by Marc Gonzalez & Molly Rose-Williams

It is almost time for the Rogue Festival again–it will be taking place March 1-9 in the Tower District of Fresno. Here are 2 more of several Rogue Performer Preview articles we will be posting between now and then, and we will also have a more general Rogue Festival article coming soon! We will also be posting several show reviews once the festival begins!

You will be able to see ALL of our Rogue Festival coverage in our special Rogue category and you can find more Rogue Festival information on our Rogue event page over on KRL News! There you will find press releases and extra info! You can also go to the Rogue Festival website for more info and to purchase tickets.

Marty’s Turn
By Marc Gonzalez

The idea for this play came from a full-length play I’ve been working on where the supporting character Marty dominated the script even though that play doesn’t revolve around him. The original full-length play is my “Covid play,” and centers around a firefighter’s journey from childhood to promotion, featuring the people who helped him along the way. Marty, a toy store owner, was a character that simply dropped into my head and onto the page when I took the firefighter on a toy store trip with his dad to get a firetruck. After several table reads and a staged reading, the common feedback from everyone was, “Marc, give Marty his own play!” So I finally heeded the advice and did that.

Marty is the only character not based on anyone I know; he’s a purely created character. And while I’ve given him a few of my personal experiences, he and I are nothing alike. I didn’t know why I resonated with this character so much, so I brought it up in therapy and my therapist said,

“The characters we are drawn to, that aren’t based on someone we know, means it’s character we want to learn from. What do you want to learn from Marty?” That insight blew my mind, because it’s true. Billy Jack Anderson, who has read for and played Marty in every Fresno-based iteration, made the comment one day in rehearsal that “Marty mirrors the obsolescence of the toy store: as the nice-guy-who-finishes-last goes ‘out of business’ so is the mom-and-pop stores.” That remark also blew my mind because it’s true and I hadn’t realized that.

Billy was my first ask to read for Marty because I had seen him in several productions around town and in BYRTL (via UR Here) readings and just felt he would fall right into the role, and I believe I was right. When I write characters, it’s much easier for me to write with a voice in mind, specifically a person’s cadence and timbre. So being able to write Marty with the voice of Billy in my head became an effective process from drafting to rehearsing this play. Billy has been a foundational, integral person to root and develop this character and I’m so excited for Rogue audiences to see his performance!

CRUSH
By Molly Rose-Williams

What’s it like to fall in love? In 2020, I was desperate to figure this out. I had just broken up with someone I thought maybe I was in love with, and I was desperate to know if true love might feel different. But the idea of getting back on the dating apps devastated me. So I set out to make a dance-comedy show instead, hoping that would ease the agony.

It worked…kind of. Just weeks after I started making CRUSH, I met someone who flipped my whole world upside down. She was my new housemate, and within days of moving in together, I realized that I had a huge fat crush. So I worked on the show and tried to stay cool. Professed my feelings when the pressure got too much. Nearly had a heart attack of relief when she reciprocated. Freaked with joy when we started dating. And I kept rehearsing. Before long, I had fallen in true love, and I also had a show about it all.

I premiered We Are All Friends (which was the title of the first version of CRUSH), two weeks after my housemate-lover and I broke up. In the midst of heartbreak, I got on stage each night and sweated my heart out dancing about love. And despite the irony of it all, that first run of shows felt electric. I loved the piece, I loved how I felt performing it, and I loved the resonance and laughter I got from the audience. I finished the run determined to keep working on the show, and also knowing that in order to do so, I likely needed to put it aside for a while until it felt less emotionally-charged.

Nine months later, I picked it back up to take it to the Vancouver Fringe Festival. I reworked the entire show—keeping what I liked, ditching the stuff that no longer felt relevant, and just generally trying to clean, hone, and tighten. And it worked…mostly. I got great responses from my first audience, but the second show fell totally flat. I realized there was still a long way to go before the show could consistently inspire the kind of laughter, emotion, and recognition that I wanted for the audience.

The next four performances were an intensive incubator of creation, construction, destruction, and re-creation. I took the now entirely-reconstructed show to New York and Vermont, and then back to the Bay Area for another run, just a little over a year after the initial premiere. The show kept changing, and audiences started laughing harder and harder. A year after the premiere, I felt I’d finally created the show I’d meant to make all along—one that would allow the audience to relive the most agonizingly-heartbreakingly-ecstatically-disorienting moments of their lives while I did the same!

CRUSH is fun, heartfelt, absurd … and funny! Hope to see you there.

A little bit about me: I grew up training Chinese acrobatics and playing competitive soccer, and started dancing in college. Now, I also work part-time as an award-winning podcast producer. My performance work integrates all these threads, and has been recognized for awards by Theatre Bay Area and the Isadora Duncan Dance Awards. For more, check out www.mollyrosewilliams.com.

CRUSH
Created & performed by Molly Rose-Williams
Length: 50 minutes
Venue: Dianna’s Studio of Dance, 826 N Fulton St., Fresno CA
Performance Dates & Times:
– Friday March 1, at 8:30 p.m.
– Saturday, March 2, at 5 p.m.
– Sunday March 3, at 6:30 p.m.
– Friday March 8, at 10 p.m.
– Saturday, March 9, at 5 p.m.

If you love theatre, be sure to check out Mysteryrat’s Maze Podcast, which features mysteries read by local actors. You can find the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Play, and also on podbean.

Check out more theatre reviews & other local entertainment articles in our Arts & Entertainment section. You can also find more theatre coming up on KRL’s Local Theatre event page.