Olivia Roberts - 2015 Cast

December 2015

Participating in the creation of “Weaving Our Sisters’ Voices” was the opportunity of a lifetime. As a freshman brand new to the theater department here at Gonzaga, I was beyond anxious to establish myself in the program. Seeing as though I did not know anyone involved in the department, I was totally unsure of how I was supposed to go about doing this. However, it was the first day of Intro to Theater when the class was informed about upcoming shows this season and open auditions available to us that would present me with the perfect chance to accomplish this goal.

As we began the rehearsal process, we were initially asked to do a cold reading of the script itself. The cast of nine, strangers to me at this point, dove head-first into the piece with a sense of excitement paired with the nervous uncertainty that comes with meeting new people and entering a new community. I too felt this surge of excitement. I was eager to see what could become of such a heavy and emotional work of poetry and I could not wait to submerge deeper into the process. In a collaborative manner, Suzanne held an open discussion with the cast shortly after the initial reading of the text, which allowed us to voice our own individual reactions to the art we had before us. It was so intriguing to hear the inspirational and useful responses from these women who, at the time, I knew little to nothing about. Looking back on the process as a whole, I feel as though this initial table work provided me with so much insight into what the words on the page truly meant and how others perceived the messages, similarly or differently than how I interpreted it. Soon after, we were also given the opportunity to sit with Suzanne one-on-one to discuss how her vision of our solo scenes would mesh with our own ideas. This collaborative effort was extremely helpful in discovering the depth to Woman with a Hemorrhage and allowed me to explore how her deepest intentions would affect the way in which I would portray her. For example, it was after this collaboration with Suzanne that I finally realized what the Woman with a Hemorrhage’s story was conveying in terms of the ways in which we view the concept of suffering. It was not solely the physical ailment of the hemorrhage that was the source of the woman’s pain but it was also the agonizing pain of an internal battle struggling to develop a sense of self-worth. Without this collaboration, I might not have discovered this insight early enough to accurately portray it onstage.

I am so grateful to have been blessed with the chance to spread the messages of such powerful and inspirational women alongside some of the most incredibly passionate young women I have ever met. This experience has allowed me to grow as an actor as well as an individual in ways I did not know possible. I can’t wait to see what’s next!