SEASON 35 | SEPTEMBER 2022

EDIT ANNIE
September 9-24, 2022

A New Play by Mary Glen Fredrick
Directed by Will Detlefsen
Presented by The VORTEX

Agoraphobic video editor Annie finally meets Clara, the #influencer she’s been editing remotely for years. As their relationship blossoms, Clara seems to be the salvation Annie's been waiting for—but her best friend Dana isn't so sure.

This dark comedic thriller descends deep into Annie’s mind and interrogates the loneliness of living with screens, the implications of being able to edit every aspect of yourself, and what’s “real” in a digital age. Our increasingly-digital landscape invites us to do this revising: to erase imperfections, delete all but the highlight reel, and be lulled into the picture-perfect version of the story. But what wounds does this erasure carve onto our psyches? For all of its theatrical elements, Edit Annie is a story about loneliness and longing to connect.

Edit Annie defies genre; it is a dark comedic queer rom-com psychological social media thriller. On the surface, Edit Annie is about video editing, social media, and the relationship between a video editor and the #influencer she co-creates. At its core, Edit Annie is about our minds—their endless power to create, warp, and destroy, all in the name of protection. By incorporating video, live feed, movement choreography, and claymation, Edit Annie reflects us: living straddled between digital and 3D worlds and altering “reality” with the press of a button. Edit Annie asks us to question which version of us is true? Which version is real, and how can we be sure? What does it mean to be authentic, when everything we do is edited for public consumption?

Starring Alaithia Velez as Annie. Jacqui Calloway as Clara. Erin McNellis as Dana. Dane Parker as Jackson.

Production Team

Directed by Will Detlefsen. Scenic Design by Alex Cassillas. Lighting Design by J Mwaki. Sound Design by Malyssa Quinn. Costume Design by Madison Murrah. Video Design by Mary Glen Fredrick, Claymation Design by Sofia Canestaro, and projection engineering by Johann Solo. Poster Design by Melissa Vogt. Production Manager, Katie Hamilton. Stage Manager, Monica Kurtz. Assistant Director, Jelena Stojiljkovic Rhynes. Financial Director, Krystle Cline. Managing Director, Melissa Vogt. Producing Artistic Director, Bonnie Cullum.

ABOUT THE PLaywright

Mary Glen Fredrick (she/they) is a New York-based writer, actor, and video editor. A writer for both theatre and film, she creates kinetic, femme-centric stories that dance with the absurd, the imaginative, and the dystopian. Her plays include Edit Annie (2022 O’Neill semifinalist, Leah Ryan’s FEWW finalist, Neukom Literary Arts Award finalist), Anarchy (New Perspectives Theatre Women’s Work Short Play LAB and 2021 Festival), and fire work (LOM Ensemble Playwright Lab Residency, Fault Line Theatre Irons in the Fire finalist). Her short film script Anything Valuable was selected for the 2021 Tribeca x Chanel Through Her Lens Women’s Filmmaker Program and her feature script Kin has been developed with the Eastern Frontier Society and NYC’s Filmshop. She received her BA in Comparative Studies in Race and Ethnicity from Stanford University and her MFA in Acting from UC San Diego. You can check out more of her work and self at heymaryglen.com.

ABOUT THE director

Will Detlefsen (he/him) hails from the Bay Area, CA. Will trained at the Playwrights Horizons Theater School at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and received his Masters in Directing at UC San Diego. This is his seventh time collaborating with Mary Glen Fredrick. Previous productions include Our Town (NYU Strasberg Institute), Pippin (Five Towns College), The Straights by T. Adamson (JACK), I am a positive person by Danny Rocco and You’re Gonna Be Famous by York Walker (Atlantic Theater School), and The Brewery by Manning Jordan (Dixon Place). Will lives in Harlem, NY, with his husband and his puppy, Oprah Winfrey.

Edit Annie is funded and supported by VORTEX Repertory Company, National New Play Network, The O’Neill Theatre Center, Six Square Austin’s Black Cultural District, The Texas Commission on the Arts. NNPN.org