Shaking The Tree Theatre
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    • ESCAPED ALONE
    • MADE TO DANCE IN BURNING BUILDINGS
    • _____ THE WOLF
    • SALT
    • MACBETH
    • THE CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE
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    • MISS JULIE
    • WE'RE ALL MAD HERE
    • HEAD . HANDS . FEET
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    • A DOLL'S HOUSE
    • PASSION PLAY
    • SUDDENLY LAST SUMMER
    • MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH
    • ONE FLEA SPARE
    • WILDE TALES
    • FAR AWAY
    • THE TRIPPING POINT
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  • SHOWS & EVENTS
    • NOTHING LEFT TO LOSE SUMMER FESTIVAL
    • DANCING ON THE SABBATH
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    • PERFORMANCE RESIDENCIES
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    • ACCOUNTABILITY
    • LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
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  • ARCHIVE
    • THE ANTIPODES
    • UBU AMERICA
    • THE BROTHER AND THE BIRD
    • WE WROTE THIS WITH YOU IN MIND
    • BLOOD WEDDING
    • IN A DIFFERENT REALITY SHE'S CLAWING AT THE WALLS
    • FORBIDDEN FRUIT
    • FUCKING A
    • MODELMINORITY
    • CHICK FIGHT
    • COMMUNITY IN CONVERSATION
    • FAMILY
    • 家 人 (JIA REN)
    • REFUGE
    • SHORT FLIX
    • BAKKHAI
    • ESCAPED ALONE
    • MADE TO DANCE IN BURNING BUILDINGS
    • _____ THE WOLF
    • SALT
    • MACBETH
    • THE CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE
    • COME TO THE TABLE
    • MISS JULIE
    • WE'RE ALL MAD HERE
    • HEAD . HANDS . FEET
    • ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE
    • A DOLL'S HOUSE
    • PASSION PLAY
    • SUDDENLY LAST SUMMER
    • MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH
    • ONE FLEA SPARE
    • WILDE TALES
    • FAR AWAY
    • THE TRIPPING POINT
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made to dance in burning buildings

By Anya Pearson

Directed by Jamie M. Rea
​Choreographed by Jeff George
February 15th - March 16th 2019

Tickets to our Thursday Preview (on 2/14) are half price
Shows run Thursday - Saturday Evenings at 7:30
and Sundays at 2pm

​*All our Sunday matinees are free to all low-income: patrons, communities of color, and survivors of sexual violence. You can reserve free Sunday matinee tix online through the "Book Tickets" link, or by calling the box-office.
Each Sunday show will be followed by a talk-back.
 
​Running time: 90 Minutes

What people are saying:

"Deeply powerful and poetic"
"Exquisite, powerful and uplifting"
"Profound, poignant, painful, powerful & rhapsodic with hope!"
"The choreography and dancing were nothing short of extraordinary"
"The most powerful expression of trauma I’ve ever seen. Courageous and intense, Made to Dance in Burning Buildings gives audiences a unique opportunity to witness precisely what it means to be a Survivor. To see this production is to see Us. Congratulations to Anya, cast, and crew, on an astonishing show."

"This is not a love poem." These words are repeated throughout Made to Dance in Burning Buildings, a dreamlike fusion of dance and theater written by Anya Pearson and directed by Jamie M. Rea. It's a fitting refrain. While there are moments of romance throughout the play, its focus is one black woman's story of surviving rape and battling PTSD." Bennett Campbell Fergudon, Willamette Week
​READ MORE HERE
​
"The use of an unspeaking dancer as the main character stands out as Pearson’s most promising innovation in performance, thanks in large part to Bates’ captivating presence. Two scenes stand out in my memory: a gentle duet by Bates and George, with flirtatious leaps giving way to a wrenching apart, and the final solo, in which Bates, her chest thrust forward and hand at her back, performs a stamping shuffle. It’s a dance that refuses to be diminished by fear." -Ben Waterhouse, Oregonlive
READ MORE HERE

Onstage, the slap of flesh as dancers hit the floor, rise, and pull each other through movement is a percussive counterpoint to the cadence of the characters’ spoken words." ~Fiona McCann, Portland Monthly
​READ MORE HERE
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Photos by Gary Norman

Cast

Dancers
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Amber Bates
​(Ava)
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Jeff George
​(First Love)
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Minon Minniewether (Ringleader)
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Malik Delgado (Sidekick Assassin 1)
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Ian McBride (Sidekick Assassin 2)
Actors
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Emily Hogan (Official Lady of Missing You)
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Tonea Lolin (Lady of Intoxicating Romance)
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Shani Harris-Bagwell (Lady of this Crippling Despair)
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Nicole Accuardi (Lady of this Uncertain Madness)
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Anya Pearson* (Lady of Utmost Perseverance)
*Member of Actors' Equity Association

Creative Team

Scenic & Costume Design: Jenny Ampersand
Lighting Design: Trevor Sargent
Stage Manager: Natasha Stockem
Assistant Stage Manager & Front of House Manager: Jennifer Wyant
Technical Director: Ted Gold
​Master Carpenter: Kyra Sanford
​Intern: McKensie Rummel
​
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​Made to Dance in Burning Buildings by Anya Pearson is a fusion of poetry, theatre, and violent and visceral contemporary dance, which poses the question: how do we heal from trauma?

