Review Fix chats with playwright Eric Micha Holmes (Mondo Tragic with The National Black Theatre), who discusses his newest product, Falls For Jodie.
About the Production:
The Tank NYC (Artistic Director’s Meghan Finn and Johnny G. Lloyd) have announced the full cast and design team for their New York Premiere of Falls for Jodie by Eric Micha Holmes (Mondo Tragic with The National Black Theatre), directed by Terrence I Mosley (Clubbed Thumb New Play Directing Fellow) at The Tank (312 W 36th St., New York, NY 10018), September 24-October 18.
1980. New Haven, Connecticut — Four months before he will attempt to assassinate President Ronald Reagan, John Hinckley Jr. moves into the Colony Inn with a simple plan to make Jodie Foster his girlfriend. In his first night at the hotel, John meets Eddie, the night concierge, where they discover a shared dilemma: both are in love with Yalies who don’t know they exist.
When Eddie offers to connect John to Jodie in exchange for an investment, their business partnership blossoms into an unexpected friendship, revealing a growing crisis neither recognizes in the other… Falls For Jodie, a dark comedy by Eric Micha Holmes, dares to ask: “How can the pursuit of love escalate to a national tragedy”?
The cast will feature Boone Sommers (Grooming My Ass at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival) and Harry Thornton (Poker Face on Peacock) with Set Design by Chen-Wei Liao (A Girl Is A Half-Formed Thing with the Irish Rep, New York Times Critics Pick), Lighting & Projection Design by Gavin Strawnato (Faggy Faafi Cairo Boy with National Queer Theatre), Costume Design by Rodri Hernandez Martinez (Pepper Slit: Live in Her Living Room at East Village Basement) Sound Design by Padra Crisafulli (Swallows at La MaMa), and Props Design by Cailey Harwood (Beaches on Broadway) with Composer Hillary Bonhomme, Graphic Designer Reed Gulden, and Associate Producer Caroline Pastilha.
Performances will take place on:
Thursday, September 24 at 7pm
Friday, September 25 at 7pm
Saturday, September 26 at 7pm
Monday, September 28 at 7pm
Thursday, October 1 at 7pm
Friday, October 2 at 7pm
Saturday, October 3 at 7pm
Monday, October 5 at 7pm
Thursday, October 8 at 7pm
Friday, October 9 at 7pm
Saturday, October 10 at 7pm
Wednesday, October 14 at 7pm
Thursday, October 15 at 7pm
Friday, October 16 at 7pm
Saturday, October 17 at 7pm
Sunday, October 18 at 3pm
Tickets ($28-$53) are available for advance purchase at https://thetanknyc.org/calendar-1/fallsforjodie. The performance will run approximately 90 minutes, with no intermission.
Review Fix: What inspired you to write this play?
Eric Micha Holmes: I saw John Hinckley Jr.’s mugshot which triggered two thoughts at the same time. “I know this guy.” “I could never know this guy.” As I read more about his obsession with Jodie Foster, and his attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan, he inspired something I keep coming back to in my work: the way reality and perception clash and revise each other.
I’m drawn to characters whose fantasies are so powerful that they change the truth, and the truth responds by changing the fantasy. John has an idea about Jodie Foster that lives in his head. Eddie, John’s business partner in the play, forms an idea about John that lives in his. And this triangle of projections breaks and renews itself every time they’re forced to confront an inconvenient or horrifying truth.
I was also inspired by the artistic exercise. By writing a 2-hander set in a hotel room, I challenged myself to pursue a derivative genre of theatre, and to do so with honesty and sincerity, by coloring within the lines of its conventions, which are stranger than they first appear.
Review Fix: What was the research process like?
Holmes: Most of my research was lived. The play draws heavily from my 20’s when I was a concierge at a hotel in New York. The character Eddie is a composite of people I knew from that world, and the parts of myself that hustled for tips and recognition. The job dropped me into the middle of people’s intimate lives. I bought their condoms, distracted paparazzi, arranged dates for extramarital affairs, and served guests in all kinds of strange and vulnerable situations that were held together by a spontaneous, one-directional, and weirdly resilient bond between client and service worker. I could not have written this play without that day job.
Review Fix: When do you feel like you hit the sweet spot?
Holmes: When I write, I’m looking for the exact moment when things could’ve gone differently, when the wave might’ve broke another way. It’s the smallest gestures that matter. Like, if this character wore a different color scarf…if that character said “and” instead of “but”… if they both drove North instead of Northwest…maybe a catastrophe could’ve been prevented. In “Falls for Jodie,” that moment happens in the final scene of the play.
Review Fix: Who do you think will enjoy this production the most?
Holmes: I want to say “everyone,” but not everyone would enjoy a play with stalking, mental illness, racial slurs, and gun violence among its content warnings. If you just read that sentence and thought “That could still be a fun night at the theatre,” then you might enjoy this production.
Review Fix: Who do you think is the unsung hero of this production?
Holmes: Caroline Pasthila, our Associate Producer. Her tenacity, organization, and talent elevated our production immeasurably. If anyone reading this is thinking about a career in the theatre, I urge you to seriously consider producing at least once. As major houses reduce their seasons, (if not closing their doors entirely), the community needs industrious and organized producers to usher in the next movement in American theatre if it’s going to survive.
Review Fix: What did you learn about yourself through this entire process?
Holmes: I wrote “Falls for Jodie” 13 years ago, so I learned that it can take awhile for a play to find its time. The resistance to producing the play when I first tried to find a theater seems quaint now – the way many concerns from the Obama era seem quaint. But I think the community is ready for a play that asks us to enlarge our capacity to recognize a crisis before it erupts into violence.
Review Fix: What’s next?
Holmes: I’ve written a prequel to “Falls for Jodie” called “Jackets in May” inspired by the events that lead to the New Haven Black Panther Trials. It takes place 10 years before” Falls for Jodie.” Eddie is an off-stage, 15-year-old errand boy for the Panthers as they conduct a kangaroo trial of a young man they suspect is an informant. My goal is to see these two plays in rep together.
I’m also working on “Year of the Goat,” a play I wrote for Primary Stage’s Dorothy Strelsin New American Writers Group. That one’s about a star basketball player whose oracular tweet triggers a crisis between the U.S. and China.
Review Fix: What else would you like readers to know that we haven’t discussed?
Holmes: While Reagan’s shooting quickly turned into a national punchline, his press secretary, James Brady, was paralyzed. He pursued gun reform until he passed in 2014. America’s gun laws are notoriously inefficient, but some of the controls we do have come from the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act. The Brady Organization is still doing amazing work. Check them out and donate if you can.
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