PlayNotes - Season 50, Issue 4 - What the Constitution Means to Me

Discussion Series

Join us for a Book Club-style Page to Stage with the Portland Public Library. Check out your copy of the script and join us two weeks before previews of each Mainstage Production. Scripts are available at the reference desk at the Main Branch of the Portland Public Library. This year discussions will be held in the Rines Room at 5pm two weeks before a show opens. Feel free to come and chat about the plays with Literary Manager, Todd Brian Backus; his Directing and Dramaturgy Apprentices, and special guests. Visit portlandlibrary.com/programs-events/ for more information.

The Artistic Perspective , hosted by Artistic Director Anita Stewart, is an opportunity for audience members to delve deeper into the themes of the show through conversation with special guests. A different scholar, visiting artist, playwright, or other expert will join the discussion each time. The Artistic Perspective discussions are held after the first Sunday matinee performance.

Curtain Call discussions offer a rare opportunity for audience members to talk about the production with the performers. Through this forum, the audience and cast explore topics that range from the process of rehearsing and producing the text to character development to issues raised by the work Curtain Call discussions are held after the second Sunday matinee performance.

All discussions are free and open to the public. Show attendance is not required. To subscribe to a discussion series performance, please call the Box Office at 207.774.0465.

HannaH Cordes, Paula Vogel, anita stewart, and todd Brian BaCkus in a talkBaCk, Portland stage ComPany

What the Constitution Means to Me

by Heidi Shreck

PlayNotes Season 50 Editorial Staff

Editor in Chief

Todd Brian Backus

Contributors

Ellis Collier, Julia Jennings, Ellery Kenyon, Alex Oleksy, Jessi Stier

Copy Editor

Adam Thibodeau

Cover Illustration

James A. Hadley

Portland Stage Company Educational Programs, like PlayNotes, are generously supported through the annual donations of hundreds of individuals and businesses, as well as special funding from:

The Simmons Foundation

Letter from the Editors

Dear PlayNotes Readers,

We're so excited to have you with us for our next production in our 50th season!

In this issue, we explore the world of What the Constitution Means to Me, a play by Heidi Shreck that grapples with both the successes and failures of the US Constitution with regard to being a woman in America. Told through the lens of her teenage years as a Constiutional Debater, Heidi takes us through our nation's highs and lows, ultimately delivering the hopeful message that "We all belong in the preamble."

Want to learn about this production of What the Constitution Means to Me? Head over to our "Interview with Todd Brian Backus” (pg. 12), and our chat with Abbie Killeen as she deciphers the question "What Does it Mean to Play Someone Who is Still Alive?" (pg. 14).

Curious about the societal context for this play? Check out the article "History of the American Legion and the Oratorical Contest " (pg. 18) or discover the Supreme Court cases that have affected the Constitution throughout time with "Significance of Roe v Wade, Castlerock, and more" (pg. 20).

When compiling each issue of PlayNotes, we strive to provide articles and interviews that give you insight into what the process has been like behind the scenes (see articles in Portland Stage's What the Constitution Means to Me), contain pertinent information about the play’s setting and major themes (“The World of What the Constitution Means to Me”), and provide deeper dives into specific subjects that compelled our literary department (“Digging Deeper”). We include a list of books, plays, and other media that we hope audiences will access for more cultural content that relates to the play (“Recommended Resources”).

We are so excited to have you join us in welcoming our 50th season, and we hope you enjoy seeing What the Constitution Means to Me.

Sincerely yours,

The Portland Stage Literary Department

Todd Brian Backus

Julia Jennings

Alex Oleksy

Jessi Stier

About the Play

by Julia Jennings

Playwright Heidi Schreck calls What the Constitution Means to Me an “auto-legal history”— an autobiography with amendments. In this genre-bending memoir play, Heidi revisits the speech she delivered in high school for the American Legion Oratorical Contest, during which students compete for scholarship money by writing speeches that connect their own lives to the United States Constitution. Heidi wondered, “What if I did that as an adult woman? What would it actually mean to do one of these contests in a way that wasn’t just about selling the idea of America, or buying into American exceptionalism, or just trying to win?”

The resulting play weaves personal anecdotes from Heidi’s life and the lives of the women in her family into a sharp and searing examination of the United States Constitution, with particular emphasis on the Amendments Nine and Fourteen, and Supreme Court cases such as Castle Rock v. Gonzales, Dred Scott v. Sandford, and Roe v. Wade. The play closes with a live debate in which Heidi welcomes a local high school student to join her onstage and consider whether we ought to keep or abolish our national Constitution, imploring audiences to consider their own relationship to this foundational text and its ever-current societal implications.

What the Constitution Means to Me was first developed in 2007 as a ten-minute piece for a benefit night at East Village venue P.S. 122, directed by Heidi’s husband Kip Fagan. In 2014, Heidi received a commission to expand the play to its current full-length form, which was produced at the Wild Project in New York as part of Clubbed Thumb’s Summerworks in 2017. The play quickly made its way to Broadway, opening at the Hayes Theater in March 2019, where it enjoyed an extended, sold-out run. Since then, What the Constitution Means to Me embarked on a national tour and is now being produced regionally—in fact, American Theatre announced it to be the most produced play in the United States for the 2023–2024 season.

Though this play was originally staged prepandemic, mid-Trump administration, and before the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, it remains incredibly timely in the shadow of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and the overturning of Roe v. Wade. This production, directed by Portland Stage Literary Manager Todd Brian Backus and starring Portland Stage Affiliate Artist Abigail Killeen, brings one of the most compelling plays of the decade alive for Portland Stage’s 50th Anniversary Season and the beginning of the 2024 election cycle.

mattHew delamater and aBigail killeen (aea) in reHearsal for What the Constitution Means to Me. PHoto By: James a. Hadley.

Pre-Show Questions

by Ellis Collier & Ellery Kenyon

1. What do you know about the United States Constitution? What rights does it protect? Who has access to those rights? What associations do you have when you think about the Constitution? Is it something you have a positive association with? A negative one? Why?

2. This show involves a formal debate about the constitution. Have you ever experienced debate in your life? What kind of debate and with who? What does debate achieve? What should debate achieve? Do you believe in the merit of debate?

3. Look up the rules of parliamentary debate. Are the goals of competitive debate different from other kinds of debate? Is one more useful or important than the other?

4. Read the “History of Solo and Autobiographical Theater” article in Playnotes. Have you ever seen a one-person play before? How does it create a different experience for the audience? Why do you think this play is created in this form? Would you consider this a one-person show? How does it follow or subvert the expectations of a solo performance?

Post-Show Questions

by Ellis Collier & Ellery Kenyon

1. This play was originally written and performed autobiographically; Heidi Shreck wrote and performed this show about her own life. Now, it’s being performed by another actor. How did it change your experience that this was performed by an actor? Does it change anything about the story that it was not a first hand experience? Did it feel “real”-- and what does that word mean?

2. Think of an instance in your life where you or a loved one were directly affected by the Constitution or the Bill of Rights. Was it a positive experience or a negative one? What factors contributed to it being negative or positive?

3. How did the Production/Design side of this show (Lights, Sound, Set, Costumes, Props) affect your experience of the play? What story was told through the ways these elements were designed? If you were designing this show, what would you have done differently?

4. Why do you think Heidi Schreck made the choice to include the character of The Legionnaire? Would you have included him in the way Heidi chose to? Are there any other people you would put onstage?

5. Should we abolish the Constitution? Why or why not? If possible, host a debate on this subject.

About the Characters

by Julia Jennings

Actor: Abigail Killeen (AEA)

Character: Heidi Shreck

An autobiographical character, Heidi Schreck speaks to the audience as an American playwright and actor in her midforties. She also occasionally inhabits her fifteen-year old self, participating in a reimagined version of the American Legion Oratorical Contest she competed in throughout high school.

Actor: Matt Delamater

Character: Legionnaire

Based on a real person in Heidi’s life, the Legionnaire moderates the imagined contest onstage, and later sheds this character to transform into Danny Wolohan, a real actor that Heidi worked with in developing this show.

Character: Debater

A real, live high schooler who Heidi invites onstage to join her for a debate about whether to keep or abolish the Constitution. While the text for this role was devised by Rosdely Ciprian, who originated the role, this character is portrayed by local Maine high school students in Portland Stage’s production.

