More good news

A glorious sunrise and confirmation of more good news: Donna Hayes is among 34 Black, Indigenous, and "People of Color" artists selected for an award of $1500 each, for work "Capturing the Moment" of the Covid-19 shutdown in the USA. 

Donna immediately asked me to collect home addresses of all eighteen people who composed the cast and crew of Silent Voices. As followers of this journal know, Donna wrote the piece for theatre and then, because of the shutdown, we developed it for video instead. Donna will send each member of the cast and crew a piece of her award, and she will donate the rest to the Portland organization of families of people killed by police. Donna and her mother live together on nothing but disability and old age pensions and could certainly use the money, but she said to me on the phone, "I don't want the money. What I want is a way to say thank you to all the people who made the characters I wrote come to life. Without you all, it would have remained in my imagination." 

The videographers who created Silent Voices also filmed our rehearsals and are working on a "Making of the Movie" video to share with other theatre groups who may want to take the same route. I'm looking forward to seeing that video, as it will show mothers of murdered people talking to actors about how to perform their dead children, me directing actors while wearing a mask and staying more than 6 feet away from them, and the film crew working together without coming near the unmasked actors.