Who is going to love ADA & THE ENGINE?
What’d you say, Steven?
I said I think anyone who loves theatre and
storytelling
will be at base.
Well, of course.
But I think that Lauren Gunderson, the playwright,
has a special place in her heart for nerds
who are science geeks like me, who love the
latest technology, the biggest breakthrough
from NASA.
Because even though she
She knows.
has a poetic license for this play and creative
love story, these characters are amazing science
giants that few people know about.
That’s very true.
I said progressive feminists,
Okay.
Excellent.
because I am one.
And there is one in the play.
And I play one in the play.
There’s two.
Yes, I think so.
Yeah.
And then I also said revisionist historians.
Big words.
And mathematic music lovers, because mathematics
and music go together.
This play would hopefully remind them that
history often forgets and/or wants to silence
the progression that women have been a part
of for centuries.
It’s kinda cool that it’s just now coming
back, I guess, because of social media and
people are looking back in the history books.
I mean, like ‘oh, actually that was a woman
who did this.’
And Lauren Gunderson is also incredible about
pulling those women out of history, making
sure that we know that these are the women
that are leading.
But I hope they go home with a reminder that
women are huge in pushing forward humankind.
Oh, if I were seeing this show, I would pull
out my cellphone the moment the house lights
came up, and I’d be Googling these characters.
Exactly!
Because they just make you wanna know who
they were, what they did.
It definitely changes their mind about history
and, honestly, invention and intelligence
and progression, because women were a huge
part of that.
Not just mothers and sisters, which are important
as well, but they were minds.
At the beginning of the computer revolution!
At the beginning!
It was a woman!
Yes!
The challenge of bringing this piece to life
is honestly just maintaining the balance between
the extreme theatricality of it, which is
really cool, but also grounding it in just
human experience, especially for the women
of this time.
Because there’s a lot of scenes with letters
and time jumps, and a lot of stuff that happens
with the actual numbers and binary code.
But also just making sure that these were
characters that since because these were humans
in history, making sure that we see and show
the audience the humanism of this play.
Theatre by its nature takes a lot of imaginative
leaps.
The imagination requires not just the actors,
but the audience, is both the challenge but
also the great joy of theatre.
It does things that film simply cannot do.
This is a really exceptional play in that
way.
We take a journey through time and space in
this way.
It's gonna be so much fun.
Come see it.
Come see Steven and I act together again for
the third time this year!
Yeah!
