The Milly Project & Arabian Nights
May 3, 2019
7:30 P.M.
Willard High School Choir Room & Theater
Two concurrent performances will begin at 7:30PM and at 8:15PM and includes an essential talkback at the end of the two performances. The performance is 30 minutes long and the Q&A/Talkback will last approximately 20 minutes. A ticket to see both shows is $6 per person.
Please purchase your tickets online at willard.booktix.com.
The Milly Project is a newly unveiled true account of an enslaved woman in Springfield rightfully gaining her freedom over a decade before the Dred Scott case. The yellowed handwritten court manuscript remained shelved and boxed until a Springfield archivist freed Milly Sawyers again. Archivist Connie Yen and reporter (Jack) Giacomo Bologna have now unleashed this piece of history and we feel obliged and honored to enter the life of a woman who was diligent and bold enough to proclaim and imagine freedom and inalienable rights.
The gift of story is claimed again and again by Shahrazad, but will she be able to stay the King? Her life depends on it. This newly wed queen weaves a new tale each night, and if she wishes to see another day, her story must sustain King Shahrayer who has grown accustomed to sentencing death on the morning of each new bride’s dawning. And yet the Visier’s daughter volunteered for this honor. The dazzling tales are humorous, full of whim and imagination and just clever and outrageous enough to tantalize and create uproarious guffaws. Perhaps this story will serve as a gift to defame the uprising of prejudice and fear of the other or those who live a different life, the stranger.