Evangeline Beasley Vagni Das Paige Scalia

Lyra Legawiec

Lily Jessen

An Interview with the Director

Todd Brian Backus

Edited for Length and Clarity by Assistant Director Julia Jennings

Assistant Director Julia Jennings sat down with Director Todd Brian Backus to talk about his artistic journey with Portland Stage, and discuss his vision for the play.

Julia Jennings (JJ): Could you start off by telling me a little bit about yourself and your theatrical journey?

Todd Brian Backus (TBB): I started doing theater when I was in high school, like many people. I found I had a knack for it. My mom said I could not go to school just for theater, though, so I got a degree in theater and graphic design, two things that I loved doing. Right after school, I wound up here at Portland Stage as the marketing apprentice. I stayed on for an additional year and then as that year was closing, I was asked to stay on, technically in a permanent position, as junior staff. So that's how I wound up doing my third year here. During that time, I was also directing stuff in town, in the studio, in Theater for Kids. I'd been here for three years and then I applied for grad school and I got interviews at Yale and at Brown, but I didn't get into either, and the consensus was like, "You need to direct more." So in 2014, I ran away to New York, and I connected with some friends, Ben Ferber and Nora Sorena Casey, who were part of my internship cohort my first year here, and the three of us revived our theater company that we were running up here, Power Out Productions. And in the space of like 16 months, we did seven fully produced shows in New York, which was crazy.

In 2016, the literary management position opened up here at Portland Stage and I applied kind of on a lark. It's the sort of job I would love to be doing, and I'm very happy to be doing now. But I didn't think that they were going to hire me. And so, since 2016, I have really focused on revitalizing our New Works program, focusing it and trying to workshop the plays that we really want to produce on our Mainstage. In addition to work for the Little Festival of the Unexpected, I worked on

a previous thing that we were doing called the Studio Series Workshops. In addition to the three shows that we would workshop in the spring, I would try to just workshop plays as we got them. [I was interested in] taking those people I'd been working with in New York and bringing them here and also trying to cast a wider net and see, who are the playwrights in the area that we should be supporting and uplifting? Then in the last two years, I've been fortunate enough to direct on the Mainstage here at Portland Stage. Last year, I did The Cake, and this will be my second Mainstage production with What the Constitution Means To Me.

JJ: I know you've been a fan of What the Constitution Means to Me for a while. Could you tell me a bit about your history with this play and why it's exciting to you?

TBB: I was really lucky to see the extension of this during its original New York run before it went to Broadway. And it really stuck with me, there's something about how Heidi Schreck both makes and breaks rules in the piece that makes it a really exciting theatrical event to watch. In rehearsal, I had some worries that this play would (in some ways) be dated. This

direCtor todd Brian BaCkus.

is a play warning us about the dangers of Roe being overturned, and we're doing it in a postDobbs world. And yet, day after day, week after week, we've been getting all of these headlines about things that the Alabama Supreme Court is doing, things that are happening with voting rights, things that the Supreme Court is weighing in on or not weighing in on. Alito apparently threatened Obergefell again, like two days ago, and was like, “I agree with how we're ruling on this, but I think maybe we should overturn same-sex marriage.” And nine unelected people have that decisionmaking power over our lives in a way that is sometimes scary and can lead to despair. And I think this play offers a possibility of collective action, and the hope that we can really engage and support one another and create a system that works for the people better.

JJ: Why do you think this story is important to tell at Portland Stage now?

TBB: Thankfully, in Maine, abortion is not negotiable. Like, that right is not under attack, we have state laws that protect the right to abortion. There's a movement to try to get that into the Maine State Constitution. Heidi, herself, reached out to all of the theaters producing the show about the fact that a lot of Americans think that the Equal Rights Amendment got passed. People marched for it, states did ratify it—but not in the time limit, there are weird technicalities. And so there's a bunch of people who believe that that happened, but it has not. And in fact, it seems like there's some people trying to put together a new resolution to consider the amendment, which would be really cool and pretty radical. I think it's important to know that we have an election coming up, the Supreme Court has not gotten better since 2017—in fact, depending on your view, it may have gotten much worse. And how can “We the People” try to regulate or make the Supreme Court more indicative of the feelings that the population has? Should nine unelected people push back against progress that most of the country actually wants?

JJ: What is it like directing a (basically) onewoman show? What is it like directing a play that was partly originally improvised and still has some room for improvisation?

TBB: I think what's really hard about this play— but really exciting—is that there are no scene breaks. There are two parts so, technically, we can think of it as two scenes, but really, they bleed into each other. But all of these stories, all of these points that Heidi is making over the course of the play—there is no room to catch your breath. There is no “the lights go out and we have a nice scene change and we have a different stage picture.” And a part of me misses that from The Cake, which had a lot of scenes. But for the rehearsal process, what's been interesting is just trying to figure out when do we stop and go back and when do we push through? When do we try to shape, because the whole scene is part one? And that's been interesting to try to navigate and negotiate, particularly as someone who thinks a lot about the stage picture we're setting up. What is the stage picture that we're going to? Not having a chance to reset is making things difficult for me in a way that is exciting and a little scary at the same time.

JJ: What has surprised you so far in this process of working on the piece with Abbie and Matt and the teenage debaters?

TBB: First—we've had one rehearsal with the teenage debaters at this point—and I was so impressed with all of them coming in and feeling like they could hold their own against an older professional actor. All but one have

todd Brian BaCkus and aBBie killeen (aea) during tHe first read-tHrougH of wHat tHe Constitution means to me.

come up through A Christmas Carol at one time or another, and it's a very different feeling to have the adults of the ensemble of that show guiding you through something, like, “And now we do this, and we're all on a team together” versus “Let's have a debate right now” and really standing your ground against someone—that's been exciting.

It's also been interesting to sort out the feelings of this play. I think Heidi has a lot of opinions and a lot of feelings that are showcased in this piece, but they also bring up so many other questions for other people. And I don't think I've worked on anything that's been this politically charged before. It’s been interesting to figure out, like, “Ooh, some of these things are a little taboo in our culture,” and how do we make this a space where everyone feels comfortable and supported while also engaging with some of these really hard ideas in a way that's honest and truthful? A lot of people have a lot of feelings about all of these things, and I've learned so much about Abbie and Matt and their backgrounds and what they're bringing to this, and also Meg, our stage manager. It's been really fascinating because these aren't topics we talk about all the time in public. And that's been really illuminating, being less surprised when people's life stories are not what I expect them to be.

JJ: What does the Constitution mean to you? If you were to enter a speech in the American Legion Oratorical Contest, what might you talk about?

TBB: The first and perhaps worst idea I have is the argument that a 15- or 16-year-old me would have made, which is that I love that this Constitution protects my right to not love my country. I think it’s really important that we live in a place where I can be upset about the government and furious at the people who run our government, and I am not at risk of being locked up or jailed for that. I don't think the American Legion in particular is going to award me any prize money for this, but I think that's where I would go, and talk about the importance of protest, both in our history and in this current political moment. And how protest is perhaps the most patriotic thing you can do.

JJ: What are you most excited for audiences to see?

TBB: As someone who has seen the show before, and as someone who feels pretty confident about how we're doing part one, I don't think I will be surprised by how people feel about part one. I'm hoping there will be gasps, I'm hoping there will be, “Oh my god, I can't believe she said that.” But I think the thing I'm most excited for is the debate, and how the debate will play out with our audiences. Will audiences always side with the teenage debater? Will that change? Will we have people who are really pro–keeping the Constitution, or really pro–abolishing the Constitution over the course of the run? What an incredible sample set to look at and to wonder, what does our community believe on this? What does the community that Portland Stage talks to believe on this?

JJ: Is there anything else that you want to add about working on this show?

TBB: I hope that we are able to engage with people who might not feel how Heidi feels on this, and to present her stories and the story of her family in a way that people will have an open mind about and perhaps reconsider thoughts that they have about abortion and women's rights in this country.

sam rosentrater (aea), eileen Hanley, eCHaka agBa (aea), and todd Brian BaCkus in reHearsal for tHe Cake.

