About the Book
Collected here are four full-length plays and one piercing scene by the eminent poetic language, social justice dramatist, Karen Malpede:
The particular twists in bloodlines, in psychosexual scars, in cataclysmic social forces are what US exposes; the very particular violence and reconciliations that recur endlessly between two disparate human beings who confront one another as lover and beloved.
Better People are to be concocted in this genetic research play that interrogates the true import of better.
From the depths of a dystopia, in the wake of the climate apocalypse, four rebels enact a daring plan to give birth to something new — to beings Other Than We.
In a great leap of fellow feeling, the separate griefs of three diverse characters converge — together with that of a blue roan horse: Blue Valiant.
From the fastness of observation, in Dinner During Yemen, two foreign experts dine to the tune of bloodcurdling screams.
Each of these works represents a heroic attempt to liberate the world.
About the Author :
Karen Malpede is author and director of 20 plays and co-founder with George Bartenieff of Theater Three Collaborative. Other Than We follows Extreme Whether (La MaMa, New York, 2018; ArtCop21, Paris, 2015; Theater for the New City, New York, 2014); the shorts Dinner During Yemen (Signature, New York, 2018), Hermes in the Anthropocene: A Dogologue (University of Iowa, Iowa City, 2019; Reed College, Portland, 2015); the revival of her 1995 The Beekeeper’s Daughter (Theater for the New City, New York, 2016), Another Life (RADA, London and Theater for the New City, New York, 2013; Irondale, Brooklyn, 2012; Gerald W. Lynch Theater, New York, 2011), Prophecy (English Theatre Berlin, 2007 (reading); New End Theatre, London, 2008; 4th St. Theater, New York, 2010), the docudrama Iraq: Speaking of War (Culture Project, New York, 2007; CUNY Grad Center, New York, 2006). Her most recent play, Blue Valiant, written for Kathleen Chalfant, had its debut in 2021. She is author of the anthology Plays in Time: The Beekeeper’s Daughter, Prophecy, Another Life, Extreme Whether, lead editor of Acts of War: Iraq and Afghanistan in Seven Plays, and author of an anthology of early plays, A Monster Has Stolen the Sun and Other Plays. Her short plays, fiction, and essays on ecofeminism, climate crisis, a new green Federal Theater, bearing witness, the Iraq war, the U.S. torture program, etc., are published in The Kenyon Review, TriQuarterly, Dark Matter, Howlround, Transformations, Torture Magazine, New Theater Quarterly, TDR, New York Times, and elsewhere. She was an adjunct associate professor on the Environmental Justice and Theater faculties at John Jay College, City University of New York; McKnight National Playwrights’ Fellowship, New York Foundation for the Arts; Vogelstein fellow; and a member of PEN, Dramatists Guild, ASLE (Association for the Study of Literature and Ecology) and of Brooklyn for Peace.
Marvin Carlson is the Sidney E. Cohn is Distinguished Professor of Theatre, Comparative Literature, and Middle Eastern Studies, The Graduate Center, The City University of New York. His wide-ranging research and teaching interests include dramatic theory and Western European theatre history, dramatic literature, and translation, especially of the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries. He has been awarded the ATHE Career Achievement Award, the George Jean Nathan Prize, the Bernard Hewitt prize, the George Freedley Award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. He has been a Walker-Ames Professor at the University of Washington, a fellow of the Institute for Advanced Studies at Indiana University, a visiting professor at the Freie Universitat of Berlin, and a Fellow of the American Theatre. In 2005 he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Athens. His best-known book, Theories of the Theatre has been translated into eight languages. His book, The Haunted Stage, won the Calloway Prize.
Lydia Koniordou was born in Athens, studied English
literature at the Athens University, and graduated from the National Theatre
Drama School, in combination with parallel studies in music and dance. As an
actress, she has interpreted major roles, both classical and contemporary, in
Greece and abroad, collaborating with the National Theatre, the Karolos Koun
Art Theatre, the Municipal Theatres of Larissa, Volos, Patras, as well as with
the Chatelet Theater in Paris, Teatro Piccolo in Milan and many other. She has
worked with eminent theatre directors such as Karolos Koun, Alexis Minotis,
Kostas Tsianos, Lefteris Voyatzis, Sotiris Chatzakis, Robert Wilson, Alexander
Vassiliev, Yannis Kokkos and others. As a director, besides contemporary plays,
she staged many ancient Greek tragedies, for the National Theatre, the
Municipal Theatres of Larissa and Volos, the Athens Conservatory and for the
Getty Museum in California. For her work and overall contribution in this
field, she has been awarded the Karolos Koun and the Critics Awards. She has
served as artistic director of the Municipal Theatres of Volos and Patras. Koniordou
served as the Minister of Culture and Sports of the Hellenic Republic from November
5, 2016 to August 29, 2018.
Review :
Karen Malpede is a downtown New York Theater mainstay
known for her unflagging commitment to social justice. —Brad Rothbart, American
Theatre
Karen Malpede’s plays scream “Pay Attention.” —Cindy
Rosenthal, The Theatre Times
A real kick in the gut and terrific writing. — Naomi
Wallace, playwright, MacArthur Fellow
Sublime writing, first very realistic, then a slow build
toward poetic monologues that are glorious and heartbreaking. — Linda
Eisenstein, composer, playwright, chief theatre correspondent for angle: a
journal of arts + culture
Her characters are strong & fascinating, her contexts
brilliant & horrifying, and her tone always warm & in the end loving. —Andrew Solomon, past president of PEN
American Center
We want to believe that mending our species is indeed
possible . . . Can the quartet of fugitives accomplish their outlandish goal? —Lena
Zeldovitch, Other Than We: The Making of Post Homo Sapiens, Woman Around Town
One of America’s more prominent political playwrights . .
. These plays seek to bring us to our senses, intellectually, morally, and
socially. —Marvin Carlson, Sidney E.
Cohn Distinguished Professor of Theatre, Comparative Literature, and Middle
Eastern Studies, The Graduate Center, The City University of New York
Karen Malpede’s latest creation evokes the wordless love
people and animals can experience . . . Hannah Doyle is at wit’s end with grief
and rage when she sees Blue galloping in an open, but fenced-in field. She is
immediately smitten. What unfolds . . .
is an intense meditation on freedom, love, patience, taming, and compromise. In
short, it’s the stuff of human connection. — Eleanor J. Bader, The Indypendent
Simultaneously unsettling, surreal and hopeful . . . a
post-apocalyptic scenario in which survivors have a chance to remake the world
. . . a grand vision, born of catastrophe, but with the possibility of triumph
. . . Albert Einstein is credited with saying that great opportunities lie in
the midst of calamity. Award-winning playwright Karen Malpede agrees. — Eleanor Bader, The Indypendent
A utopian vision for a reconfigured race that will be
“Other Than We” – hybrid creatures, human/non-human that will adapt and sustain
themselves in the treacherous territory outside of The Dome. Malpede uses
image-rich language and striking stage pictures to transmit an urgent call for
global unity, imagination, transformation, and action. —Cindy Rosenthal, The Theatre Times
