New Impact Factory Residents bring creativity, disruptive storytelling to the Dallas theater scene
Updated: May 4
The Impact Factory is proud to announce its newest Resident: Claire Greenberg. Greenberg's project within the incubator is the Watering Hole Collective, a nonprofit theater company with a mission to create boundary-breaking and socially conscious art while ensuring that all their actors and crew members are paid a living wage. Their first production is Spring Awakening and will be performed at Arts Mission Oak Cliff in July 2023.
Based on Frank Wedekind's groundbreaking and controversial play, Spring Awakening is a story of sexual awakening, youthful rebellion, and self-discovery. However, this production of Spring Awakening is unlike versions seen before. The team's mission for this project is to use the musical as a tool to teach both kids and adults about the importance of sex education and mental health for teens. The team hopes to show that all of the tragedies depicted in the play are avoidable through robust education and guidance.
Co-directed by Greenberg and Mac Welch, this fully staged and reimagined production will include a team of 13 actors, a lighting designer, a sound designer, a movement/intimacy director, and a costume designer. The production will also feature high school students both in the cast and on the production team, as the team believes a story about high-school-aged kids is obligated to represent those kids in the rehearsal room and on the stage.
Unlike other productions of Spring Awakening, the team intends to avoid depicting the adults as comedic and instead will show that they are culpable for the misinformation and misunderstandings the teens in the show have regarding sex education. The team plans to make it clear that all of the choices of the children are being directly fueled by how they have been influenced by the adults in their lives. "Violence breeds violence, bullying breeds bullying, and sexual ignorance leads to uninformed behavior" is the message that the team hopes to convey.
Overall, the goal is to leave audiences determined to provide teens with the resources they need to live healthy lives. Greenberg will be working with her Impact Factory mentor, Laura Payne, to develop the Watering Hole Collective.
More information about the Watering Hole Collective can be found here.
Watering Hole Collective will be hosting a fundraiser at The Wild Detectives on April 4th from 5p-7p. Details can be found below.