Community Connections: Maine's Work to Protect Abortion in the State Constitution

Edited for length and clarity by Jessi Stier

In What the Constitution Means to Me, playwright Heidi Schreck describes a deeply personal experience detailing how the United States Constitution impacted her experience with abortion and reproductive healthcare. In the recent Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization case, a momentous decision was made about whether the Constitution protects the right to an abortion. In a divided opinion, the Court upheld the Mississippi law, overturning Roe v. Wade (1973) and Planned Parenthood v. Casey (1992)—concluding that the Constitution does not protect the right to an abortion. Post-Dobbs, both Maine and the United States at large have seen increased attacks on not only abortion care but on comprehensive sexual and reproductive rights. The Planned Parenthood Maine Action Fund (PPMEAF) in Portland is determined to protect these rights both statewide and nationally. We sat down with Jillian McLeod-Tardiff, Organizing and Training Manager of PPMEAF, to learn more about the organization’s work and the ways community members can get involved.

Jessi Stier (JS): How did you first get involved with Planned Parenthood?

Jillian McLeod-Tardiff (JM): I was a Planned Parenthood patient when I was living in Boston. I had some other previous reproductive health experiences with my college nurse, but when I found my way to Planned Parenthood, I was just blown away by how welcoming, caring, and holistic every aspect of the appointment was. At the time, I remember thinking how much I’d love to give back to an organization that was giving so much to me. So when I moved to Maine in 2013, I thought—I don’t have a lot of money, but I’ve got a lot of time to give. So I started volunteering, and did a lot of community outreach, canvassing, things like that. Then, I was lucky enough that a spot opened up on the team. Since then, I’ve been on the organizing team and specifically running our storytelling program and deep canvassing program.

JS:What is your role with the Planned Parenthood organization?

JM: My title is Organizing and Training Manager with the Planned Parenthood Maine Action Fund. There is Planned Parenthood of Northern New England, which is the healthcare provision side of our nonprofit, and then separately there’s the Maine Action Fund, which is the advocacy side of our work.

JS: How has Maine reacted to the Dobbs decision? How has your work been affected?

JM: We have a deep canvassing program where we go door-to-door and make phone calls to talk to voters about abortion and stigma. We’ve been doing this program since 2015, and what we found after the Dobbs decision was that people were waking up to the fact that abortion has been stigmatized, politicized, and threatened for a long time—and that even before Dobbs, there were a lot of people around the country and even in Maine who had trouble accessing abortions when they needed them. I think this really angered people, especially Mainers, because autonomy is really important to us. So, threats to the ability to live our lives according to our own needs do not sit well with people, especially Mainers. One thing that we also saw post-Dobbs was an influx of people who were interested in taking action and joining our volunteer teams. It also further motivated us to make sure that our rights are protected here in Maine. So, we’re pursuing proactive legislation to make sure that our rights are as protected as possible.

JS: Can you tell me about the constitutional amendment you're looking to help pass in Maine?

JM: We are advocating to pass Senator Eloise Vitelli's resolution, known as LD 780, which would explicitly enshrine the right to reproductive autonomy in our state's constitution. If it passes, and then it passes with a simple majority in the election, it would change the Maine State Constitution to explicitly protect reproductive rights. We’re doing this because Maine has, relatively speaking, a lot of abortion rights protections and

reproductive rights protections. But, we know that can change depending on the makeup of the legislature and the makeup of the legislature can change with every single election. We know that our rights are so important, that we have to find a way to more permanently protect the right to reproductive care. I would also add that we know that abortion can be a hot button issue, and so that’s what we’re hearing a lot about in regards to this amendment, but it’s also important to note that this amendment protects reproductive rights generally. So yes, that includes abortion—but that also includes birth control, testing, and really any reproductive/sexual healthcare.

JS: What is the process to amend the Maine State Constitution?

JM: First a bill is introduced by a legislator in the Maine State House or Senate. That bill is then assigned to a committee, and that committee has a public hearing where they are able to hear from constituents about why the constituents are either in favor or against that bill. Then the bill goes to a full vote in the Maine House and/or Senate, depending on who introduced the bill. The bill needs to pass with a 2/3 majority in both chambers. If the bill passes with a 2/3 majority in both chambers, then it goes to the voters. So, the voters of Maine then get to have their say about whether or not they’d like to amend the constitution.

JS: What types of services does Planned Parenthood offer in Maine?

JM: Planned Parenthood of Northern New England is an affiliate made up of three states—Vermont, Maine, and New Hampshire. Planned Parenthood health centers provide sexual and reproductive healthcare, so that includes things like birth control, testing/treatment, HIV care, abortions, and gender affirming care. We also provide some primary care services. For example, not many people know that you can get a flu shot at Planned Parenthood! We also have a sex ed department that makes sure communities are empowered with all the information that they need to be safe and happy.

JS: How can folks get involved with Planned Parenthood’s advocacy?

JM: There are a ton of ways to get involved with the Planned Parenthood Maine Action Fund team. Much of what we do is focused on protecting our rights through the courts and through legislation.

We also do a lot of rights consciousness work so that people understand what’s at stake, and what their rights are. We also do a lot of work to destigmatize reproductive and sexual healthcare. One of the best ways to get involved is actually to share your story. Almost every person has a story of receiving, or needing, or not receiving reproductive and sexual health care. That is one of the most effective ways to advocate because it lets people know what it’s really like to need these services, and to receive these services. So often these concepts can get hypothetical or theoretical but the fact is that real people are affected by these issues. We have to remind our lawmakers, our neighbors, and sometimes ourselves that there’s real people at the center of these decisions.

JS: Why is art about reproductive rights important to the mission of Planned Parenthood?

JM: We’ve been really lucky to collaborate with arts groups from Maine. We’ve worked with ARRT [Artists’ Rapid Response Team] who has helped us make really beautiful banners for protests. We’ve worked with Lumen Arts, who projects messages on the sides of buildings in Maine to really show messages on a huge scale. We’ve also worked with SPACE Gallery to showcase some films with discussions. We’re so grateful to have these community connections to support the message and make it very clear that Maine stands for reproductive rights.

JS: Is there anything else you’d like to add?

JM: Reproductive rights and abortion rights are human rights, and we have to do everything we can to destigmatize and make sure that all sexual and reproductive healthcare is accessible, affordable, and supported. So, all of us should consider the ways that we can have an impact. People can learn more or connect with us at ppmeaf.org,

Protestors adVoCating for Planned ParentHood.

An Interview with Actor Abigail Killeen

Edited for Length & Clarity by Julia Jennings

Assistant Director Julia Jennings sat down with actor Abigail Killeen to talk about her connection with the play, her history with Portland Stage, and what excites her about this piece.

Julia Jennings (JJ): Could you tell me a brief history of your work with Portland Stage, how long you've been working here and what your connection is to the theater?

Abigail Killeen (AK): The first show I did at Portland Stage was in 2009. Anita was directing A Christmas Carol and asked me to play the Ghosts. And I was thrilled, I was so excited to work here. I think it's an incredible thing to work at a professional theater that's also in your community, linking place and professionalism. Thinking of the regional theater market as it's often set up, you audition out of New York and you travel to a different part of the country to do a play. There's something I treasure, I cherish about working in a community, working with a number of people over and over again, at a level of expertise and professionalism that we have the training and background for. That feels very special. And I don't take it lightly.

JJ: You saw What the Constitution Means to Me when it was still on Broadway, right? What did you think of it then?

AK: I had a visceral reaction when it was over. I felt the play in my body. And I thought, “I have to do this play. And I don't know how I'm going to do this play.” And then after that intense first moment, I was like, “Alright, I have to release this play and let it be what it is.” But then I got to do it. But I remember watching it, and just feeling so challenged and entertained at the same time.

JJ: What does your process look like to prepare for this role? How is it different performing a show that's almost entirely monologue? And have you done something like this before, that's so text-heavy?