It's about Ava, a young black woman, who is raped by her boyfriend's friends while he watches; she develops PTSD as a result. Metaphorically, she fractures into five different women who each represent a different facet of her personality (Romance, Despair, Madness, Perseverance, and Missing You). Poetically, these women narrate her journey through PTSD while she, her first love, and her abusers, explore through dance the trauma and the events leading up to it. 

Based on a true story, and inspired by the original choreopoem, Ntozake Shange's For Colored Girls, this play seeks to revolutionize the theatrical experience by combining poetry and breathtaking and gut-wrenching contemporary dance to tell an all too familiar story in a brand new way.  

For the play, Anya was the inaugural winner of the $10,000 Voice is a Muscle Grant from the Corporeal Voices Foundation which is run by best-selling author Lidia Yuknavitch. The grant recognized a writer of color from Oregon who demonstrates exemplary merit and a passion for social justice.
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Photo by Gary Norman

Made to Dance in Burning Buildings is generously supported by the Collins Foundation, and our season sponsors: Ronni Lacroute, Jessie Jonas & Ellyn Bye. Major support is also received for this year's season by AGE (Advanced Gender Equity in the Arts) 
We'd also like to thank members of Shaking the Tree's Board, as well as many other individual supporters. To support this show, or any others in our season, please click 
for more info.

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Shaking the Tree Theatre is located at 823 SE Grant St.
Portland, OR 97214

Oue main office is located at 2136 SE 8th Ave
Portland, OR 97214

For our theatre: Look for the Big Blue Warehouse on the corner od SE 9th and Grant and enter through the gate.
​For our main office: look for the beautiful mural on the corner of SE 8th and Grant. Entrance is on SE 8th.


Shaking the Tree receives major funding from:

 The James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation,  The Marie Lamfrom Charitable Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, The Rose and David Dortort Foundation, supporting organization of the California Community Foundation, The Benjamin Buckley Young Actors Fund of Oregon Community Foundation, The Jackson Foundation, The Ronald W. Naito Foundation,
Ronni Lacroute, Jessie Jonas, Ellyn Bye & Anonymous x2.

Shaking the Tree Theatre receives support from the Oregon Arts Commission, a state agency funded by the State of Oregon and the National Endowment for the Arts.
Shaking the Tree is supported by the Oregon Cultural Trust through the Multnomah County Cultural Coalition.

  • WELCOME
  • SHOWS & EVENTS
    • NOTHING LEFT TO LOSE SUMMER FESTIVAL
    • DANCING ON THE SABBATH
    • TICKETS
  • WORKSHOPS
  • RESIDENCIES
    • VISUAL ARTS RESIDENCIES
    • PERFORMANCE RESIDENCIES
  • DONATE
  • RENTALS
  • CONTACT
    • FIND US HERE
    • ACCESSIBILITY
    • WORK WITH US
  • ABOUT
    • WHO WE ARE
    • ACCOUNTABILITY
    • LAND ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
    • COVID POLICY
  • ARCHIVE
    • THE ANTIPODES
    • UBU AMERICA
    • THE BROTHER AND THE BIRD
    • WE WROTE THIS WITH YOU IN MIND
    • BLOOD WEDDING
    • IN A DIFFERENT REALITY SHE'S CLAWING AT THE WALLS
    • FORBIDDEN FRUIT
    • FUCKING A
    • MODELMINORITY
    • CHICK FIGHT
    • COMMUNITY IN CONVERSATION
    • FAMILY
    • 家 人 (JIA REN)
    • REFUGE
    • SHORT FLIX
    • BAKKHAI
    • ESCAPED ALONE
    • MADE TO DANCE IN BURNING BUILDINGS
    • _____ THE WOLF
    • SALT
    • MACBETH
    • THE CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE
    • COME TO THE TABLE
    • MISS JULIE
    • WE'RE ALL MAD HERE
    • HEAD . HANDS . FEET
    • ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE
    • A DOLL'S HOUSE
    • PASSION PLAY
    • SUDDENLY LAST SUMMER
    • MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH
    • ONE FLEA SPARE
    • WILDE TALES
    • FAR AWAY
    • THE TRIPPING POINT