CREATION STORY to Premiere at Teatro Círculo with Notch Theatre

Notch Theatre Company will present the World Premiere of Creation Story, written and co-composed by Octavia Chavez-Richmond (El Mentiroso at Arts On Site) and directed by Rebecca Martinez (Canciones with Radical Evolution/The Sol Project; Dirty Laundry at WP Theater), with co-composer and co-music direction by Jen Anaya, at Teatro Círculo (64 E 4th St, New York, NY 10003), December 5-January 3.

Creation Story is a Chicanofuturist musical that blends myth, migration, and environmental collapse with rancheras, ballads, and desert-western sounds. Set in a shape-shifting shadow version of the American Southwest, Creation Story follows a writer as she remixes Catholic and Hopi creation stories, breathes life into unruly characters, and unravels the mysteries of destruction, and cultural memory.

'When I write for performance, I channel the desires of youth that kept me playing make-believe for hours in New Mexico,' said playwright Octavia Chavez-Richmond. 'The dusty landscape of my childhood inspires my artistry. Like the characters in my work, I am far from home, wandering and hungry for answers. We seldom acknowledge how much Indigenous religion has shaped literature and Hispanic culture in the Southwest. Chicano musicals are few and far between. I hope to water this drought with Creation Story, which is my reminder to the world that memory is cultural, generational, and precious.'

Playwright Octavia Chavez-Richmond was awarded a 2025 NYSCA Grant for this World Premiere production of Creation Story.

Tickets are pay-what-you-can with advance reservation at www.notchtheatre.org/creation-story. The performance will run approximately 100 minutes, with no intermission.

Performances will take place on:

Monday December 7 at 7pm (Opening Night)

Thursday, December 10 at 8pm

Friday, December 11 at 8pm

Saturday, December 12 at 8pm

Sunday, December 13 at 2pm

Thursday, December 17 at 8pm

Friday, December 18 at 8pm

Saturday, December 19 at 2pm

Saturday, December 19 at 8pm

Friday, January 1, 2027 at 8pm

Saturday, January 2, 2027 at 2pm

Saturday, January 2, 2027 at 8pm

Sunday, January 3, 2027 at 8pm

Creative Team

Octavia Chavez-Richmond (Playwright) is a writer/actor/storyteller who uses theater and film to disrupt hierarchy, imperialism, racism, and misogyny. She's a wanderer, a clown, and a believer in cosmic cycles. Written works include Lolita Express (NYC Indie Theatre Film Festival), El Mentiroso (Arts On Site) and Creation Story (NYSCA Grant, 2025). Octavia holds an M.F.A. in Acting from Brown University/Trinity Repertory. Awards include: Motif Award for Best Actress; David Wickham Playwriting Award; Margo Skinner Memorial Fellowship; IRNE Nomination. Acting work includes: Film/TV: The Diplomat, At The Sea, Free Guy, Knives Out, Who We Are Now (TIFF), From Nowhere (SXSW). Theater: Disruption, Signature Theatre; Maestra, Clubbed Thumb Winterworks; Irrepressible Magic of the Tropics, INTAR; Give Me Carmelita Tropicana, Soho Rep; Fuente Ovejuna, Theatre for a New Audience; Mary Gets Hers, The Playwrights Realm; Pride and Prejudice, Long Wharf Theatre; Between Riverside and Crazy, SpeakEasy Stage Company; Yoga Play, Syracuse Stage/Geva Theatre; Last Ship to Proxima Centauri, Portland Stage Company; Marisol, Trinity Repertory Company.

Rebecca Martínez (Director) is a director who focuses on new plays and musicals and uses adaptation to envision classic plays through a contemporary lens. She serves as the BOLD Associate Artistic Director at WP Theater, and before that she served as the Cohort Collaborations Director for One Nation/One Project, supporting public art and health projects across the U.S. Recent credits: Canciones (Radical Evolution / Boundless / Latinx Playwrights Circle / Sol Project), Public Theater's Mobile Unit: Much Ado About Nothing; The Comedy of Errors (also co-adapter; Drama Desk Nomination, LATA Awards for Directing, Outstanding Adaptation and Theatrical Concept). At WP: Dirty Laundry (WP Theater / Spark Theatricals), Bite Me (WP Theater / Colt Coeur), Sancocho (Latinx Playwrights Circle / Sol Project / WP Theater). Regional projects include: Sancocho (Geva Theater), In Her Bones (Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center), Living and Breathing (Two River), Somewhere Over the Border (Syracuse Stage & Geva Theatre). Affiliations: member of the Obie Award-winning Sol Project Collective, WP Directors Lab Alum, 2021 TCG Rising Leaders of Color, Lincoln Center Theater Directors Lab, INTAR's Unit52, New Georges Affiliated Artist, Drama League Fellow, member of SDC. Commissions: Artist-in-Residence (Radical Evolution), SEED Directing Commission (Public Theater). Awards: Colorado Henry Award for Directing; four Portland, Oregon Drammy Awards; Lilla Jewel Award for Women Artists. She is originally from Colorado with deep ancestral roots in the Southwest. rebeccamartinez.org

About Notch Theatre Company

Notch Theatre Company creates community-responsive cultural work to drive change around pressing issues of our time, offering communities a platform to tell their stories and be their own change makers. www.notchtheatre.org