AK: I did The Amish Project in 2016 as a studio project at Portland Stage, I self-produced that. That was my first experience doing a solo show. This isn't a solo show. But the couple of times we've done runs, I come out and I start the play, and I have this feeling in my chest where I'm like, “It's time for the other people to talk. Oh no, it's still me.” And I have to kind of tell myself to calm down. I didn't have that feeling doing The Amish Project, I think because I was playing different characters. But this is one character, and I do feel a kind of internal check, almost like I'm at a party and I've been monopolizing the conversation. Like, “Wait, is it time for someone else to talk? Oh, no, it's still my turn to talk.” I have to take up a lot of space. There is a sense like, I am on this stage, and you all are going to be listening to me for a while as this character, and here we go. And trusting that that's enough. That perpetual question of being enough is really challenged. But it's also thrilling. I don't think I could walk into a theater and tell my own life story. So the courage that Heidi Schreck needed to do this is significant. It gives me respect for her.

JJ: What is it like playing someone who is still alive? I'm curious what it's been like creating your own version of this role, in conversation with already having seen Heidi's version.

AK: I think one of the beautiful paradoxes of acting is that playing someone else somehow permits you to be yourself. So while playing Heidi Schreck, I'm also somehow more myself. There are these aspects of myself that I would never reveal in public personally, but a play gives me a lens or a costume to reveal them. That gives me just enough safety to really express. And some of these things feel very

scary to say. "Because that's what I wanted. I wanted an abortion." It's scary to say that. "Let's make a new Constitution." Like, are the feds gonna come and get me? It's scary to say those things, but I have the coward's courage, where I can say “Well, I maybe wouldn't say these things, but it's thrilling to say them as another person who is saying them.” Because it's important that these things are said, questioned, examined. And saying them out loud is a way to do that. In terms of playing someone who's still alive, I hope I'm doing her justice. I also hope I'm doing the spirit of the play justice. It’s different than a fictional play, this is an autobiographical drama. So I hope that I'm honoring her in our shared experience as being women relatively the same age who are living in this country right now.

JJ: Have you ever met Heidi in person before?

AK: Never.

JJ: What were you like when you were 15?

AK: Insufferable. I'm afraid I was insufferable.

JJ: What kind of things did you love? How did you feel about politics at fifteen?

AK: I loved theater. I found a lot of my identity in theater, and in those ways, I know I was

insufferable. In ways I have actively sought to make amends in my adult life. I was more concerned about being a good girl and being liked and behaving than being engaged in politics. I needed more humbling. And I had enough privilege to not be so affected by the issues of the time that involvement wouldn't have been a choice. As I've gotten older in this country, it's no longer a choice.

JJ: What is the most exciting part about working on this show for you?

AK: We're gonna say all these things! We're gonna say all these things, out loud, in front of God and everybody!

JJ: Yes! And is there anything else that you would like to add?

AK: There aren't a lot of spaces that want to hear the embodiment of my voice. It's legend in the field how as you get older, you work less, and so I also feel like, wow, I get to act right now, when I finally have begun to actually learn how to do it.

aBigail killeen (aea) during tHe first read-tHrougH of wHat tHe Constitution means to me. PHoto By: James a. Hadley.

About the American Legion & Oratory Contest

by Jessi Stier

A large part of What the Constitution Means to Me takes place in the regional finals of The American Legion's Oratorical Contest. The American Legion is an organization of US war veterans established on March 15, 1919, by the Paris Caucus in Paris, France. The veterans were delegates of the American Expeditionary Force as a patriotic, mutual aid organization. The action of the Paris Caucus was confirmed and endorsed by a similar meeting held in St. Louis, Missouri, from May 8–10, 1919, when the Legion was recognized by the troops who served in the US. The Paris Caucus appointed an Executive Committee of seventeen officers to represent the troops in France, with the St. Louis Caucus doing the same for those in the US. These two national executive committees composed the initial governing body of the Legion, with a temporary headquarters located in New York.

A national charter was granted to the American Legion by the US Congress on September 16, 1919; it was later amended to admit veterans of World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and Operation Desert Shield/Storm. The Legion successfully sponsored the creation of the US Veterans Administration in 1930. In 1944 it played an important role in drafting and passing the enactment of the GI Bill of Rights for World War II veterans, and later in supporting similar legislation for Korean War veterans. These measures afforded college or vocational training to more than 10,500,000 veterans and enabled more than 5,600,000 veterans to purchase homes under the mortgage loan provisions of the act.

Overall, the organization’s membership requirement is honorable service in the United States military and an honorable discharge. Its annual conventions are some of the largest volunteer group meetings in the United States. Today, the Legion's national headquarters reside in Indianapolis, which houses the American Legion’s archives, library, magazine editorial offices, and departments of membership, internal affairs, and public relations.

One of the American Legion’s major goals is to lobby for funding to cover medical, disability,

education, and other benefits for veterans and their families. Such programming includes their National Emergency Fund, which has provided more than $10 million in direct financial assistance to American Legion family members and posts in the wake of disasters such as hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, and wildfires. The American Legion Riders, a group of American Legion members who motorcycle for charity, raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for local children's hospitals, schools, veterans’ homes, and scholarships. They also sponsor a Homeless Veterans Task Force to assist unhoused veterans, who make up approximately 11% of the nation's total homeless population. The taskforce's work consists of fighting for legislation affecting veteran homelessness, ensuring local services and resources are available, and collaborating with government agencies to develop and implement initiatives that will help homeless veterans. Additionally, Homeless Veterans Task Force chairpersons can provide direct aid to veterans and their families who reach out to them.

The American Legion is also very passionate about youth programming, including supporting thousands of Boy Scout troops, junior baseball teams, and student government initiatives. Two of these programs are known as Boys State and Girls State, which encourage high school students to become part of the operation of local, county, and state government. Participants learn the rights, privileges, and responsibilities of franchised citizens, with activities including mock legislative sessions, court proceedings, lawenforcement presentations, assemblies, bands, choruses, and recreational programming.

One of the American Legion’s biggest youth programs is the American Legion Oratorical Contest, which is the inspiration for What the Constitution Means to Me. The contest began in 1938 and exists to develop deeper knowledge and appreciation for the US Constitution among high school students under age 20. The program aims to present participants with an academic oration challenge to teach leadership, the history of US laws, and the ability to speak clearly, as well as an

understanding of the duties, responsibilities, rights, and privileges of American citizenship. Speech subjects must be on an aspect of the US Constitution, with emphasis on the obligations of citizens to the US government. Speeches are eight to 10 minutes long; threeto five-minute speeches on an assigned topic (pre-determined by the American Legion) are also part of the contest. Legion department representatives certify one winner per state to the national contest, where those winners compete against each other in two speaking rounds. The contest ends with one last round that determines the three top finalists. Young orators earn some of the most generous college scholarships available to students at this age, reaching a total of $203,500 that the American Legion disburses each year in eligible funding that can be used at any college or university in the United States.

Among these orators is Portland’s Oona Mackinnon-Hoban, who won the Maine state competition and also placed in the national contest in 2015. Oona first found the competition by searching for scholarship opportunities. She had never heard of the contest before searching, and had no prior experience with the American Legion. However, she was interested in American history and politics, so she was eager to

participate. Additionally, she had been acting since childhood and did theater in school, so she felt comfortable with aspects of public speaking and memorization. Given her interest in the US government, Oona also participated in Mock Trial and Model UN, which had a similar format of memorizing and reading speeches in front of a group.

To prepare for the contest, Oona wrote a 1400-word general essay on the Constitution and four smaller essays (about 500 words each) on amendments that were selected for the contest. She memorized all of her writing in preparation. “All of these involved some research, but I was in AP US History at the time, so I already had a general background on the Constitution, as well as my own independent interest in American history,” she said. “Most of the research I did was trying to build out the speeches with quotes and specific historical details.”

Her central speech argued that the Constitution is a living document that is meant to evolve as humans do, taking into account changing social sensibilities and the evolution of civil rights. The speech was structured around the phrase We the people. When asked to synthesize her speech’s thesis, Oona noted, “I argued that the Constitution is only as strong as we are, and therefore it's our responsibility to continue to guard it while also updating it to reflect our modern world.” Oona’s thesis is greatly similar to that of Heidi in What the Constitution Means to Me.

