ROE at Sophia Gordon Center for Creative and Performing Arts

Salem State University Theatre Presents ROE by Lisa Loomer Running February 23-25 and March 1-3

Salem State University’s theatre department continues its 2023-2024 season with ROE by Lisa Loomer. All performances take place in the Sophia Gordon Center for Creative and Performing Arts, 356 Lafayette Street, Salem, MA.

ROE goes beyond the headlines and the rhetoric, offering a clever, shocking, humorous and poignant portrayal of the two women at the center of the landmark 1973 Supreme Court Case that established a woman’s right to an abortion. The personal journeys of attorney Sarah Weddington and plaintiff Norma McCovery (“Jane Roe”) follow divergent paths as Loomer’s script reveals what it’s like to be an average citizen caught in the currents of history. The play takes place from the 1970s to the present, acknowledging the 2022 Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade and presenting characters on both sides of the issued from decidedly pro-choice to decidedly pro-life as the battle of over a woman’s right to choose rages on.

ROE was originally commissioned in 2012 by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) as part of their series “American Revolutions: The United States History Cycle”, a multi-decade program of commissioning and developing new plays about moments of change in U.S. history. It was developed at the University of Texas and The Kennedy Center as part of DC’s Women’s Voices Festival as well as OSF’s Black Swan Lab before premiering at OSF in 2016.

Loomer's other stage works include Café Vida, Distracted, Living Out and The Waiting Room. She has written extensively for film and television, including Looking for Angels and Girl, Interrupted. She is the recipient of multiple writing awards, including the American Theatre Critics Award (twice), the Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays Award, the Lurie Foundation Award, the Edgerton Foundation New American Plays Award, the Imagen Foundation Award, the Jane Chambers Playwriting Award (twice) and the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, among others.

ROE co-sponsors are Salem State Sociology Department, Center for Civic Engagement, and Intersectional Feminist Collective.

Tickets are $15 general/$10 seniors/free for students and under 18.