I-95 South

By Kate Marks

Production History:
-Staged Reading in the New Plays Festival at Brown University; February 2001

-Workshop Production at The American Living Room Series, HERE Arts Center; August 2006

Synopsis:
Can we choose our identity? Can we define someone else’s? How do the heroes of pop culture shape who we want to be? This is the crisis of one bi-racial American family depicted in I-95 South.

Born into a legacy of Elvis impersonators, Cell longs to continue her family tradition and play the King. However, her father has been grooming her to join his act as Priscilla, Elvis’ young wife. Desperate to escape her family and the role she will be forced to play, Cell runs away. Her adventures take her on a path that cuts through both a fantastical American landscape and the hidden corners of Cell’s own house. She travels into the very cabinets in the kitchen and between the cushions of the couch. I-95 South is the story of Cell’s journey towards owning and expanding the boundaries of her silver-studded and lip-curling identity.

A dazzling script of a most original texture
-Nilo Cruz, Pulitzer Prize Winner