Oona said that she was very excited to win the Maine state contest and was thrilled to go to nationals, where she greatly enjoyed meeting so many other students who were interested in history and government. Reflecting back on the experience as an adult, she stated, “Even though I have a very different view of the United States than my sixteen-year-old self did, I think the general thesis of my speech is still something I stand behind.” She went on to describe an argument deeply related to the play. “The Constitution is meant to be changed and the Founding Fathers were just men with a collection of individual interests based on their own business holdings and political ambitions. The greatest favor they gave us was creating a document that can be changed. Having any sort of reluctance to do so today is contrary to the purpose of the Constitution itself.”

ameriCan legion memBers at a ConferenCe in arlington, Va.

The Cases of Constiution

by Alex Oleksy

In Heidi Schreck’s re-examination of her relationship to America’s most important legal document, multiple cases seen by the Supreme Court before, during, and after the playwright’s years as an oratorical competitor were just as formative to her experience as an American woman as constitutional amendments. Here are some of the judicial interpretations she describes, as well as one that occurred after the play’s publication, further complicating what the Constitution means to Heidi.

Dred Scott v. Sandford (1857) - Dred Scott, an enslaved man residing in Missouri, filed suit against his master in 1856, arguing that his decade-long residency in Illinois and the Louisiana Purchase (both territories that outlawed slavery) made him a free man. In a 7–2 ruling, the all-white court decided in 1857 that “a negro, whose ancestors were imported into [the US], and sold as slaves,” regardless of freedom status, was not an American citizen and therefore could not file suit in federal court. The case was dismissed on procedural grounds. This ruling also decided that the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which designated free and slave states in the Louisiana Purchase, was unconstitutional, and that all laws which stripped slave owners of their right to slave ownership were unconstitutional. This case was a major setback for the abolitionist movement.

Thompson v. Thompson (1913) - In 1910, plaintiff Jessie Thompson filed an action against her husband, defendant Charles Thompson, for assault, asking for $70,000 (about $2.2 million in 2024) for damages incurred. The Supreme Court ruled that such a charge could not be pressed by a wife against her husband due to the unity of husband and wife under common law, as well as the fear that such a precedent would “open the doors of the courts to accusations of all sorts of one spouse against the other, and bring into public notice complaints

for assault, slander, and libel, and alleged injuries to property of the one or the other by husband against wife or wife against husband.” This “threat” to the general welfare was enough to convince the all-male court that the legal autonomy of American wives needed to be tempered.

Roe v. Wade (1973) - The anonymous Jane Roe (who later identified herself as Norma McCorvey) sued Dallas County District Attorney Henry Wade, challenging a Texas law that limited abortion access except through a doctor’s permission to save a mother’s life. The case, which argued that limiting abortion access was an invasion of Roe’s privacy, was decided in 1973, with a 7–2 majority in favor of the plaintiff. The suit was a landmark decision for reproductive freedom, and protected abortion on the federal level for nearly fifty years before being overturned in 2022.

a Painting of dred sCott.

Town of Castle Rock v. Gonzales (2005) - After the Castle Rock Police Department failed to enforce Jessica Gonzales’ restraining order against her ex-husband, leading to the abduction and murders of her three children, Gonzales, who now goes by Jessica Lenahan, brought a complaint against the local government. She argued that their failure to intervene violated the Due Process Clause, which states “[n]o state shall...deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law..." In a 7–2 ruling, the Supreme Court determined that Gonzales had no “property interest” in the claim, and therefore owners of restraining orders are not owed any specific mandatory action by law enforcement.

Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (2022) - After the passing of the Gestational Age Act in Mississippi, which prohibited nearly all abortions after 15 weeks for state residents, Jackson Women’s Health Organization filed a federal lawsuit,

arguing that 15 weeks was not enough time to prove that a fetus was viable, which went against Supreme Court precedent. After the suit arrived in front of the Supreme Court, the conservative majority ruled that the Constitution does not confer a right to abortion, overturning the decision of Roe v. Wade made nearly five decades prior.

Protestors in a marCH for tHe ProteCtion of roe V wade

a PHoto of tHe suPreme Court room from 1904.

a maP dePiCting aBortion law aCross tHe usa Post-doBBs. tHe BlaCk areas dePiCt wHere aBortion is illegal

Complicating RBG's Legacy

by Alex Oleksy

The late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s influence on American politics in the 21st century cannot be overstated. The first Jewish woman to be a Supreme Court Justice, Ginsburg’s liberal viewpoints on a court that experienced a decades-long “red wave” of conservative justices positioned her as a key figure in numerous Supreme Court decisions. Despite facing institutionalized misogyny, she advocated for the women’s rights movement in every step of her career, serving as director of the Women's Rights Project of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), arguing six successful cases before the Supreme Court 20 years before her eventual appointment. Only the second woman ever appointed to the court, it’s no wonder that RBG serves as a beacon for women in the political and legal fields, and for artists like What the Constitution Means to Me’s Heidi Schreck.

With her passing in late 2020—during President Donald Trump’s term—her legacy as a martyred feminist was solidified. Ginsburg merchandise and social media posts became even more prominent in popular culture. RBG transcended politics to become a pop culture icon, popularized as the ultimate “girl boss” and the pinnacle of left-leaning ideals. Even Heidi Schreck falls sway, concluding the first part of What the Constitution Means to Me with Ginsburg’s famous “When There Are Nine” comment about the gender composition of the Supreme Court. The late justice’s history, and legacy as a liberal icon, is cemented in our current political moment.

While Ginsburg’s voice on majority opinions and minority dissents (like Castle Rock v. Gonzales) demonstrates a progressive stance on judicial proceedings, her murky record with cases involving climate change, Indigenous rights, race, and labor rights complicates her history. Throughout What the Constitution Means to Me, Schreck takes detailed care to highlight intersectional systems of oppression in America’s justice system, but fails to examine the decisions of the “Notorious RBG” with a more critical racial and class-lens. What would it mean to more closely scrutinize a celebrated

figure such as Ginsburg, particularly within the context of this one-woman show?

The late justice has been heralded for her legal battle against gender discrimination and sexual violence towards women, writing the majority opinion in United States v. Virginia, deciding that the Virginia Military Institute could not deny admission to qualified female applicants. Her advocacy also continued through dissenting opinions such as Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, where she argued in favor of a Title IX lawsuit concerning the gender wage gap. But these articulations misaligned with her 2019 comments, in which Ginsburg described newly appointed Justice Brett Kavanaugh as a “very decent” man. Arguing that the confirmation of Kavanaugh was “too divisive,” the feminist justice seemed to ignore the credible accusations of sexual misconduct brought forward by Christine Blaisey Ford. While one can argue for the importance of nonpartisanship on the Court, these comments certainly put Ginsburg’s relationship to gender and power into question. Placed within the constraints of What the Constitution Means to Me, this juxtaposition is only magnified.

Ginsburg’s identification as a Jewish woman was a landmark for the diversity of the Supreme Court. However, her relationship to

a CHildren's Book written aBout tHe life of rBg.

race was oftentimes less radical. Away from the bench, she described Colin Kaepernick kneeling during the national anthem as “dumb and disrespectful.” In court, she was known to credit Black attorneys in her dissents and collaborated with Justice Sonia Sotomayor (who identifies as a woman of color) on several writings, but in the case of prisoners’ rights, a highly racialized issue, she has been described by criminal justice activists from The Marshall Project as an “inconsistent ally.” In writing majority opinions, she both bolstered the religious freedoms of the incarcerated and made it more difficult to defend their rights in federal court. She also joined the unanimous decision to uphold visiting laws in Michigan, which included potential lifetime visitation bans if prisoners were found guilty of substance-abuse violations. When the intersectional oppression of women and people of color is so clearly connected within Heidi Schreck’s text, why does the praise of Ginsburg and the liberal feminism she symbolizes go unscrutinized?

Finally, when considering the questions of bodily and political autonomy within the history of the Constitution that Schreck poses, it’s important to evaluate Ginsburg’s history with Indigenous rights. While she joined multiple majority opinions that supported tribal sovereignty, she also wrote several opinions that were detrimental to Native American causes. These include stopping a

$600 million settlement for the Navajo Nation through United States vs. Navajo Nation, and penning the majority opinion for City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York, which denied the Oneida Nation’s claim on a parcel of land that had been rebought by tribal leadership in the 1990s. What the Constitution Means to Me grapples with American women’s push against the legal system for autonomy— but Ginsburg’s decisions have limited the autonomy of Indigenous women.

