TWO LAS VEGAS PERFORMANCES ONLY!
6/24/2023 @ 2PM & 7PM
ONE WEEK IN LONDON
7/4/2023 - 7/8/2023
THE THERAPIST by Gabriela Yepes (Peru); translated by Gigi Guizado
How do you look the enemy in the eye?
A human rights lawyer, accustomed to solving unwanted cases, receives an unusual proposal: to organize a yoga workshop for the leaders of Peru’s most notorious terrorist groups: The Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso) and MRTA (Movimiento Revolucionario Tupac Amaru). The men are serving life sentences in a maximum-security prison since their arrest in the early 90s. Abimael Guzmán, Shining Path’s leader, is one of them.
All prisoners have the right to rehabilitation. But how do you teach wellness skills to the perpetrators of the bloodiest civil conflict in contemporary Peruvian history? Can those responsible for such suffering change? To address these questions, the therapist confronts a group of now aged, fragile looking men, who remain invisible on stage. The sheer act of standing there, with the audience as witness, strengthens her resolve to confront her own family history. The Therapist is above all a settling of accounts with past demons. The play takes us back in time through our protagonist’s early years, marked by abandonment, and solitude. A time when violence stalked her country, as well as her home.
Awards
Premio Luces 2019 Best Peruvian Play: La Terapeuta de Gabriela Yepes (Teatro de la Alianza Francesa)
THE ARTISTS
Born in Lima, Peru, Gabriela Yepes started as a producer, scriptwriter and director of La Buena Tierra, a documentary series on the environment and development, produced by the United Nations and the National Television of Peru. In 2004, she was awarded a Fulbright scholarship to study film directing in the United States, where she wrote and directed Vivir es una Obra Maestra and Danzak, short films that won awards at the Austin Film Festival and the Lima Film Festival.
Gigi Guizado is an actor, writer and theatre translator based in Las Vegas. She earned her BA in Drama at SF State University and plays “The Boar” in the audio drama We’re Alive: Descendants. She is the Resident Playwright at The Asylum Theatre. Her micro-play, Letter to a Clone Manufacturer, has been translated into Hungarian. Her poetry is published in The Emerson Review, Rogue Agent Journal, Salamander Ink Magazine, The Bluebird Word, among others and has been nominated for Best of the Net. Her translations have been published in Another Chicago Magazine, Asymptote Journal, The Mercurian, and featured on Performing International Plays.
Sarah O'Connell Assumed the role of The Asylum's Artistic Director in 2003. Originally from SF Bay Area, she served as the Associate Artistic Director of Impact Theatre. She holds an MDra in Directing from the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland (RCS). Her work includes several regional and world premieres. She is an alumnus of the Director's Labs in L.A. and Chicago, and La Mama ETC in Umbria. In addition to teaching at UNLV, she has worked at American Conservatory Theatre, TheatreWorks Silicon Valley, the SF Mime Troupe, and Glasgow's Theatre Cryptic. She is the publisher of EatMoreArtVegas.com.
Gig Guizado's translation of The Therapist ( La Terapeuta) by Gabriela Yepes is available for purchase from Inti Press at intipress.com.
