In EXPAND UPON Round Five Mirror Stage Takes Aim At Gun Control

Theatre That Gets People Talking, Mirror Stage's Expand Upon series engages the community in meaningful dialogue, while enabling local artists to develop artistic responses to important issues.

For Expand Upon round five, the community selected the theme Gun Control, and Mirror Stage commissioned The Memory Bus by Amontaine Aurore, and In My Good Christian Neighborhood by Sien Méndez, with dramaturgy by Marquicia Dominguez. Performances of Expand Upon: GUN CONTROL will be will be October 3, 4, 10, and 11 on Zoom-Saturdays at 8:00pm and Sundays at 2:00pm, Pacific.

Directed by Suzanne M. Cohen, Expand Upon: GUN CONTROL features local Seattle actors Angie Bolton, Eloisa Cardona, Rachel Permann, Jonathan Keyes, Mario Martinez, Jordi Montez, Kevin Shannon, and Andy Tran. The plays are presented in tandem, as simply staged readings, encouraging audiences to create their own imagined world inhabited by the play's characters. Focusing on the text intensifies audience engagement and empathy, connecting people more deeply to perspectives other than their own. A moderated discussion with artists and audience exploring the issues raised in more depth follows every performance.

Admission is $15; $10 for students and seniors. Every performance has 10 Pay-What-You-Can tickets ($1 minimum). For more information, please visit https://mirrorstage.org.

The United States has 120.5 guns per 100 people, or about 393,347,000 guns, which is the highest total and per capita number in the world. Nearly one in four Americans (22%) own one or more guns (35% of men and 12% of women). America's pervasive gun culture stems in part from its colonial and revolutionary roots, as well as a history of frontier expansion. The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution states: "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." Proponents of stricter gun control laws believe the Second Amendment was intended for militias; that gun violence would be reduced; and that a majority of Americans, including gun owners, support new gun restrictions. Opponents counter that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to own guns; that guns are needed for self-defense against a range of threats from local criminals to foreign invaders; and that gun ownership deters crime.

Amontaine Aurore is a writer, actor, director, and author of numerous plays which have been presented on stages in Seattle, New York, and abroad. Her solo play, Free Desiree was named by Indie Theater Now as one of the Best New Plays of the 2013 New York Fringe Festival. In 2017 her play, Don't Call it a Riot! was a finalist in the Bay Area Playwrights' Festival, and had its world premiere in 2018. Amontaine is the recipient of artist grants from Artist Trust, Seattle Office of Arts and Culture, 4Culture, and the Puffin Foundation. She has been a writer-in-residence at the Hedgebrook Writers' Retreat, and was named a finalist for the 2019 Emerald Prize in playwriting.

Sien Méndez is a multi-disciplinary theatre artist who has been based in Seattle for about three years and hails from Houston, Texas and San Juan, Puerto Rico. Their plays, which include [A willow and no window,], Boson (finalist: The Scratch), Joke Scarcity, and Ozark National Forest have been seen at Cornish College of the Arts and Seattle's Mirabella as well as recognized on New Play Exchange. Their short play, somos un bosquejo was published through Cornish's In Other Words in 2018. As an actor, Sien has been seen at Seattle Children's Theatre, Seattle Public Theatre, Book-It Repertory Theatre, Seattle Shakespeare Company, and The Scratch, and was recently the dramaturg and assistant director of Washington Ensemble Theatre's Dance Nation. Sien is a teacher of playwriting and new play development at various elementary schools in the North Seattle area, and a board member of Seattle's newest theatre group The Collective We. They hold a BFA in Original Works from Cornish College of the Arts.

More at https://mirrorstage.org.