Fabulous Females Fly Into November With Color My Wings
Illinois Youth Center playwrights are busy creating scenes and songs for the new musical Color My Wings. The original play, based on the writers’ personal lives, tells the story of a girl who feels like a colorless butterfly after a family member sexually abused her. Tatiana must learn to connect her emotional shutdown, subsequent substance abuse, and contact with the law to her traumatic experience. If she can let go of her guilty secret, Tati can take a personal and artistic risk and once again display her brilliant colors.
Clubs, guilds and civic organizations are already booking blocks of 20 seats or more for this exciting new musical on two special performance days: November 19 and 20, 2008 at 10:30A. Following the performance, the audience will join the Fabulous Females for a catered lunch and the unique opportunity to discuss what they have just seen with the young playwrights and performers.
Guests who attended the November 2007 performances of BELIEVE ME made a profound impact on Fabulous Females participants. “I really didn’t think they would care about us. But I was wrong,” one girl said as she summed up the thoughts of the others. “Those folks were alright. I really liked them and they seemed to like me. I didn’t expect that.”
Audiences at Slippin’ Out My Suitcase, the collection of stories on which Color My Wings is based, shared their thoughts with us:
The girls were fantastic! You could feel the positive energy in the room. This is so wonderful for their self-confidence. What talent!
These were powerful, honest stories from the heart. I have never heard a first hand tornado survivor story. Great songs!
I loved the songs- you all shared so much joy with us. And in the stories, you shared your bravery and your pain and all those things inside of you. They make you who you are and you are wonderful.
All performances take place at IYC, 30W200 Ferry Road, Warrenville, IL 60555. Admission for the performance and lunch is $30 per person. Reservations are required; to do so, contact Nancy McCarty, Executive Director, Music Theatre Workshop, and (773) 973-7266.
MTW and the Fabulous Females program receive support from the Chicago Foundation for Women, Daniel M. Kaufherr Charitable Trust, Grand Victoria Foundation, Girls’ Best Friend Foundation, Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, Michael Reese Health Trust and Richard H. Driehaus Foundation.
Stephanie Fulkerson, Rosa Smith and Aremy Santos, former Fabulous Females at a conference hosted by MTW collaborator Health and Medicine Policy Research Group and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services/Office on Women’s Health, Region V on April 10, 2008. The conference, which focused on reclaiming the health of court-involved girls, was attended by state and local juvenile justice administrators, facility health and mental health directors and supervisors, mid- and senior- level program staff, and county judges. The “MTW Still Fabulous Ensemble” performed excerpts from several MTW original musicals at the conference luncheon.