www.theoffcentral.com\/box-office<\/a>.<\/p>\nAccording to Alan Mohney Jr., managing director at Off-Central Players, the Think Inside the Box initiative is designed to give time, space, and voice to artists and to stories that deserve to be told but don\u2019t fit the mold of traditional theatrical offerings. Creneti\u2019s \u201cMy Year of Saying No\u201d is a deeply relevant one-woman show. She is a local Pinellas artist with four decades of experience. After years of developing this autobiographical piece \u2014 which tracks her journey through the COVID pandemic to confront sexism, mental health, and the \u201cPatriarchy\u201d \u2014 she is finally bringing this powerful story home.<\/p>\n
Set during the COVID-19 pandemic, \u201cMy Year of Saying No\u201d explores impacts of the mental health crisis, sexism, and society\u2019s rigid expectations using multimedia and multiple characters such as Patriarchy, Perfection, Zoom, Janice\u2019s Body and COVID. This serio-comedy examines things that aren\u2019t working in the world, and in her life, as she builds a path back to herself. This production was developed with and is directed by Jessica Lynn Johnson.<\/p>\n
\u201cDuring COVID lockdown, I discovered the power of saying \u2018No!\u2019\u201d Creneti said. \u201cI was in a world bent on silencing my voice and I took a stand for what really mattered to me, depression\u2019s grip weakened and joy returned. I share this discovery to pave a way for others, especially women, to reclaim their own lives.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are thrilled to have Janice and her story on our stage,\u201d Mohney said. \u201cJanice is an incredible, honest actor. I am grateful that we can give voice to such an amazing person and important story.\u201d<\/p>\n
Creneti is an award-winning actor and director with four decades of experience. She has appeared in over 100 productions including live theater, TV, and film. She began her journey of personal storytelling with Powerstories Theater of Tampa. It taught her to deeply embrace and leverage theater as a vehicle for social change.<\/p>\n
In 2024, Creneti shared some of the story behind the creation of \u201cMy Year of Saying No\u201d with Tampa Bay Newspapers.<\/p>\n
\u201cTowards the end of the first year of COVID, I was having lunch with a friend where we were swapping stories of all we’d learned from the pandemic experience,\u201d Creneti said. \u201cI commented that it had been \u2018my year of saying no.\u2019 My friend noted that was a great title for a book.\u201d<\/p>\n
As fate would have it, a few weeks later, Powerstories issued a call for scripts for the inaugural Voices of Women Theatre Festival.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had always thought in the back of my mind that one day I would do a one woman show,\u201d Creneti said. \u201cI threw myself into writing and a week later had the story that became the play,\u201d she said. \u201cI then had the great fortune of getting connected with Soaring Solo Studios where I studied the art of solo theater with Jessica Lynn Johnson who helped me turn the simple narrative story into a 20-character play.\u201d<\/p>\n
Opened in 2021, The Off-Central is an intimate black box theatre and gallery space offering audiences an intimate storytelling experience in an immersive environment. Over the course of the past four seasons, The Off-Central has produced more than 30 Main Stage productions, with many being award-nominated and winning, and has been home to a children\u2019s educational theater program since its inception, The Big Break Youth Stage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ST. PETERSBURG \u2014 The Off-Central Players will launch its new Think Inside the Box initiative with \u201cMy Year…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":232812,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[85103,104020,202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":["post-232811","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-diversions","tag-museums_theater","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232811","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=232811"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/232811\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/232812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=232811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=232811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=232811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}