CORNELIA'S VISITORS Begins This Month at eSe Teatro

Cornelia, an advanced operating system, is born in a factory in China in a ritual that carefully prepares her to be sent to serve her first owner. With this image the audience is taken into the world of Cornelia's Visitors, a play written by Argentine playwright Julieta Vitullo, directed by Montse Garza, and produced by Seattle's first and foremost Latine theatre company, eSe Teatro.

Cornelia is not your run-of-the-mill AI. Played by Mexican-American Jessica Marvin-Romero, she possesses distinctive features. Shrewd and adaptable, she adjusts her communication style to the requirements of the humans around her, always keeping everybody on their toes - does she really not understand the requests of those around her? Or is she playing dumb? Moreover, Cornelia has developed a specific sense of humor to satisfy the needs of her owner, Isabel Inchausti-a bestselling novelist whose career has stalled since her last book, The Way of the Ancestors.

While Isabel is obsessed with publishing a new book inspired by Greek tragedy, Cornelia complies with her owner's orders with total obedience. "Your wish is my command," Cornelia says after efficiently carrying out each instruction. Her days revolve around Isabel's agenda until three enigmatic people suddenly appear in Isabel's living room. Cornelia Fabra, Mr. Meier, and Professor Gregoria Abarca are all incidental characters included in Isabel's bestselling novel, The Way of the Ancestors. Confused in a world they don't recognize because they come from 1930s Europe, these three visitors struggle to make sense of the all-access information world they've arrived at.

"When I visited Madrid a few years ago, I was struck by Picasso's painting, Guernica," Vitullo says about why the theme of war is included in the play. "It's something you don't forget. The painting is huge, and it had a big impact on me and made me think about war and the cruel things we humans do to each other. Guernica is considered to be one of the first bombings in history aimed at deliberately destroying a civilian population. The idea of humans 'toying' with one another in the game of war brought me to the notion of AI and how it may potentially 'toy' with us. There's another connection that goes farther back in human history, but I'd hate to give any spoilers."

Cornelia's Visitors is particularly relevant not only because it deals with the questions and fears people have regarding advances in artificial intelligence, but also because it reminds the audience about the long-lasting consequences caused by military conflicts. "The US is always at war and, nowadays, any civilian population can unfortunately experience something like that. It is something that hasn't stopped. Up to this day, civilians are being bombed in different countries," says Vitullo, who also explored themes of war in one of her previous plays, Two Big Black Bags, which opened at West of Lenin in 2023.

In that way, the experience of pain, memory, and loss is unique to humans, which is something Cornelia, of course, has a hard time grasping. However, she quickly learns from what she observes. "Cornelia is always listening and taking in information," says Montse Garza, the director of the play, a Latina software engineer who graduated from MIT. "I like to think of Cornelia almost as a child, like Isabel's child, because everything Isabel does, Cornelia learns it with no moral judgment. There's no right or wrong for her. There's only what you tell her and show her, and she will replicate that."

According to Garza, there is a lot of misinformation around AI. "For example, there is significant racial bias in AI. The facial recognition tools are a lot worse for Black people, for Latinos, or people of color," she says. "However, it is important to remember that AI is not inherently bad; these kinds of situations happen because we, humans, are racist."

As a Latina in a field mainly dominated by men, race issues are also a theme that Garza wants to highlight with this play, which is being produced by Seattle's Latine theatre company eSe Teatro and features a cast of mainly Latine actors and Spanish speakers.

"We're mostly a Latine cast, which is something you wouldn't expect in a play like this one. Science fiction is largely a very white field and, unfortunately, when you think of Latine stories you think about immigration, poverty, and drug dealers," she says.

Seattle Awards - Live Stats

Best Musical - Top 3

1. REEFER MADNESS (The Spartan Theatre)

8.6% of votes

2. CLUE THE MUSICAL (Edmonds Driftwood Players)

8% of votes

3. THE HITCHCOCK HOTEL (Can Can)

7.1% of votes

Vote Now!