UC Santa Cruz

ABSTRACT

Brooke Lauren Jennings

Directing Fefu and Her Friends

Directing Fefu and her Friends, by Maria Irene Fornes, as an artist, an educator, and a woman, opens doorways to dynamic design that embodies generous hindsight to the flux of history as fact and myth. As an educator, Maria Irene Fornes brings forth the dramaturgical reinforcing of Emma Fry, Jill Dolan, and many others who preach art as a powerful educational tool for change. As a woman, this play taught me that I am not alone. I am blind, deaf, and afraid, but not alone. Thus, looking to our mother's and grandmother's generations as evidence of how the status quo came to be, this production of Fefu and Her Friends gives young women and men today the tools to fight gender inequality, break antiquated gender myths, and redefine them for a new generation.