Plot Threads Tangle in The Antipodes

FRIDAY, NOV. 19 - 20

If you're interested in getting the story straight, Annie Baker's The Antipodes is probably not the play for you.

Over the past decade, Baker has built a reputation as one of today's most provocative playwrights, with scripts that both challenge and reward. Although her works have at times polarized audiences, the long list of awards she's garnered in her young career (including the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for 2014's The Flick) would indicate her creative risk-taking generally pays off. The Antipodes, which premiered in 2017, followed that same precedent.

Set in an unspecified place at an unspecified time, the entirety of The Antipodes takes the form of a massive brainstorming session between nine characters around a conference room table. The ultimate aim of this conversation? That's never clarified either, but that's beside the point. The point is to examine the story as both transactional and transcendent, real and abstract, ordinary and absurd — and its value as a uniquely human device. 

The Antipodes will finish a four-show run this weekend as part of the Dramashop Staged Reading Series, helmed by director Zachery Hoffman. Reciting lines will be Michael Weiss, Jade Mitchell, Jennifer Maloney Puz, Nick Warren, Michael Wachter, Marshall Mack, Justin Karns, Benjamin Snyder, and Eli Coppock. 

Come with a mask and an open mind as you soak in this sensational script.

Friday and Saturday, 8 p.m. // Dramashop, 1001 State St., Suite #201 (Renaissance Building) // Pay what you can // dramashop.org/the-antipodes