The Sunflower Theatre is preparing to host “The Letter C,” a one-woman showcase, on Friday, April 4 and Saturday, April 5 from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.
All proceeds from ticket purchases will be donated back to The Sunflower Theatre, M Waldron, the writer and performer, told The Journal.
According to The Sunflower Theatre’s website, “The Letter C” is a performance about “finding light in the darkness from catastrophe to community.”
Waldron shared that the idea for the show “popped” into her head about a year ago, and she began writing the script soon after.
Each of the acts in the four act performance start with the letter “c.” The first act is a geology lesson of sorts about the theory of catastrophism and the second act discusses climate chaos, followed by an intermission.
“My education is as a geologist,” Waldron said. “In geology, there’s tension between the idea of everything we see in the rock record slowly occurring … but then catastrophism is like, no, asteroids happened, volcanoes happened, earthquakes happened. So then I just kind of play with that as more of a metaphorical concept in relation to my own life. Sort of that tension of, do we slowly build a depositional environment over time by investing with our community, or do we let ourselves be totally caught in response to catastrophe?”
Waldron also shared a snippet from the script in the first act, which highlights how these difficult and intense life moments have helped create something beautiful.
“I am a depositional artist. My writing needs time and pressure to transform into something coherent, to become art,” the script reads. “But like the fossil record, my art has also been shaped by intense moments some of them short-lived, some of them catastrophic.”
In regards to climate chaos, Waldron draws experiences she had in two floods that were both results of “unprecedented precipitation events.”
The third act centers around cancer and the last act is about community. Once again, Waldron uses her own experiences.
“I talk about losing both my uncle and my mom to cancer about 15 years apart in time, and talk about how those experiences shaped me and changed me,” Waldron said.
In summary, Waldron hopes to show how community is what was there for her, at the end of the day.
“If you’re going to survive a catastrophic event, community is kind of the thing that will save you and help you through,” Waldron explained.
This will be the first time “The Letter C” will be performed, though Waldron shared that she does have a performance background in spoken word and poetry. There will also be a “multimedia aspect of the show.”
“I’m using different visuals throughout the whole show,” Waldron said. “Some of that is personal family artifacts, and some of that is from a friend of mine who is an illustrator.”
Ultimately, Waldron wants audience members to take away hope at the end of the performance.
“I want people to take away hope,” Waldron said. “I think that, regardless of your political views, it’s a really tumultuous time to be a human alive on planet earth. While I definitely explore some more complex and complicated themes, at the end of the day, I hope people feel a renewed sense of hope and the connections they can make with their community.”
Though Waldron will be donating all ticket sales back to the Sunflower Theatre, she will have some of her poetry books for sale at the event.
“I really believe in what they’re doing,” Waldron said of The Sunflower Theatre. “Having a space like that in a small community is so cool.”
Tickets are available online at www.sunflowertheatre.org/events/the-letter-c/.
