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Celebrating our differences – the fractured bits and whole
Spring is a time of transitions, and Barbara Phillips of Mad Poet’s Ink is busy shaking the dust off her January production of Lost Marbles.
Barbara thinks of the new edition as a Tinker Bell production. She said, “I want to bring lightness, magic, warmth and mental wealth to those struggling in the mental health system as well as in our personal lives.”
Lost Marbles is based on a crisis of postpartum frailty in 1994, which catapulted Barbara into a psychiatric facility, and the subsequent year of survival.
“To put it bluntly, I got my head shrunk. My diagnostic identity was chameleon-like, adopting a few different medical name-tags, and carrying the usual social stigma. Sometimes the medical treatment felt as traumatic as the condition.”
Phillips was a mother with four children, all under the age of six and emotionally all over the map. She was hospitalized three times that year. “It really cranked up the crazy dial for everyone in our family.” In Lost Marbles, she explores that era and her personal brokenness, while attempting to inject grace, laughter and hope.
The play is a composite creation, a crazy quilt of prose and poetry, music and movement. Within the script are insights regarding Kermit the Frog, Emily Dickinson, Vincent van Gogh, and Oscar Wilde. Barbara sees all these wonderful enduring individuals as light posts of navigation, exhibiting beautiful traits of non-conformity in our society. There will even be a Beatles sing-a-long.
“Let’s celebrate all our differences, the fractured bits and whole.”
Please note: No psychiatrists have been injured during the making of this play.
Lost Marbles will be performed at The Stage Door on Saturday, June 10 at 7 p.m.
Tickets are $15 and will be available at the door as well as through EventBrite.
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