DIRECTOR'S NOTES

Like so many readers, I remember where I was when I read Fall On Your Knees because I remember the effect the novel had on me. As a young, queer, gender non-conforming person, born and raised on the East Coast into a family whose tree included immigrants, settlers, secrets, and surprises, I was moved and inspired by the novel; I felt seen by the story and stirred by the hope that lay in the characters’ reckoning with truth – however searing.

As a theatre maker, I was struck by what I recognized as an inherently theatrical engine driving the novel; I could see, hear and feel the worlds that MacDonald created. I was inspired to explore a theatrical adaptation because I knew that this voice, which continued to speak and sing in my imagination long after I set the book down, would speak and sing as powerfully to an audience. I’m grateful that Ann-Marie (who is, full disclosure, one of my most frequent artistic collaborators and also my wife) allowed me to try.

I have had the good fortune to assemble a remarkable team of artists. Over the past ten years, Vita Brevis Arts, my company with producers Paul Beauchamp and Patricia Cerra, with the support of incredible theatre companies and artistic leaders, has shepherded the project through a development process designed to listen to the voice of the novel; to explore the material and discover the style of the piece. My first artistic partner in this endeavour was Hannah Moscovitch, who had not only the talent and vision but also the courage and stamina to take it on. I want to thank all the gifted artists who have joined the project during this process and whose brilliant work you experience on stage today.

The shared dream of our artistic team was to bring to the stage the dynamic of the novel; its sweep of love and ambition; its page-turning suspense; the deep relationships that readers develop with characters who are flawed, gifted, and often wounded. All this, along with the sheer delight of a story animated by music and passion and ultimately love.

When it came out, the novel Fall On Your Knees was immediately remarkable for the lesbian love story at its heart but as time has gone on, the long overdue reckoning with racism and abuses of power in our society has rendered other veins in the novel more urgent than ever. In the twenty-five years since I first read it, my children have grown up, my parents have passed away, and both my perspective and our world have shifted. In light of the increasing vulnerability of so many of our communities, the larger embrace of the novel’s story of family, both chosen and biological, is all the more poignant and powerful.

Fall On Your Knees is above all a story of passion – for life, for love, for truth and ultimately for redemption. Redemption is possible only when the truth has been acknowledged and shared. Ann-Marie has been quoted as saying that it’s a happy ending when at least one person has survived to tell the tale. Our theatrical version is inspired by the healing power of storytelling in its most enduring form, the shared circle. The circle crosses cultures and eras, and its invitation to bear witness is not only extended to a community, it also creates community. Thus, in one of the oldest forms of theatre we find the heart of our piece’s offer of hope for the future.

Package includes: Two tickets to Neptune Theatre ’s production Billy Elliot The Musical Charming accommodations at The Halliburton Hotel

A three course, candle-lit dinner for two at local restaurant Stories