Of course, it’s important to remember that Ginsburg’s work on the court was still far more progressive than many of her colleagues, and her decisions have led to incredible leaps for the feminist movement in the US. However, like Schreck’s analysis of misogynistic male justices, we must analyze all of RBG’s history, even when it clashes with our ideas of her legacy. It may be more comfortable to idolize her memory, but What the Constitution Means to Me pushes us to reexamine our relationship with political figures and institutions. To reevaluate her work is not to disrespect or disregard the legacy of the late justice, but instead to recognize her for what she was: a human being. Just as Heidi’s relationship to the Constitution changes, so can our perspectives on judges and politicians—even those we admire. By welcoming criticism of Ginsburg, we as Americans can honor her work and continue the spirit of Schreck’s play beyond the bounds of the stage.

a Painting of JustiCe sandra day o'Connor and JustiCe rutH Bader ginsBurg

Glossary

by Julia Jennings

Antonin Scalia: (1936–2016) Moderately conservative Supreme Court Justice, serving from 1986–2016. Scalia wrote the most concurring opinions of any justice in history, and the third most dissenting opinions. Scalia was an originalist in his interpretation of the Constitution, believing the document should be interpreted as originally intended. He also believed that a woman’s right to abortion was not constitutionally protected, as he dissented in Planned Parenthood vs. Casey.

Audre Lorde: (1934–1992) An American poet, philosopher, intersectional feminist and civil rights activist, self-described as a “Black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet.” Her work focused on the importance of organizing to oppose oppression across race, gender, class, sexual orientation, age, and ability. She is best known for Sister Outsider, The Cancer Journals, and Zami: A New Spelling of My Name, as well as her essay, “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House.”

Battered woman syndrome: Now more formally known as “Intimate Partner Violence,” a historically common term for people (most often women) who experience physical, sexual, or psychological abuse perpetrated by their partner. It is considered a subcategory of post-traumatic stress disorder, as the victim often experiences physical or psychological symptoms.

Bayard Rustin: (1912–1987) A human rights activist and significant organizer of the 1963 March on Washington, as well as one of Martin Luther King Jr.’s most trusted advisors. Rustin helped found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and later became a LGBTQ+ rights activist and AIDS education advocate in the 1980s.

bell hooks: (1952–2021) American author and social critic, best known for her writings on the intersectionality of race, gender, and class in producing systems of oppression. Her most notable works include: All About Love, The Will to Change, and Feminism is For Everybody.

Billie Jean King: (b. 1943) American tennis player, formerly the number one tennis player in the world. In 1973, Billie Jean King defeated Bobby Riggs in the “Battle of the Sexes,” which became one of the most significant events in history for gaining respect for women in sports.

Changeling: The offspring of fairies or elves in European folklore, who is surreptitiously substituted for a human child.

Democracy Index: Calculated by the Economist Intelligence Unit, this scoring system analyzes the degree to which people can participate in politics, select their own leaders through fair elections, enjoy civil liberties, and have a government that functions on their behalf. The index ranges from 0 to 10, 0 being the least democratic and 10 being the most. As of 2022, the US had a score of 7.85.

Dirty Dancing: 1987 classic film starring Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey. The film features Grey as the well-to-do Frances “Baby” Houseman, vacationing at a resort in the Catskills with her cardiologist father and the rest of her family. When Baby begins to fall in love with Johnny, a dance instructor at the resort, she learns that his dance partner, Penny, is pregnant, and Baby borrows money from her father to help cover Penny’s abortion. However,

a PHoto of Bayard rustin

Penny is badly injured in the abortion, and Baby enlists her father to help save Penny.

Dr. Dorothy Height: (1912–2010) An activist and leader of the Civil Rights Movement and the President of the National Council of Negro Women for 40 years. Her work focused on ending lynchings and restructuring the criminal justice system, and her counsel was regularly sought after by Eleanor Roosevelt, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Lyndon B. Johnson. In 2004, Dr. Height was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor and inducted into the Democracy Hall of Fame International.

Equal Rights Amendment (ERA): First proposed in 1923, this proposed constitutional amendment guarantees equality of rights under law regardless of gender. As of January 2020, the ERA satisfied the requirements for ratification laid out in Article V of the Constitution; however, the ratification deadlines set by Congress for the amendment have passed, and several states have moved to rescind their prior approval.

Extemporaneous: Spoken or done without prior preparation.

Fresno: The fifth largest city in California, located in the geographic center of the state, with much of its economy tied to large-scale agriculture. Fresno is also a majority-Latinx city, with 50.5% of its population identifying as Latinx in 2020.

Gloria Steinem: (b. 1934) Nationallyrecognized leader of second-wave feminism in the 1960s and 1970s and co-founder of Ms. magazine. In 1971, she co-founded the National Women’s Political Caucus to provide training and support for women seeking elected office.

Hammurabi: The most well-known ruler of the first dynasty of Babylon (ruling 1792–1750 BCE), noted for his surviving set of laws. The Code of Hammurabi was his set of legal decisions, regarding economics, family law, and criminal law.

Harry A. Blackmun: (1908–1999) A Supreme Court Justice, appointed by Richard Nixon in 1970. He initially leaned conservative in his rulings, but became increasingly interested

in the people affected by the outcome of the cases. In his landmark Roe v. Wade decision, he led the rest of the court to rule in favor of protecting abortion, a decision which he staunchly defended, refusing to retire until he was confident that the precedent was safe. Indeed, Bill Clinton appointed Ruth Bader Ginsburg to replace Blackmun in 1994.

Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR): An organization within the Organization of American States, whose mission is to protect human rights in the Americas. In 1965, the IACHR was authorized to hear petitions regarding human rights violations.

John Bingham: (1815–1900) A member of the House of Representatives from Ohio, a leading anti-slavery voice in Congress, and eventually a key member of the Joint Committee on Reconstruction. Known as the “Madison of the Fourteenth Amendment,” Bingham was the main author of the Fourteenth Amendment, and the one responsible for the “equal protection of the laws” language.

Log running (log driving): The process of moving logs downstream to sawmills or pulp mills using the current of a river. Log drivers would watch the spots where rivers were likely to jam, and dislodge logs that would get caught, preventing a pile up. Many log drivers lost their lives due to being crushed by logs.

Martin Luther King Jr.: (1929–1968) A Black American civil rights activist and the president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (1957–1968), known for his use of nonviolent civil disobedience and the 1963 March on Washington, where he delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.

Melancholia: A subtype of depression, often involving extreme despair, a lack of energy, and an inability to experience happiness. Melancholia (or melancholy) is also a word that has historically been used to describe a general depressive state, and in medieval medicine was one of the four temperaments, believed to be born of an excess of black bile.

Glossary (continued)

by Julia Jennings

Pater familias : The oldest living male in the household, the head of a Roman family. Latin for “father of the family” or “owner of the family estate.”

Patrick Swayze: (1952–2009) American actor and dancer, best known for his role in the 1987 film Dirty Dancing, which quickly became a cult classic and earned Swayze a Golden Globe nomination. People voted Swayze “Sexiest Man Alive” in 1991.

Salish Tribes: A linguistic grouping of tribes of Indigenous people living in the upper basins of the Columbia and Fraser Rivers, in what is now considered British Columbia, Washington, Idaho, Oregon, and Montana. The Salish people are made up of four major groups: Bella Coola (Nuxalk), Coast Salish, Interior Salish, and Tsamosan. Each of these groups speak distinct varieties of the Salish language, many of which are seriously endangered.

Red Noses: A 1985 play by Peter Barnes, in which a priest and a band of fools travels to plague-stricken villages in fourteenth-century France. The play combines song and dance with vaudeville-style humor.

Rosa Parks: (1913–2005) American civil rights activist, well-known for her role in the Montgomery bus boycott. Honored by Congress as “the first lady of civil rights” and the “mother of the freedom movement,” Parks was also active in the Black Power movement and supported political prisoners in the US.

Susan Sontag: (1933–2004) American public intellectual, writer, and critic. Known for her 1964 Notes on ‘Camp’ and her 1977 On Photography, as well as her opposition to the Vietnam War. She wrote extensively on art, literature, human rights, and political conflict.

