Event: Soderville:
Excavation of a Life
Playwright: Scott M. Rubsam
School: Metropolitan State University
Performance Dates: Tuesday Jan. 20 & Wednesday Jan. 21
Whether it’s a quarter life crisis, mid-life crisis, or simply a
mental breakdown, there comes a time when a person needs a good, old fashioned,
self-evaluation.
Soderville: Excavation of a Life is the story of actor Julie Dafydd, an
older woman who recalls growing up in a boy’s body, the wrong body. Playwright
Scott M. Rubsam constructed this one-woman show after 30 hours of interviews
with Dafydd.
The smell of homemade soup slowly fills the theater and Dafydd
takes us from growing up as a young boy in rural Soderville, Minnesota, to her
transgender surgery in Minneapolis.
Rubsam, who also directs the play, fills the script with witty
colloquialisms including, “I needed an epiphany…on the rocks” and “I almost
checked the ‘you-are-homosexual’ box with lipstick.”
Dafydd also recounts an impactful trip to the shoe store. Twelve-year-old
Dafydd wanted a pair of pointed white tennis-shoes, but her mother publicly
chastised her, stating that these were not fit for a boy, the beginning of the
end of their relationship.
Soderville is a story of self-discovery: transitioning from male
to female, rural to urban, and family-oriented to estranged. Yet, Dafydd tells
her story with ease, pride, honesty and wisdom.
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