BACKSTORY YOUR GUIDE TO TIMELINE PRODUCTIONS MIDWEST PREMIERE BY NAOMI IIZUKA directed by Lisa Portes YESTERDAY’S STORIES. TODAY’S TOPICS. From Artistic Director PJ Powers a message in Concerning Strange And her bold theatricality Devices from the Distant will keep you guessing, Naomi Iizuka’s writing has a mystery, West, Naomi Iizuka’s sexy piecing things together and puzzle-of-a-play that we speculating about what is intrigue, yearning and sensuality that are thrilled to introduce real, what is imagined and Dear Friends, to Chicago in only its what is fabricated. is both beguiling and entrancing. second production. It had Think back. Way back to Her exploration of the its world premiere in 2010 exotic other-world. Just passed on, carefully crafted We also invite you to join in a time that now seems unknown was quite at Berkeley Repertory as they were curious to to depict a seemingly the photographic odyssey almost incomprehensible— alluring to TimeLine’s Theatre, where our literary learn about that distant accurate snapshot of a time that Naomi ignites. While nearly the last millennium. Company Members when manager Ben Thiem saw it. culture, we explore history and place. taking photos is prohibited we read this play. We too with a similar desire for during the performance Can you recall when you But do we know better now, Born in Japan, Naomi spent are continually trying to understanding. How and inside the theater, didn’t have a camera at your armed with our own crafty much of her life traveling stretch beyond what we’ve did people dress? What more mysteries and images fingertips, seemingly at all new strange devices built the world prior to putting known and tackled before, were their lifestyles, their await you in the lobby, and times, handily embedded in into app-filled smartphones? down roots in her current always trying to take you politics, their romances? we hope you’ll peruse, your cell phone? Is there really such a thing home of California. Her with us to new places. participate and maybe even Remember when you exposure to different lands Yet this search for clarity as a pure snapshot of a For this journey we’re tinker with photography of couldn’t—with just a couple and cultures lies at the often is clouded by the lens moment in time? Or is the delighted to welcome your own. of taps—snap a picture and heart of much of her body through which we peer. world of manipulation and director Lisa Portes, immediately circulate it to of work as a playwright. Whether we’re looking selective sharing the new We also hope you’ll join one of Naomi’s closest the world for perusal? She often examines the into history or merely to norm—one that we all are in a larger conversation collaborators, to TimeLine another part of the globe, lured into playing? about imagery and And do you also remember relationship between for the first time. Friends our perspective is shaped the play on Twitter when you couldn’t—with America and the Far East, We’re eager to tackle since graduate school, by what is presented for (@TimeLineTheatre), Flickr just a click or two more— be it Vietnam, Cambodia, these and other timely Naomi and Lisa have us—stories, photographs (flickr.com/timelinetheatre) alter and manipulate that or, in the case of Concerning questions in discussion worked together on and tableaux that have and our Behind the ‘Line same photo just prior to Strange Devices from the with you during the run of numerous projects, and been chosen, shared and blog (timelinetheatre. broadcasting it worldwide, Distant West, Japan. Concerning Strange Devices. their partnership has wordpress.com). creating an image exactly Crafted as a triptych, this been seen on stages Kate Eastwood Norris, Bruce McKenzie and Johnny Wu starred in the world Check our website as you’d like it to be seen? play traverses Yokohama, ranging from the Guthrie premiere of Concerning Strange Devices from the Distant West at Berkeley (timelinetheatre.com) for Seems like a lifetime ago Tokyo and the United Theatre in Minneapolis to Rep in 2010. Photo courtesy of kevinberne.com. Image © Berkeley Repertory Theatre. All rights reserved. up-to-date information that this wasn’t the norm. States, transporting you the Goodman Theatre in about ways to interact with It’s a brave new world now from present day back to Chicago, and beyond. Now us and each other about of 24/7 voyeurism. And it’s the 1880s when a strange they open another thrilling Concerning Strange Devices! not only image sharing, but new device—the camera new chapter in TimeLine’s also image crafting. —opened up worlds of intimate space, bringing Thank you for coming along discovery and intrigue for you up close to the play’s on this exciting venture. Can we trust that anything Americans curious about language, imagery