Presented by the Program in Theater with support provided in part by Princeton University’s Program for Community-Engaged Scholarship (ProCES).
Take Care
An original contemporary circus show led by Ruth Schultz ’22, with set and lighting design by Ricky Feig ’22
Run Time
Approximately 60 minutes with no intermission.
Content Warnings
This show contains discussions of anxiety, sexual assault, body dysmorphia, and eating disorders. There are also brief mentions of suicide and self-harm. If you would like to leave during the part about body dysmorphia and eating disorders, you should do so when you see a bathtub and mirror onstage, and come back after five minutes have passed. If you would like to leave during the discussion of anxiety, leave when you see the mirror and bathtub being removed from the stage and come back after six minutes have passed. If you would like to leave during the discussion of sexual assault, leave when you see the pink loop of fabric — not the green one — hanging down on its own, and come back after seven minutes have passed.
Special Notes
Please silence all electronic devices including cellular phones and watches, and refrain from text messaging for the duration of the performance.
Cast
Eliyana Abraham ’23*
Shekinah Williams
Jessica Brice ’22
Matthew Gancayo ’22
Ruth Schultz ’22*
Tyshaun Thomas
Ethan Luk ’24*
Production Team
Set Designer: Ricky Feig 22*
Costume Designer: Keating Debelak
Lighting Designer: Ricky Feig 22*
Sound Designer: Minjae Kim
Stage Manager: Alexis Maze ’23*
Assistant Stage Manager: Elliot Lee 23*
Run Crew: Jenni Lawson 23*
Guest consultant: Natasha Shatzkin
Rigger: Matt Pilsner
*denotes a certificate student in the Program in Theater
Faculty Advisors
Tess James, Lighting advisor
Darryl Waskow, Logistical advisor
Note from the Student Thesis Proposers
Welcome to Take Care, an original contemporary circus show created over the course of this school year. Circus is my first and greatest love, and I’m honored to have brought this show to fruition with the best community of collaborators I could have asked for.
This show was shaped by a wide array of art, scholarship, stories, and people. You can find a list of project sources here, and listen here to the playlist of songs that we use in this show.
Thank you to Shekinah, Matt, Eliyana, Tyshaun, Jessica, and Ethan for believing in this project and making it your own. Thank you to Alexis, Ricky, Minjae, Elliot, and Jenni, without whom we would be lost at sea. Thank you to Hugo the octopus board-op and his crocheted sweater. Thank you to everyone at the theater program for letting me run with this unusual proposal, and for helping to navigate the frankly bananas bureaucracy of this process. Thank you to Natasha for coming all this way to help, and for being a long-distance logistics coordinator and dramaturg. Thank you to Maggie for being my best friend. Thank you to everyone who’s taught me circus and the spirit of stone soup. Thank you to my family for holding me from underneath.
Love,
Ruth
When I joined Ruth on this project I didn’t quite know what to expect. All I knew was Ruth’s contagious excitement to create and collaborate with others. Working on Take Care was a truly unique experience as a designer. Never before have I been able to participate so much in rehearsal and help shape the direction of a show from such an early state.
Thank you to the all the cast for trusting me and welcoming me into rehearsals. Thank you to Minjae, Alexis, Elliot, and Jenni for putting up with my many light cues. Thanks to Tess for advising my lighting and my crocheting. Thank you to Hugo (the octopus) and Rachel (the radiant sensor) for keeping me company through long days of rehearsals. Thank you to Ruth for bringing me into the project. And thank you to my love Juliana for supporting me through everything.
Love,
Ricky
Land Acknowledgement
An estimated 10 million Native Americans lived in North America before the arrival of European colonizers. Many thousands lived in Lenapehoking, the vast homeland of the Lenni-Lenape, who were the first inhabitants of what is now called eastern Pennsylvania and parts of New York, New Jersey, Maryland, and Delaware.
Princeton stands on part of the ancient homeland and traditional territory of the Lenape people. In 1756, the College of New Jersey erected Nassau Hall with no recorded consultation with the Lenni-Lenape peoples.
Treaties and forced relocation dispersed Lenape-Delaware to Ohio, Kansas, and Oklahoma. We acknowledge the violence of settler colonialism and pay respect to Lenape peoples past, present, and future and their continuing presence in the homeland and throughout the Lenape diaspora.
Current Princeton student activists and alumni are advocating for Indigenous students and studies at the University. For more information, see the websites of Natives at Princeton and Princeton Indigenous Advocacy Coalition.
Lewis Center for the Arts
Interim Chair: Michael Cadden
Executive Director: Marion Friedman Young
Director of Program in Theater: Jane Cox
Producing Artistic Director, Theater And Music Theater Season: Elena Araoz
View a full list of the Program in Theater Faculty & Guest Artists
For a look at all the people working behind the scenes to bring you this event, View a full list of LCA staff members »
