New Kristina Wong Play FROM NUMBER TO NAME 3: WELCOME BACK HOME to Have Workshop at TCG
The workshop production will have three public performances on Friday, June 26 at 8pm; Saturday, June 27 at 7pm; and Sunday, June 28 at 11am.
From Number to Name 3: Welcome Back Home?, directed and devised by Kristina Wong, features formerly incarcerated members of API RISE, their families, and supporters. From Number to Name 3 is a devised theatre performance that asks what does “freedom” actually mean once you’ve gotten it back?
Presented by Center Theatre Group, the workshop production will have three public performances on Friday, June 26 at 8pm; Saturday, June 27 at 7pm; and Sunday, June 28 at 11am in Downtown LA. Reservations are available by visiting CTGLA.org/FromNumberToName. Please RSVP to receive the address and additional information about your performance.
Created over an intensive three-week process with Pulitzer Prize Finalist Kristina Wong, the show centers formerly incarcerated Asian Pacific Islanders—members of API RISE—as they navigate reentry into a world that is anything but welcoming.
The growing Asian American prison population and the impact of incarceration in our communities often goes unaddressed because of the cultural shame and stigma of incarceration in our families. The previous East West Players digital productions examined how incarceration specifically impacts API communities, and what it’s like when you “kill” your prisoner number and return to society.
Through humor, storytelling, movement, and sharp collective inquiry, performers reflect on the strange in-between space of being “free” while living under the looming threats of deportation, surveillance, anti-immigrant rhetoric, and the everyday obstacles of rebuilding a life after incarceration.
API RISE is an extended family of formerly incarcerated or detained Asian immigrants/refugees, Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders. API RISE embraces and welcomes individuals of all backgrounds including immediate, and chosen family members, friends, and supporters, in the Lobs Angeles County and Inland Empire region.
API RISE’s mission is to make freedom possible for the community of current and formerly incarcerated individuals, youth and families in high-risk situations, allies, supporters, and their communities. It does this through culturally sensitive direct support, education, power building, organizing, and advocacy. API RISE envisions true freedom and liberation for API communities living within a compassionate society that harnesses its community power.
This is the third time API RISE has collaborated with a professional theatre company to produce this show and the first time working with Center Theater Group. And this is the first time it is happening live and in person. The first two shows were digital production in 2021 and 2022 produced by East West Players.
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