Introduction

Hello, we are Lauren Brooke Ellis and Meredith Dayna Cope-Levy, theatre artists located in Southwest Virginia who are in the process of getting their theatre group off the ground and started creating plays that speak to empowerment, identity, and love through holistic rehearsal and performance methods. We are committed through the act of storytelling to taking care of each other, encouraging and inspiring growth, and planting seeds of community.

The Ask

We are currently in the process of producing Meredith's "Bread Baking Play", which was a finalist for the O'Neill National Playwright's Conference last year. We have found a venue in Roanoke, Virginia (St. Elizabeth's Episcopal Church) and have selected dates in mid-Spring (May 17-19, 2024). We are working on securing funding to pay for the venue, the ingredients, and most importantly, for the time and work of our actors. We believe that the act of taking care of our community and collaborators includes economically and we want to make it feasible for them to participate fully in the time production takes without causing financial burdens outside of the rehearsal room. Artists deserve to be paid for their expertise, creativity, and time and we want to make it possible for them to feel supported in the rehearsal room and in their lives outside of it. By choosing to help us fund this project, you are empowering local artists to tell stories and create together.

In addition to producing the play and compensating actors, we are working on building funds so we can offer attendance to the play free-of-charge for all audience members. We want to make sure the work is economically feasible to attend and that anyone who wants to be there has the ability to access it.

The Play

Modeled off two sisters from the Bible’s New Testament gospels — Mary and Martha, the sisters of Lazarus who died, then was resurrected — “The Bread Baking Play” follows sisters Polly and Martha as they bake communion bread for their brother’s funeral. With their brother, the bridge that joined familial gaps seemingly died as well. Throughout the preparation and baking process, “old hurts and new secrets rise to the surface” like bread rises, and with those hurts and secrets comes a fundamental question: Can the sisters ever reconcile with each other and their differences, and find healing?

The concept was influenced by work done in a dramaturgy course where Cope-Levy researched the role and treatment of women in the early days of what would come to be called Christianity, through the lens of her Episcopalian faith practice. Cope-Levy conceived of this story in 2017. Like many others in the United States, she found herself facing extreme political polarization in the aftermath of a contentious presidential election that divided families and friends. How, she wondered, do we reconcile with those who are so different from us in fundamental ways, and exist together even on opposite sides of what she called an “arbitrary political divide”?

“I think what was really compelling for me about the play is that it exists in this context of Christianity and women, but really what the play is about is reconciliation,” she said. “How do we forgive each other? How do we reconcile with each other? How do we exist together when our mediator is gone?”

-A story written by Shannon Kelly of Cardinal News

The Process

Rehearsal processes require time and resources for supplies, props, and technical needs. This play has a particularly interesting twist in that the performers will be baking bread throughout the play, so additional time will be needed to learn how to mix, knead, rest, and bake real dough. The production process will consist of weekly meetings through March, regular rehearsals through April, and tech and performances in May. Things covered in rehearsals will include:

The Creative Team

Lauren Brooke Ellis and Meredith Dayna Cope-Levy have been in collaboration since 2016, creating space for marginalized voices and stories onstage. They met through the Hollins Playwright's Lab and have toured SHE MADE SPACE across the Southeastern region since 2017. SHE MADE SPACE, a lyrical monodrama inspired by Meredith's own coming out story, occupies space made by the loves and works of Sylvia Beach, Gertrude Stein, and Dujuna Barnes, inviting us all to critically consider how one traces steps towards embracing their whole self. Other projects they have collaborated on have included THE HILLS for the Hollins Playwright's Lab Summer Festival of New Works and 'THE TRAGEDY OF ROSIE AND HER VINTAGE LAUNDRY MACHINES.

Lauren Brooke Ellis is a director and stage manager from Aiken, South Carolina. In recent years, her directing work has almost exclusively been in new works, where her goal is to carve out space to amplify marginalized voices. She was honored by The Kennedy Center with a commendation for directing for her work on SHE MADE SPACE. Lauren holds an M.F.A. in Playwriting and a Certificate of New Play Directing from the Hollins University, where she most recently directed THE JUPITER BIRD, which performed at Hollins University and Under St. Marks Theatre in New York City. She currently works in the non-profit sector at an arts organization whose primary goal is to provide arts education and artistic experiences to historically under-resourced communities.

Meredith Dayna Cope-Levy (Roanoke, Va.) writes plays rooted in lived experience and emotional truth, and aims to make space through her work for dynamic, challenging women (both on stage and off). Produced work includes: DECISION HEIGHT (Samuel French/Concord Theatricals); SMART KID (Youth Plays Inc.); SHE MADE SPACE; COUPLER; and WAITING FOR SYLVIA. Her plays THE HILLS and THE BREAD BAKING PLAY were finalists for the 2020 and 2023 seasons of the National Playwright's Conference at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. She holds an M.F.A. from the Hollins Playwright’s Lab and is a member of the Dramatist’s guild. She identifies as a lesbian.

To read more about some of their previous work, please visit the link here.

We are extremely grateful for your time and consideration.