Riven at Theaterlab

Riven

We are happy to invite you to a staged reading of Riven, a play conceived by Marina Zurita and created in collaboration with Laila Garroni and Josanna Vaz. Based on interviews conducted with Brazilian waste pickers (people who pick and sort recyclable materials as a way of living), Riven is set to investigate thematics around environmental justice, accumulation of waste, and complexities of hope.

“Community anchors both the narrative and its [Riven’s] realization” - Jaquinn Sinclair for American Theatre

Riven follows the characters Melina and Alessandra, two black women  from the global south working at a waste picking cooperative – a place where recycled materials are sorted and people are rescued from neglect. Side by side, our characters share not only a lifetime of sorting the accumulated discards of a society that has failed them, but also a promise: to survive and to stay bound to each other.

Friday, March 29th @ 7:30PM 

Saturday, March 30th @ 7:30PM 

Theaterlab, 357 W 36th st, 4th floor, New York, NY 10018

TICKETS

Cast features Josanna Vaz as Melina and Dee Beasael as Alessandra

Production written and directed by Marina Zurita (2023 NYC Women’s Fund grantee)

Created in collaboration with Josanna Vaz and Laila Garroni

Produced by Giorgia Valenti (Narrator)

Stage Manager: Erin Gray

Sound Composer: Jackson Pelz

Lighting and Projection Designer: Attilio Rigotti

Riven wouldn’t have been possible without the support of Mollye Maxner (Co-director of A.P.E Gallery), The Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Target Margin Theater, Brooklyn Arts Council, and The NYC Women’s Fund.

PRODUCTION HISTORY:

The research behind Riven started in 2021 with a series of interviews conducted by director Marina Zurita with waste pickers living in Brazil. The play started being developed in 2022, through a collaborative artistic process hosted by The Space Residency at the Target Margin Theater and The Lab at APE. Riven was presented in workshop format in June of 2023 at the Artist Space @ BRIC Arts.