The Weeping Woman: A 1937 series of paintings by Pablo Picasso (and not Heidi’s grandma Bea), depicting Dora Maar, Picasso’s mistress and muse, painted in response to the bombing of Guernica in the Spanish Civil War.

“The Yellow Wallpaper”: A short story written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (an early utopian feminist) and published in 1892. The narrator is an unnamed woman experiencing “nervous depression,” who has been taken to an estate for the summer by her husband as a “rest cure”

rosa Parks Being fingerPrinted after tHe Bus BoyCott.

a PHoto of PatriCk swayze and Paula aBdul.

and begins to see women trapped behind the pattern of the wallpaper. The story is often associated with the oppressive power of the patriarchy and postpartum depression.

Violence Against Women Act: The first federal legislation recognizing domestic violence and sexual assault as a crime, enacted in 1994. The act also provides federal resources to combat violence against women, such as housing, legal assistance, and prevention programming. This act is up for renewal every five years.

Wenatchee, Washington: The county seat of Chelan County, Washington; nicknamed the “Apple Capital of the World” because of its many orchards. As of 2020, the population was 35,508. For thousands of years before European colonizers settled the land, the Wenatchi people lived nomadically there, and later participated in the fur trade with the British Northwest Fur Company. The first nonIndigenous settlers were gold prospectors, cattlemen, and, later, workmen for the Great Northern Railway.

Wenatchi: ("People in the between") Indigenous people who live between the Columbia and Wenatchee Rivers. There are

several individually distinct Wenatchi bands, who were very isolated before the arrival of the horse, but soon adopted the traditions and styles of the Spokane tribes. The Wenatchi tribes were never given reservation land by the United States government, and thus most surviving members today live on the Colville Reservation or the Yakama Reservation.

White Shoulders: A flowery perfume made by Evyan, launched in 1945 and popular with women of the 1940s and 1950s.

William O. Douglas: (1898–1980) An Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, appointed by FDR in 1939. Raised in Washington state and well known for his commitment to civil liberties and individual rights. He is considered by some to be the most liberal justice thus far in US history. Douglas served on the Supreme Court from 1939 to 1975.

Wonder Twins: Fictional twins with extraterrestrial superpowers who first appeared in the animated show, The All-New Super Friends Hour. The twins (Zan and Jayna) access their powers by holding their fists together and saying “Wonder Twin powers, activate!”

tHe weePing woman Painting.

wenatCHee, wasHington

Theater of the Oppressed

by Alex Oleksy

In the second part of What The Constitution Means to Me, playwright-performer Heidi Schreck takes a radical reapproach to the monologue structure of her show by throwing the script to the wind and performing an improvised debate, challenging the audience’s (and her own) understanding of the effectiveness of the United States Constitution. While this deconstructed performance is explicitly a recreation of educational speech and debate competitions, its engagement with audience and reconfiguration of theatrical norms implicitly aligns Schreck’s writing with a progressive form of drama known as Theatre of the Oppressed.

Inspired by the work of educator-activist Paulo Friere’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Theatre of the Oppressed is a community-engaged dramatic practice developed by Brazilian artist Augusto Boal in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. His pedagogical performances can be sorted into one of six categories: Newspaper Theatre, Invisible Theatre, Image Theatre, Forum Theatre, Rainbow of Desires, and Legislative Theatre. In each form, the act of performing is recontextualized without the conventions of modern drama: actors are often untrained, lacking scripts, or even a proper “stage” or performance space. Rather than enforcing the alienation of the proscenium theater, where the “fourth wall” has separated characters from audiences for more than a century, Theatre of the Oppressed aims to merge reality and drama, actor and spectator.

Boal’s techniques were first published during the beginning of his 16 year exile from Brazil, which was under control of Médici's fascist regime. Believing that those “who are teachers—and students—of theatre, in reality we are students and teachers of human beings,” the drama educator aimed to utilize performance tools to liberate oppressed peoples, especially the poor proletariat of Brazil. Beginning in small farming communities

in the Latin American country, Theatre of the Oppressed has become a landmark program in educational and community-engaged theater, with modern practitioners continuing the work across the globe.

While it can be argued that the political and personal nature of What the Constitution Means to Me ties to many aspects of Boal’s work, the script’s debate most clearly relates to one of Theatre of the Oppressed’s most famous structures: Forum Theatre. Forum Theatre consists of a scene or series of improvised scenes, in which a main character faces some sort of challenge, usually related to an oppressive structure: this can be a femaleidentifying employee facing sexual harassment, a farm laborer having their wages withheld by an abusive employer, or a BIPOC individual’s encounter with racist law enforcement. After the initial narrative is presented, a facilitator, or “Joker,” interacts with the audiences to ask them questions about what they witnessed, and what the protagonist could try to do to overcome this difficulty. The troupe plays out one or two suggestions, each failing to succeed, before the Joker invites the audience to intercede. The spectator is transformed into what Boal names the “spect-actor,” both perceiver and creator of the narrative. Through collaboration with the troupe, any audience member is given the power to yell “Stop!” during a scene and take the place of the main character. This scene swap can play out for as long as the Joker deems necessary.

While the spect-actor may never achieve catharsis through “winning” the role play, the troupe and audience are able to build personal strength through the Brazilian practitioner’s “rehearsal for the revolution.” Through collective imagination, Theatre of the Oppressed investigates the paths we have towards liberation, weighing the pros and cons of each, and providing a practice space for community activism.

The debate that concludes What the Constitution Means to Me may be less involved than Forum Theatre’s audience engagement, but its spirit of theatrical reinvention is worth analyzing. The improvisational nature of the debate, with its randomization of perspective on the abolition of the Constitution, is reminiscent of Theatre of the Oppressed’s structure. Heidi and her debate partner battle it out on stage in a different way each night, with Danny serving as the facilitator, a more distanced Joker.

Heidi’s debate partner also calls us back to Boal’s focus on community in performance. In Portland Stage’s casting of local high school students, the production finds its spiritual center within the community it performs for. With Abigail Killeen and Matt Delamater alongside them, What the Constitution Means to Me evolves beyond a production from New York to a play with Maine women at its center.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, is Schreck’s placement of the play’s conclusion in the hands of an individual audience member. After Heidi and her debate partner verbally spar, a single spectator is invited to make the imaginary decision to protect or abolish the American Constitution. This freedom of choice under dramatic circumstances is at the heart of the play’s connection to Theatre of the Oppressed. In What the Constitution Means to Me, the audience is no longer a passive spectator, but an active participant in the oncoming revolution (or lack thereof). While reading a piece of paper after a 90 minute play may not reenvision the United States government as we know it, there is something exciting about rehearsing such an idea. Like Augusto Boal, Heidi Schreck knows that the seed of revolution does not come from performance, but can be planted by the audience after the curtain falls.

PartiCiPants at a tHeatre of tHe oPPressed worksHoP led By augusto Boal in new york City.

History of Solo & Autobiographical Theater

by Jessi Stier

“Solo performance is nothing new. This has been happening since the dawn of man, and it will continue to happen.”

– Nilaja Sun, playwright

Human beings have gathered to exchange stories for thousands of years. In the period before written history existed, oral storytelling was the main method people used to share information and pass wisdom to future generations. In such exchanges, individuals fell naturally into the roles of speakers and spectators—making this storytelling perhaps the oldest form of solo performance. This was soon formalized through the convention of dramatic monologues within ancient Greek and Roman theater. While not entirely a “one-person show” as we know them today, these monologues served very similar purposes and paved the way for the conventions of solo performance to develop. These monologues, called “linked monologues,” served to demonstrate the passage of a significant amount of time, which would be difficult to otherwise perform onstage. Other types of monologues framed character entrances and exits. These speeches aimed to be both educational and engaging, as they informed viewers of important events that occurred in the plot while using action and dynamic tone to maintain audience attention.

In later centuries, medieval England and France saw the rise of solo performers known as minstrels and troubadours. Both of these performers were bards who told narrative stories or lyric poetry, often accompanied by music. Again, the stories combined elements of both education and entertainment, conveying important lessons and information in engaging ways. During the Renaissance, characters began using speeches to pursue a dramatic objective. With the invention of the printing press in 1436, plays could be more easily distributed and produced, and history could be recorded more easily. Theater became more focused on entertainment rather than didacticism, and writers had more freedom to

tell whatever stories they wanted—including those of their own lives. This led to one of the first examples of modern solo performance, the performance of poetry.

