NANCY: I tell you I’ve been honing my foresight over the past few months, ever since my husband’s inauguration, and it’s getting stronger every day.
—Timothy David Rey, from ZIP!

Come to Zip! presented by Poetry Foundation. This timely play will share space you need to be that election week. Ayako choreographed two dance scenes performed by Wannapa Pimtong Eubanks & Anniela Hubidoro for this staged reading.

Secure your free admission spot at Eventbrite for Thursday, November 7, 6-7:30 pm; Talk Back: 7:30-8 pm

Written by Chicago poet Timothy David Rey, Zip! is a prophetic and ghostly timewarped drama about Nancy Reagan’s fervor for astrology, interlaced with a Black gay love story, set on the eve of the AIDS epidemic and the Reagan assassination attempt. The play runs approximately 90 minutes with no intermission.

Zip! is a 2023 semi-finalist for the Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference. Further development occurred during the author’s time as a 2022 fellow in the playwriting cohort of the Lambda Literary Writers Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ+ Writers-Faculty Advisor, Jewelle Gomez. Zip! was given its second table-read as part of the 2021 End Of Play Program (hosted by the Dramatist Guild of America/ The 24 Hour Plays NYC).

Some of Rey’s other plays include White/House (Finalist, eta New Play Initiative, 2020), Gloria, The (Almost) Last Picture Show, and The Monologue Play: An Ongoing Work Exploring Race, Sex, Identity...And The American Myth (‘22,‘23 Changing Worlds/ Arts Work Fund Award Recipient).

Director: Roger Ellis

Cast: David Goodloe, Caren Skibell, Stephen Glaspie, Wannapa Pimtong Eubanks, Anniela Hubidoro, Donovan Session, and Saleem Hue Penny.

Production Team: Opening Graphic-Rob Riutta/ Ross Parsons, Choreography-Ayako Kato, Props-Julie Williams, Sound-Ayme Frye.