Will Work For is a fearless, farcical wake0up call.
It’s a rollercoaster ride through the dangers of today’s job market: dodging booby-trapped interviews, facing demons of employment past, and holding tight to a dream, while surviving the economic crash, told through storytelling, satire, a United-Nations’-gaggle of 21 characters and a clown!
The whirlwind journey of creating Will Work For all started from one little off-hand suggestion. Director, Tamilla Woodard invited me to read at an event by the Internationalists for World Theatre Day. Afterwards Tamilla suggested that I should write a solo show and I said, “I have no idea how to do that. I’ve never done that kind of thing before… Ok.” and so it began.
During my writing process, the nation’s economic crisis led to massive job losses of over 11 million people at its height and l became one of the long-term unemployed. The process of writing this piece while trying to survive was my way of coping with the struggle. The 2012 presidential campaign was also underway and my personal struggle became part of a heated national debate.
Throughout my research I came to understand the magnitude of how many people out there were going through the same thing and much worse. