from April 27th to April 29th, 2023
at The Red Road's Black Box Theatre
An immersive, experimental form of theatre uncovering the universal human experience of finding a new home
With the support of the Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs and the Cultural Affairs Council, the Miami-Dade County Mayor and Board of County Commissioners.
History
At one time, a passport represented one's nationality, citizenship, and freedom, but in the
postmodern world of this play, passports are no longer valid. The Passport Collector assembles
antique passports once belonging to our storytellers, who took their last journeys to find a home. The
Passport Project is a collaborative theatrical experiment between Miami and Oslo. The project
disrupts the traditional playwriting process by involving not only playwrights but also visual and
sound artists from the start. We collected storytellers/actors' visual research and sound samples
representing their childhood memories and "home.” These experiments gave us tools that are not
just words but things like movements, rhythms, noises, and psychologically stimulating visual objects.
Therefore, the script is written with scene descriptions, images, and a “Visual Narrative” to tell the
story.
I am an Associate Professor at the University of Miami and a Japanese theatre designer who has lived
in the United States for over 30 years. I teamed up with Cliff Moustache, a black artistic director who
migrated to Norway from Seychelles. “People Move Around on the Globe” was the subject that
attracted both Moustache of Nordic Black Theatre in Oslo and me living in Miami. Two opposite sides
of the globe deal with immigration issues differently. But this project also discovered that people’s
struggles, pains, and happiness are the same everywhere.
Combining Norwegian and UM’s Provost Award funding, Moustache, Erik Lawson, sound
designer/NYC, Meg Miroshnik, playwright/LA, and I conducted successful workshops in Miami and
Oslo in 2018 & 19. Anchoring to the keywords of immigration, migration, and passport, we collected
stories from our “storytellers/actors.” For example, during the Miami workshop, Moustache
conducted multiple unique exercises that the storytellers engaged in, such as “What items do you
take along to your last journey if you have to leave your home forever?” The actors were asked to
pack actual suitcases with imaginary items they would take on their journey to cross borders. One
storyteller/actor shared his brave voyage to swim across a river to reach US soil in the 1990s. He
took off his last personal belonging, his wristwatch, right before he jumped into the water and gave
it to a stranger.
On stage, there will be many suitcases and boxes beached ashore. Inside each box is a key item from
each character’s experience. The show is filled with dream-like scenes and magical characters from
local folktales. The Hulder is a seductive Norwegian mystical troll that invites people into the woods
to kill them. Norwegian trolls represent tales of natives vs. immigrants, as natives became trolls in
the woods when Christians came and chased them away.
Now, Moustache has traveled to Miami to direct this iteration, and Lawson will also be in Miami to perform
his songs on stage. It is an international collaboration between Miami and Oslo.
The Passport Project is an exciting new style of theatre that has art-installation-like quality and
audience-immersive aspects. It’s a truly unique environment to ask the universal question: “How do
you find a home?”
-Michiko Kitayama-Skinner (Scenographer and Co-Producer)
Performance Schedule:
Thursday April 27th, 8:00 PM
Friday April 28th, 8:00 PM
Saturday April 29th, 2:00 PM, 6:00 PM, and 8:00 PM
Reserve Your FREE Tickets Now!