Diversionary Theatre\u2019s first production of 2026, a world premiere of Harrison David Rivers\u2019 \u201cStraddle,\u201d has been a true team effort.<\/p>\n
It began with Artistic Director Sherri Eden Barber, who co-conceived this play with Rivers, reaching out to her longtime friend and creative associate in want of \u201ca piece about two women that sees them as full beings. I wanted a romantic dramedy. I wanted a feast for them in the room.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMy big philosophy is, if I can\u2019t find it, let\u2019s make it. He\u2019s known me since the only thing I was making was mistakes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barber is credited as co-conceiver of \u201cStraddle,\u201d a story about two lesbian women over 40 who\u2019ve been married for 14 years \u2014 and together longer than that. The couple, Vita and Dodie, are struggling with, as Barber puts it, the questions \u201cHow do you keep it going? What is it to sustain a long-term relationship, to essentially have the ordinary become the extraordinary?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cStraddle\u201d co-stars Marti Gobel, last seen at Diversionary in its production of Rivers\u2019 \u201cWe Are Continuous\u201d a year ago, and, making her Diversionary debut, Summer Broyhill, a veteran of Broadway, Off Broadway and an alumna of the Old Globe\/USD Graduate Acting Program.<\/p>\n
Barber praises the Minneapolis-based playwright Rivers for \u201cwriting female characters in such an excellent, real, grounded and full way. I knew he was the one.\u201d In collaborating \u201cwe have a beautiful shorthand together. I\u2019m speaking in images and ideas and beats, and dreaming architecturally, and he\u2019s speaking in words. We have this trust between the two of us and this clarity of language.\u201d<\/p>\n
Once the play was written, Barber brought in two other key members of her \u201cStraddle\u201d team, scenic designer McKenna Perry and lighting designer Annelise Schultz-Salazar.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re both queer women who have a deep understanding of what we were doing,\u201d Barber said. \u201cWhen we were stumped on something, we (she and Rivers) pulled the two of them in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Then there\u2019s her actors.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was an incredible click,\u201d she recalled when hearing Gobel audition for \u201cWe Are Continuous.\u201d \u201cI was blown away. She knows Harrison and knows me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Broyhill \u201cis so game. We\u2019re asking them both to really dive into what they know and what they don\u2019t know as actors.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barber admires \u201cthe love, commitment and rigor that these two have, and the bravery they have to tell a story that is so darn universal.\u201d<\/p>\n
As Diversionary Theatre winds toward the conclusion of its \u201cLove As Revolution\u201d-themed 40th season (it culminates with a production of \u201cRent\u201d opening in May), Barber reflected on revelations she\u2019s made since assuming the artistic director role there a little more than a year and a half ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve learned how much this community cares and how incredibly fortunate and invested they are in what they do. They come to the theater really wanting to be affected and moved and wanting it to succeed. I truly believe Diversionary is a place where we are taste-makers. We\u2019re asking you to see something you haven\u2019t seen before.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve learned about myself that the difficult really galvanizes everyone, and it\u2019s worth it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018Straddle\u2019<\/p>\n
When: Previews, Feb. 18 through 27. Opens Feb. 28 and runs through March 15. 7 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays; 2 p.m. Sundays<\/p>\n
Where: Diversionary Theatre, 4545 Park Blvd., University Heights<\/p>\n
Tickets: $11.50-$61.50<\/p>\n
Phone: 619-220-0097<\/p>\n