By the 1800s, solo performance had more commonly become an outlet for playwrights and performers to tell deeply personal stories that mattered to them. One example of this was Edgar Allan Poe, who recited poetry as a platform performer between 1843 and 1849. His performance tours were referred to as “lecturerecitals” because he delivered a solo oration and afterwards educated the audience about it through lecture. Charles Dickens also performed in a similar manner. These tours drew large crowds, and thus popularized the genre of one-person storytelling. Though not every poem they performed was autobiographical, their performances established a sense of vulnerability that is shared with current autobiographical performance.

By the 20th century, many solo performances had been developed and performed professionally. One major figure of the

a PHoto of edgar allan Poe.

autobiographical solo performance genre is Spalding Gray, who is known for his piece Swimming to Cambodia, which describes his experience in Thailand filming a movie about the Cambodian War. He performed this piece in New York and published it as a book in 1985, later adapting it into a critically acclaimed film in 1987. Similar to What the Constitution Means to Me, the play made use of audio recordings to help convey the story.

Another major autobiographical solo show was Lynn Redgrave’s Shakespeare for My Father, which opened on Broadway in 1992. Redgrave received a Tony nomination for Best Actress, and the piece went on to play internationally. The play captures Redgrave’s fractured relationship with her father, and follows his life and later his death from Parkinson’s disease. Next, V, best known for her 1996 show The Vagina Monologues, developed an autobiographical piece on Broadway in 2018 titled In the Body of the World, which played at Manhattan Theatre Club. The piece grapples with internal and external medical conflict, detailing V’s experience working with women in the war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo while simultaneously being diagnosed with uterine cancer.

Just like What the Constitution Means to Me, all of these pieces detail emotionally vulnerable, profoundly personal experiences that perhaps the writers needed to use art to process. This level of sharing impacts both the audience and the performer. According to Deirdre Heddon, author of Autobiography and Performance, these performances have “profound real-world effects as the retelling of self-stories regenerates those experiences in the subject-body where they can be reshaped and transformed.” This quote reveals that in recalling their memories on a public scale, autobiographical performers are actively reliving very powerful emotions. Thus, self-performance is transformative—through the show they invite themselves to confront the past, bring the audience with them into the present, and then leave them to decide how the piece will impact their future.

Playwright Kelley Van Dilla, who conceived the autobiographical solo show Let Go of Me, says performing one’s own life experiences “magnifies the layers we build through the artifice and honesty of theatricality, slowly peeling back to reveal a directness, an openness, and a vulnerability that we strive for as storytellers.” Furthermore, impactful autobiographical performers aren’t afraid to really share their humanity in a way that evokes both empathy and critical thought—which can be witnessed in What the Constitution Means to Me as Heidi chronicles both the joys and trials of being a woman in the eyes of the US government.

a PHoto of lynn redgraVe

tHe dVd CoVer of sPalding gray's swimming to CamBodia

Recommended Resources

by Editors

Watch:

PBS's Interview with Heidi Shreck

https://www.pbs.org/video/heidi-schreck-what-consititution-means-me-osptfk/ Uncle Vanya (adapted by Heidi Schreck) at Lincoln Center

RBG, directed by Betsy West and Julie Cohen

AKA Jane Roe, directed by Nick Sweeney

Reversing Roe, directed by Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern

Deadlocked, directed by Dawn Porter

Dirty Dancing, directed by Emile Ardolino

Read

My Own Words by Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Grand Concourse by Heidi Schreck

Theatre of the Oppressed by Augusto Boal

Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire

Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde

There are No More Big Secrets by Heidi Schreck

All About Love by bell hooks

Get Involved

Planned Parenthood of Northern New England

Planned Parenthood Maine Action Fund

League of Women Voters of Maine

Global Center for Reproductive Rights

a PHoto of tHe reHearsal taBle for wHat tHe Constitution means to me, featuring tHe sCriPt witH art of Heidi sHreCk. PHoto By James a. Hadley.

Portland Stage Company Education Programs

Student Matinee Series

The Portland Stage Student Matinee Program provides students with discounted tickets for student matinees. Following the performance, students participate in a conversation with the cast and crew, which helps them gain awareness of the creative process and encourages them to think critically about the themes and messages of the play.

Play Me a Story

Experience the fun and magic of theater on Saturday mornings with Play Me a Story! Ages 4 – 10 enjoy a performance of children’s stories followed by an interactive acting workshop with Portland Stage’s Education Artists for $15. Sign up for the month and save or pick individual days that work for you. Build literacy, encourage creativity and spark dramatic dreams!

Shakespeare Teen Company

In April and May of 2024, students will come together as an ensemble to create a fully-staged production of Shakespeare‘s Hamlet in Portland Stage’s studio theater. Participants in grades 7-12 take on a variety of roles including acting, costume design, marketing, and more!

Vacation and Summer Camps

Dive into theater for five exciting days while on your school breaks! Our theater camps immerse participants in all aspects of theater, culminating in an open studio performance for friends and family at the end of the week! Camps are taught by professional actors, directors, and artisans. Students are invited to think imaginatively, critically, and creatively in an environment of inclusivity and safe play.

PLAY Program

An interactive dramatic reading and acting workshop tour for elementary school students in grades pre-k through 5. Professional education artists perform children’s literature and poetry and then involve students directly in classroom workshops based on the stories. Artists actively engage students in in small group workshop using their bodies, voices, and imaginations to build understanding of the text while bringing the stories and characters to life. PLAY helps develop literacy and reading fluency, character recall, understanding of themes, social emotional skills, physical storytelling, and vocal characterization. The program also comes with a comprehensive Resource Guide filled with information and activities based on the books and poems.

Directors Lab

Professional actors perform a 50-minute adaptation of a Shakespeare play, followed by a talkback. In 2024 we will be touring Much Ado About Nothing to middle and high schools. After the performance, students engage directly with the text in an interactive workshop with the actors and creative team. In these workshops, students practice effective communication, creative collaboration, rhetoric, and critical analysis. The program also comes with a comprehensive Resource Guide filled with information and resources about the play we are focusing on. Directors Lab puts Shakespeare’s language into the hands and mouths of the students, empowering them to be the artists, directors, and ensemble with the power to interpret the text and produce meaning.

Portland Stage Company

Anita Stewart Artistic Director

Martin Lodish Managing Director

Artistic & Production Staff

Todd Brian Backus Literary Manager

Jacob Coombs Associate Technical Director

Ted Gallant Technical Director

Myles C. Hatch Stage Manager

Meg Lydon Stage Manager

Mary Lana Rice Production Manager & Lighting Supervisor

Seth Asa Sengel Asst. Production Manager & Sound Supervisor

Emily St. John Props Master

Susan Thomas Costume Shop Manager

Administrative Staff

Paul Ainsworth Business Manager

Isabel Bates Education Assistant

Beka Bryer Front of House Associate

Covey Crolius Development Director

Chris DeFilipp House Manager

Erin Elizabeth Marketing Director

Allison Fry Executive Assistant

James A. Hadley Assistant Marketing Director

Lindsey Higgins Development Associate

Jennifer London Company Manager

Renee Myhaver Assistant Box Office Manager

Donald Smith Audience Services Manager

Julianne Shea Education Administrator

Madeleine St. Germain Front of House Associate

Michael Dix Thomas Education Director

Adam Thibodeau House Manager

Apprentice Company

Katie Barnes Stage Management Apprentice

Ellis Collier Education Apprentice

Lucie Green Company Management Apprentice

Julia Jennings Directing & Dramaturgy Apprentice

Ellery Kenyon Education Apprentice

Isee Martine Scenic Design Apprentice

Claire Lowe Electrics Apprentice

Alex Oleksy Directing & Dramaturgy Apprentice

Elizabeth Sarsfield Stage Management Apprentice

Jessi Stier Directing & Dramaturgy Apprentice

Crow Traphagen Costumes Apprentice

Elena Truman Costumes Apprentice