Carmen Aguirre. Photo by Itai Erdal. Design by Elliott Smith.

Quotes

Carmen Aguirre’s Blue Box

Would you live a double life, under threat of torture and death, to fight for a cause you believed in?

How hard would you fight for a man sent to you in a vision?

What would you do if the love of your life was a beautiful Chicano TV star who only made love to you once? Ever.

Would you like to dance with an amazing woman named Carmen Aguirre?

Carmen Aguirre’s Blue Box is a sensual solo performance piece about love, lust and revolution set in Chile, Vancouver and Los Angeles.

Blue Box weaves together two stories: one from Carmen’s underground life in the 1980s Chilean resistance movement fighting the Pinochet dictatorship; the other of a passionate and complicated relationship with a charismatic Chicano actor, each exploring how to get what we want when no one wants us to get it. Funny, sexual, moving and deeply political, Blue Box reveals a woman committed to a cause to which she would have sacrificed her life, and committed to a man who refused to sacrifice anything for anyone.

It’s a story of terror, romance, fear and abandon that takes us from the dangerous mountain passes of Chile to the thrilling roller coasters of Hollywood, from her passionate love affair with a TV star to her passionate love for the revolutionary political movement that strove to free and change an entire nation.

Nightswimming commissioned and developed Blue Box and is premiering it in Spring 2012 as the first leg of a national tour produced in association with Neworld Theatre to Vancouver, Victoria, Calgary, Ottawa and Toronto.

The anchor of the 2012 tour is a two-week run at Vancouver’s premier independent venue, The Cultch, in May 2012. Production Designer Itai Erdal has developed the environment for the piece, completing a creation process that Nightswimming nurtured through hugely successful public readings in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver.

Nightswimming is delighted to announce that Carmen’s acclaimed memoir Something Fierce has been chosen as the winner of CBC 2012 Canada Reads!

“…raw, courageously honest and funny; an insightful journey into the formation of a revolutionary soul.” – Globe and Mail

Something Fierce is published by Douglas & Macintyre in Vancouver.

Production History

Written and performed by Carmen Aguirre
Directed by Brian Quirt
Production Design by Itai Erdal
Sound Design and Composition by Joelysa Pankanea
Stage Managed by Robin Richardson
Producer, Rupal Shah
Associate Producer, Kirsty Munro

Carmen Aguirre’s Blue Box was commissioned and developed by Nightswimming. It has received public workshops through Alameda Theatre (Toronto), Buddies in Bad Times Theatre’s Hysteria Festival (Toronto), Alberta Theatre Projects PlayRites Festival (Calgary) and Neworld Theatre (Vancouver).

Thank you to Marilo Nunez, Moynan King, Vicki Stroich and Marcus Youssef, Adrienne Wong and Kirsty Munro at Neworld Theatre. Blue Box was written, in part, during a residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts Playwrights Colony.