O, Possum!
Jenna Kuerzi, Hannah Gold, Bren Thomas, & Asaki Kuruma
The climate is in crisis, and so is the Mammalian Exhibit at Jumping Cholla Community Park — where a Park Ranger ‘deals’ with her feelings of inadequacy by biting off more than she can chew, sending butt-pics to her long-distance-eco-activist-girlfriend Thorn, and munching peyote with her best friend — the titular Opossum. But a bake sale gone awry turns out to be the last [single-use plastic] straw for our under-appreciated Park Ranger… who promptly punks out. At a park without a Park Ranger, things get wild: Opossum proposes eating our young, a rattlesnake attacks wall builders, and thugs beat up a culturally appropriative cactus piñata. How will the community of Jumping Cholla Community Park ever survive if they don’t work together as a community?! (Seriously, how? A balladeering Tumbleweed wants to know.) O, Possum! A (bleak) comedy about climate change, friendship, and dealing with the consequences of our inactions.
"A lot of people think that being a park ranger means I get to spend all day hiking and having meaningful interactions with nature. That’s certainly what I thought my life as a park ranger would be. Hah. False. It turns out that being a park ranger involves a lot of emails. I hate emails. I currently have about 3,582 unread emails sitting in my inbox.”
- Park Ranger
In development w/ New Pages @ Azuka Theatre
Supported by a residency with Signal Fire Arts