Description

Directed by Lisa Marie Rollins & Leigh Rondon-Davis

Shipping & Handling is a theatrical experience constructed as a night out at the theatre told in reverse.  The playwright shuffles chronology in order to scramble our historical expectations around Black plays, and unmap our limited vision of a future AI world. Are creations always a reflection of their creator? Can an AI bear witness to divine prophecy? Shipping & Handling seeks to transmit a signal for locating the tone of what it means to be human in this specific moment, and collectively reimagine our future design.

A revolutionary world premiere from Crowded Fire & Campo Santo’s Playwright In Residence, Star Finch, Shipping & Handling explores how our humanity will be measured within the soon to be robotic-reality. As an audience member, you’ll start at a moment in time and move back; from an afterparty with actors, to a playwright’s experimental talkback, to the performance of the play you’ve been hearing all about, a surreal and beautiful future vision from a Black Feminine gaze. 

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Star Finch (playwright and 2024 Rella Lossy Awardee) is a San Franciscan trying her best to hold ground amidst the erasure of gentrification. She is currently the Mellon Foundation Playwright in Residence at Campo Santo and Crowded Fire Theater and an alumni of the Resident Playwrights Program (2018-2022) at Playwrights Foundation. Finch’s plays include H.O.M.E. [Hookers on Mars Eventually] and BONDAGE (Relentless Award honorable mention). Her multidisciplinary collaborations include Campo Santo’s ETHOS DE MASQUERADE and Crowded Fire’s DEATH BECOME LIFE. Her most recent play, JOSEPHINE’S FEAST, premiered at the Magic Theatre. BONDAGE is available via Broadway Play Publishing Inc.

The Rella Lossy Award honors the memory of Rella Lossy, a lifelong champion of the American theatre and playwriting, by honoring the best new full-length script of a play by an emerging playwright that will premiere in Alameda County, Contra Costa County, Marin County, Napa County, San Francisco County, San Mateo County, Santa Clara County, Solano County, or Sonoma County in the coming year.

Learn more about the Rella Lossy Award