BootStrap Theater Launches Kickstarter for ARCTIC REQUIEM: THE STORY OF LUKE COLE AND KIVALINA

BootStrap Theater Foundation is excited to announce that this month backers have come from both the environmental justice community and the theater community to launch this Crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter for the theatrical world premiere of "Arctic Requiem: The Story of Luke Cole and Kivalina" created by Sharmon J. Hilfinger and Joan McMillen, to run October 23 - November 15 at San Francisco's Z Below Theater.

The play "Arctic Requiem: The Story of Luke Cole and Kivalina" is a powerful, true story about the first climate change refugees in the United States and San Francisco lawyer Luke Cole's response to their life threatening situation. Kivalina, Alaska is an Inupiat Eskimo village where the habitat has been dramatically mutated by pollution and climate change. Their island and way of life are vanishing. Luke and the Inupiats stand together against greed, corruption, prejudice and pollution in an arctic environment whose transformation may be irreversible.

"This is a tremendously supportive start, all the funds from this Kickstarter drive will help pay stipends for our artistic team," remarks playwright Sharmon J. Hilfinger. "Arctic Requiem" is an unconventional play with music presented as a collage of stories in layered timeframes.The production is directed by Tracy Ward, with a book by Sharmon J. Hilfinger, music by Joan McMillen, and dramaturgy by Brian Thorstenson. Choreography is by Christy Funsch, set design by Giulio Perrone, and costume design by.Callie Floor. Alva Henderson is the Musical Director. Nancy Shelby, who was Luke Cole's wife and is a San Francisco theater artist and company member with Word for Word Performing Arts Company, has provided significant guidance in the creation of Arctic Requiem and connection to the community that knew Luke and his work.

Kivalina and Luke Cole

Kivalina is a tribe, a village, a barrier reef island. It is on the west coast of Alaska, 70 miles above the Arctic Circle. This is the home of a tribe of Inupiat Eskimos. There are no roads to Kivalina; to get there, you take a plane from Kotzebue. The village and people of Kivalina have been ravaged by the effects of melting ice, vicious storms, and have been polluted by the world's largest zinc mine. Luke Cole was a fierce environmental justice lawyer, an avid bird-watcher, a root beer and chocolate aficionado, and a most beloved mentor and friend to many, many people. He was widely known for his work representing minorities in environmental discrimination cases.

Luke Cole graduated from Stanford in 1984 and then worked for three years in Washington as one of Ralph Nader's so-called Nader's Raiders, editing a consumer advice newsletter. After receiving his law degree from Harvard in 1989, he moved to San Francisco and soon after started the Center on Race, Poverty and the Environment. One of his most important legal legacies is the groundbreaking Global Warming suit filed on February 26, 2008: Kivalina vs Exxon et al. He also helped residents of Kivalina, an Inupiat village in northwest Alaska, sue the Teck Cominco Corporation, claiming that the company's zinc and lead mine had polluted the village water supply for years. A settlement, called for Teck Cominco to stop depositing mining tailings into the Kivalina River and to build a pipeline to the ocean, about 50 miles away. From 1996 through 2000, Mr. Cole served on the E.P.A.'s national environmental justice advisory council.

To find out how you can support the campaign or get involved in the project check out the link here kickstarter.com.

IF YOU GO:

Arctic Requiem: The Story of Luke Cole and Kivalina
By Sharmon J. Hilfinger and Joan McMillen
October 23 - November 15, 2015
Z Below Theater
450 Florida Street, San Francisco, CA

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