and Here’s to an alluring and we see is real? Are things the exotic Far East. sensuality. illuminating trip! ever truly as they appear? Naomi’s writing has a The triptych begins in All the best, These questions—and mystery, intrigue, yearning 1884 with Americans on a oh, so many more—are and sensuality that is both quest abroad in Yokohama, deliciously teased out beguiling and entrancing. seeking insight into an Natural cyle of human desire Naomi Iizuka the playwright the blind spot TIMELINE: A Selected History of the Camera aomi Iizuka is a Pretty Girls; Tattoo Girl; and Humans are blind. able to see infrared and Nnationally recognized Skin, among others. The human eye sends sig- ultraviolet, but we cannot. 400 B.C. Chinese contemporary playwright Iizuka’s plays have been pro- nals to the brain that allow Also, humans are unable to philosopher Mo-Ti first and also serves as head duced around the United us to navigate our environ- distinguish the difference discovers a version of the of the MFA Playwrighting States and internationally, ment. For the most part, between polarized and pinhole camera. He refers program at the University including at Actors The- Tiffany Villarin (left, who also we see things as they are. non-polarized light, but to his invention as the of California, San Diego. atre of Louisville; Berkeley appears in TimeLine’s Concerning However, the human eye many birds can. “locked treasure room,” Strange Devices) and Lisa Tejero in essentially a darkened Iizuka’s work discusses Repertory Theatre; Campo the Goodman Theatre’s 2009 world has a blind spot—located Light passes through the memory and ways of seeing, Santo at Intersection for the premiere, directed by Lisa Portes, of at the area of the retina pupil directly to the retina, room with only a pinhole and often utilizes elements Arts in San Francisco; Dallas Naomi Iizuka’s Ghostwritten. where the optic nerve leads where the light is “digested” in the windowshade, from various forms of Theater Center and Un- to the back of the brain. by proteins. The informa- through which light can Angeles, McCarter Theatre project images on the media. Her plays focus on dermain Theatre in Dallas; These spots in each eye tion the retina receives Center in New Jersey, A opposite wall. the moments during which FronteraFest at Hyde Park are symmetrically aligned; from the amount of light Contemporary Theatre in our identity (dis)appears Theatre in Austin, Texas; at each given moment given is sent through the 350 B.C. Aristotle Seattle, Bay Area Play- and folds or morphs into Printer’s Devil Theater and one eye is compensating optic nerve to the brain. appropriates Mo-Ti’s wrights Festival, Midwest something else. She layers Annex Theatre in Seattle; for the blind spot, or loss This tells us what we are technology to safely PlayLabs, En Garde Arts/P.S. and juxtaposes multiple The Public Theatre, Geva of vision, in the other. We seeing—or what we think observe solar eclipses. 122 and New York Theatre perspectives with a unique Theatre Center, Brooklyn take information from what we see. Workshop. 1021 Abu Ali Al-Hasan simplicity and sensuality. Academy of Music, Soho surrounds that blind spot This can be tested by cover- Ibn al-Haitham, an Rep and Tectonic The- Iizuka is a member of New and fill in the blank. ing one eye and focusing In addition to Concerning Egyptian man, is first to ater Project in New York; Dramatists and is the recipi- on one singular detail. A Strange Devices from the Dis- Unless you’re James Bond, document the technology Sledgehammer Theatre ent of numerous awards, in- corner of your line of vision tant West, which received its you can only see what of pinhole cameras in a in San Diego; Edmonton’s cluding the Whiting Award, falls away and the details world premiere at Berkeley scientists call “visible book called Book of Optics. Northern Light Theatre a Rockefeller Foundation are blurred. Repertory Theatre in Febru- light.” Some animals are Not until the 19th Century ary 2010, Iizuka’s plays and Montreal’s Alternate MAP grant, an NEA/TCG Theatre in Canada; and the Artist-in-Residence grant, a will the “camera obscura” include The Last Firefly; be combined with photo- Ghostwritten; Anon(ymous); Edinburgh Festival. McKnight Fellowship, a PEN Center USA West Award for sensitive paper to record At the Vanishing Point; 17 Her plays have been work- images. Reasons (Why); 36 Views; shopped by San Jose Reper- Drama, the Stavis Award Polaroid Stories; Language tory Theatre, Geva Theatre from the National Theatre of Angels; War of the Worlds Center, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Princeton Uni- (written in collaboration Conference, The Sundance versity’s Hodder Fellowship, with Anne Bogart and SITI Institute Theatre Lab, A.S.K.