MURDERING MARY
Playwright:
Director:
SET DESIGN:
COSTUME DESIGN:
Tonderai Munyevu
keren ouyang
Shalaka Joshi
sabina pieroni
DESIGNED FOR WEBBER DOUGLAS STUDIO, LONDON / PRACTICAL PERFORMANCE AT EAST15 ACTING SCHOOL, ESSEX
Murdering Mary reclaims the silenced story of Mary Mallon from a psychological and poetic standpoint. At its core, it is a narrative of migration and self acceptance. The dramaturgy tightly integrates set, costume and direction- each highlighting Mary’s journey as an immigrant and a woman, finally freeing her from the infamous tag ‘Typhoid Mary’. Through symbolic architecture and a modern-gothic aesthetic, the production transforms the stage into an organism of Mary’s psychological and historical imprisonment, and her journey toward justice.
Core Themes: Migration, Medical Literacy, Media Image, Self Acceptance
CAST: Lauryn Sherwood, REBECCA CLOZZA, NATALIE RUGINIS
The Marys are in a metaphorical glass cage,
their story an anecdote in the medical realm.
Other characters move in and out of the space,
but the Marys remain frozen in time,
waiting to be freed of their lifelong imprisonment.
No matter where they go, they come back to their prison.
Mapping The Process
The set is anchored by a dominating skeletal cage structure-
both as a spectacle and a metaphor of entrapment.
The cage is a crinoline that houses a spiral staircase- a hidden spine that gradually reveals itself and is used throughout the performance.
NEW YORK, 1883
THE MARYS
THE LECTURE
LYING IN STATE