece as sardonic, disturbing, and funny.
Petti contributed two plays. In “How to Yell,” a Latina woman fears that immigration authorities could detain her without anyone noticing. She tries to teach her friend, a white gay man who has never felt compelled to speak out, how to raise the alarm if she disappears. “Obsession” takes place in an OB-GYN office, where one member of a lesbian couple has chosen to undergo a tubal ligation without telling her partner. Her decision is rooted in the desire to retain control of her body in the aftermath of the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
Frimer’s fantastical “The Bog,” subtitled “Once Upon a Midterm Eve,” centers on an older couple who have voted, protested, and remained politically engaged since the 1970s—and must summon the will to do it again. Despite their weariness, they proceed through the ritual of casting their ballots. “Voting is an inherently hopeful act,” Citron says.
Meehan brings Ginsburg back into the program with “Ruth: A New Musical,” which features “When There Are Nine,” a song inspired by the justice’s famous answer when asked when there would be enough women on the Supreme Court.
For Citron, the challenge was to keep an evening of political theater from becoming a series of position papers. The writers solved much of that problem by creating recognizable characters and finding humor within grave subjects.
“Laughter opens your mind a little bit,” Citron says. “They’re real people relating to one another and telling stories.”
Pianist Marta Waterman, a veteran accompanist of the Rosendale Theatre’s silent-film screenings, will improvise transitions as the roughly 14-member cast rearranges painted boxes to create bedrooms, offices, meeting rooms, and other settings. Citron avoids blackouts, preferring to let the audience watch each new world being built.
The festival’s civic engagement extends into the lobby, where the League of Women Voters will staff a voter-registration table at every performance. Attending the show is optional for those who want to register, Citron notes—though she strongly recommends it.
“The Democracy Plays” will be performed September 17–19 at 7:30pm and September 20 at 2pm at the Rosendale Theatre. Tickets are $22 general admission and $20 for members. Rosendaletheatre.org
