PROJECT X Screenings are this week!

Theatre Fairfield will screen PROJECT X by Judy Tate this week.

7:00pm Wednesday October 25 and Thursday 26, 2023. 

Wien Black Box Theatre, in the Quick Center for the Arts. 

Free admission, seating is first-come-first-served.

PROJECT X is an original theatre piece about race and privilege, centered on Fairfield University and reflective of America’s 21^stcentury struggle with race and social justice. The script was created from interviews of Fairfield University alumni, students, faculty and staff members.

When he was commissioned to craft this original piece, Director Godfrey L. Simmons Jr. said that the real words of real people can be more impactful in a play than fictional words spoken by fictional characters. Simmons asked, “What would happen if we went into conversations around anti-racism, poverty, misogyny, transphobia, etc., with the assumption that we don’t know anything until we’ve asked enough questions, especially of those we consider our antagonists?” 

A valiant group of alumni, students, staff, faculty, and administrators volunteered to work with Simmons, gathering a wide range of stories through interviewing and surveying numerous members of the Fairfield community about their experience of race on our campus. Simmons worked with playwright Judy Tate, combing through hundreds of hours of interviews and reams of data, in crafting the script. 

PROJECT X was performed as a live script-in-hand reading in the fall of 2021. Theatre Fairfield recorded all the performances, then edited a definitive version of the piece. 

The PROJECT X cast features:

Jill Bodach, lecturer in the English Department

Rob Esposito ’94

Krystal Flores ’25

Kai Halm ’25

Lissbeth Larrea Ortiz ’24

Alyssa Suarez ’25

Amal White ’11

The production’s artistic team includes:

Producer Lynne Porter

Costume Designer Julie Leavitt

Projection Designer Jessie Lizotte ‘18

Technical Director Anne Kendall

Stage Managers Michelle Rakowsky ’17 and Kierstin Jones ’21

For more information on how PROJECT X was devised and for Theatre Fairfield’s dramaturgical work, visit https://www.theatre-fairfield.org/project-x.