NPX Weekly Round-Up: INFERNA by Joanna Castle Miller

A "solo" show gives a great example of autobiographical playwriting, plus three more plays that piqued my interest this week.

When I was in graduate school, I had to create a solo show as my thesis project. I had to write it, perform in it, design it— everything. Of course, then the pandemic hit and it had to be turned into a film instead…but I digress. One of the challenges that our professor was always stating was to think about the solo show in a new way— if you didn’t want to be alone on stage, how could you do that and still make the show a “one person” show? If you didn’t want to perform at ALL, how could you do that? Etc. etc. INFERNA, while a two-hander, feels a lot to me like a solo show that just happens to have a second actor on stage sometimes, and that (along with a few other things) feels revolutionary to me.

But, before I get too into it, here is the official summary of INFERNA from NPX:

As a young playwright (Joanna Castle Miller) balances the childhood expectations of religion and theatre, she comes to realize the mentors she adores aren't who they appear to be, and neither are the scripts they've passed down to her.

Short and sweet, and honestly it’s pretty dang accurate. Though there are some content warnings for discussions of: sexual assault, pedophilia, religious trauma, and hell-related imagery. If you can’t read about any of those topics at this time, I totally get it and encourage you to come back for next week’s newsletter.

Anyways, let’s continue.

This play is autobiographical, documenting playwright Joanna Castle Miller’s childhood experiences with religious indoctrination/trauma and grooming (mainly). She mostly focuses on her experiences as a young teenager through to her senior year of high school. The two main places that Joanna spends most of her time in are her church and her school, and she describes both as having their “scripts”— or, rather, there is a “Jesus” script and a “Jack” script (Jack being the name she gives to her drama teacher and groomer). These “scripts” tie back to a pivotal theme Joanna consistently draws the audience’s eyes to: the story of Eve in the garden ruining utopia for Adam, and this idea that women who just want something to call their own “ruin” life for men by speaking up. As Joanna explores the plays she saw and worked on, she sees this theme repeated in them.

This recurring symbol describes an experience that a lot of people assigned female at birth experience: that of putting aside your wants and needs to support a man’s “utopia”. This is explored both in religious and arts spaces through the experiences Joanna had as a teenager. She fully believes what her Sunday school teachers and pastor tell her about Hell, and how anybody who isn’t “saved” will burn. This terrifying image is often put upon children in fundamentalist Christianity by adults who tell them that they are responsible for “saving” their loved ones from this fate, and Joanna is no different. We see how this teaching and others allow for her to become an easier victim for Jack— because, as Joanna states, she was not educated about “coercion, consent, or believability”.

This piece is a great example of writing autobiographically. When writing a piece about real life, it can sometimes be hard to organize it. By that, I mean it can be hard to find a theme, message, or “point” to the story because real life doesn’t often have one of those naturally— we have to find that for ourselves. Joanna Castle Miller is able to tell her story not only in a way that makes sense, but in a way that conveys a deep message that is clearly important to her. She doesn’t tell the whole story, every little detail. She finds the most important experiences and draws connections between them. Much like one does when healing from trauma, Joanna takes us through her childhood memories and finds the commonalities so we can all learn from them.

When writing about our real lives, or the lives of others, sometimes things get messier than when we attempt fiction. Real people are involved, and considerations need to be made around that fact. But as the writer, especially if we are writing about our own lives, we can only succeed in telling our story by being self aware and honest with ourselves. Joanna talks about a few experiences that she is not proud of, that some would try to hide. But if she hid them, this play would not have the impact that it does. If we make the choice to take on an autobiographical project, we cannot hide from ourselves if we hope to find a coherent message and affect our audience.

Here is my official review on NPX:

A beautiful piece that demonstrates how evangelical Christianity as well as patriarchal theatrical spaces can be hotbeds of abuse, without going down the doom and gloom route. This feminist work has such a consistent message of hope in the face of a world that often tells anyone who isn't a cis white man to sit down and shut up. INFERNA is a great example of impactful autobiographical work, and shows that not all one-person shows have to only have one actor! I would love to see this on stage one day.

I truly recommend this play, and consider it required reading for anybody wanting to write an autobiographical solo show.

Three other plays that intrigued me this week:

• blowhole. by Aly Kantor

• MERCUTIO LOVES ROMEO LOVES JULIET LOVES by Gina Femia

• Tiger Beat by Kaela Mei-Shing Garvin

Want me to read any of these plays, or a particular book on writing? Let me know by responding to this email or messaging me in the SubStack app!

Happy reading, and see you next week!

~Brynn