Daughter of Venus

by Howard Zinn Directed by Jeff Zinn
Thursday - Sunday, May 27-June 26
curtain: 8pm - Tickets: $17-$34

Our 2010 season opens with Howard Zinn's Daughter of Venus. A searing family drama set against the backdrop of a world where governments gamble with mutual annihilation. Zinn reminds us that sometimes the small choices we make have vast repercussions on our world and on the people we love.

Listen to "All Things Happening" - WCAI's Alex Crowley interviews Jeff Zinn (click here)

Boston Globe: Family connections, divisions in Zinn's 'Venus' by Louise Kennedy
"Jeff Zinn, the artistic director of Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater, has found a movingly appropriate way to honor the memory of his father, Howard Zinn: by giving the late author-activist-scholar's play "Daughter of Venus" a production that makes its many virtues shine...

In Jeff Zinn's fluid, naturalistic staging at WHAT (on an evocatively academic-homey set by Ji-Youn Chang), the play comes across as a quick-witted and emotionally complex study of a family, and a world, in crisis. For admirers of Howard Zinn's passionate politics, and indeed for anyone interested in art that engages with the political world, it's worth the trip to Wellfleet." Read full review

Provincetown Banner/Cape Codder Newspaper: 'Venus,' at Wellfleet Harbor Actor's Theater, offers glimpse into Howard Zinn's genius by Reva Blau

"Even for those of us who barely knew great historian Howard Zinn it was hard to hold back from weeping at the curtain call for "Daughter of Venus." The production seems a fitting celebration of the man who became well known in the world and in Wellfleet, in that order.

Zinn wrote this play about a family in pain, while the arms race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union escalates in the backdrop, more than 20 years ago. The play has been produced twice before, most recently in Boston where the director shifted the play to contemporary times. Now in the hands of his son, Jeff Zinn, artistic director at the Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater, it has come home in a moving, heartfelt and lasting production." Read full review

Cape Cod Chronicle: "Morality And Politics Collide" by Ellen Petry Whalen
"... a powerful, thought-provoking family drama, whose social, moral and political implications are far-reaching and timeless... its broad, moral theme, of doing the right thing in the face of trying family and international circumstances, touches us all... Poornima Kirby leads the flawless acting and palpable tension between family members with her natural presence on stage as the moral compass. " (Read full review)

Barnstable Patriot Review: - "Daughter of Venus radiant on Wellfleet stage" by John Watters
"Family dynamics are always complex. Youth always questions its elders. Mores are sometimes challenged whether you're young and old... Zinn, a Boston University history professor and author, passed away this past winter. The world-renowned political activist was best known for his A People's History of the United States, a work viewing the nation through the eyes of the oppressed that directly challenged previous texts. In Daughter of Venus, one of the three plays he penned, Zinn once again challenges the viewer to see a family from many different angles.

Jeff Zinn, the artistic director of WHAT, first directed his father's play in its world premiere back in the 1980s. With his father's passing, he felt that a revival would be a fitting tribute to his politically polarizing dad. The play has worn well over the 20-year gap and its insight into family dynamics rings true today as it did near the end of the Cold War era... As an accomplished director with more than 150 productions under his belt, the young Zinn is wading in water quite familiar to him. His affection and admiration for his father's life's work and dreams means that maybe he alone can give just the right spin to this show..." Read full review

Cape Cod Times Review by Debbie Forman:
"It's the age-old battle between the generations, of idealism vs. reality, of expectations of peace on earth and the hard fact that war seems to be ingrained in the nature of mankind.

But in Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater production of "Daughter of Venus," the generations have come together with Jeff Zinn directing the play written by his father, Howard Zinn, a Boston University history professor known for his antiwar activism who died earlier this year...

Poornima Kirby gives a vibrant performance as the rebellious Aramintha. You may delight in her childlike innocence and her sometimes astute arguments at the same time you are inclined to shake her for her reckless behavior..." Read full review.

Cast:
Aramintha Matteotti - Poornima Kirby
Jamie Matteotti - Alex Pollock
Lucy Hamilton Matteotti - Elizabeth Atkeson
John Lendl - Stephen Russell

Staff:
Stage Manager - Maureen Lane
Set Design - Ji-youn Chang
Lighting Design - John Malinowski
Costume Design - Carol Sherry
Sound Design - Jess Bauer
Assistant Director - David Fraioli
Dramaturg - Dan Lombardo
Casting - Norman Meranus
Production Manager - Ted Vitale

To view more production photos click on images below or here

Poornima Kirby, Alex Pollock

Elizabeth Atkeson, Richard McElvain

Stephen Russell, Richard McElvain

Writing historical and political works, I could introduce to my readers ideas and facts that might provoke them to examine anew the world around them, and decide to join the fray. Writing plays would zoom in on a few characters, and by getting the viewers to identify with them emotionally, move the audience in a visceral way, something not easily achievable in prosaic works of history and political philosophy.

A play, like any other form of artistic expression (novels, poetry, music, painting), has the possibility of transcendence. It can, by an imaginative reconstruction of reality, transcend the conventional wisdom, transcend orthodoxy, transcend the word of the establishment, escape what is handed down by our culture, challenge the boundaries of race, class, religion, nation. Art dares to start from scratch, from the core of human need, from feelings that are not represented in what we call reality. The French rebels of 1968 posted a slogan: "Soyez realiste. Demandez l'impossible" ("Be realistic. Demand the impossible."). Centuries earlier Pascal said: "The heart has its reasons, which reason cannot know."