Theatre Arts student, Reilly Milton, has been chosen to represent Sonoma State in the Council for Public Liberal Arts Colleges (COPLAC) Undergraduate Research,Scholarly, and Creative Activity (URSCA) program:
Student Researcher: Reilly Milton
Faculty Mentor: Professor Scott Horstein
Title: “Biraciality on the American Stage”
This project will be presented at the Midwest/West Regional Virtual URSCA Conference, and the live event will be held on Saturday, November 14th, 2020. SSU students participating in this event have been working hard to video record their presentations.
"In the Fall of 2019 the show “Origin Story” was put on my Sonoma State Theatre Arts and Dance Department. “Origin Story” was written by Nathan Alan Davis and was directed by Delicia Turner Sonnenberg. The play Origin Story is about a young woman named Margaret and her experiences of being biracial and her journey to self acceptance. The playwright describes the character Margaret and “ethnically ambiguous” refusing to label her as a specific race. She is an adopter and in her twenties who isn't entirely sure of who she is or where she comes from. Margaret is a hard working individual by day she works at the Services Cooperation alongside her spunky friend Val and at night she works at the local burger joint The Burg with her comical friend Bobby. A new love interest arises at the Services cooperation when Anita shows up. At the Burg the play is thrown for a loop when the audience is introduced to Roxanne, a drive thru regular, who also claims she is Margarets biological mother who she never knew. While Margaret’s internal struggles manifest, Anita ends up seducing Maragret who encourages it, but Anita also urges Margaret to take control of her life. Margarets crisis grows even more once the audience meets Gary the “annoying” copy machine guy who admits he is her biological father. In the final scene of the play all the characters of the show are gathered around a pond. Each person steps forward to confess their feelings on life and what they have decided to do moving forward. Margaret is influenced by all of these confessionals and decides to leave behind her agony and questioning of who she is and accepts what she knows now. I decided to further this work deeper by analyzing why it is important to have characters like Margaret to progress theatre forward. My work I have done helps to educate those who might not be familiar with the concept of biraciality."
-Reilly Milton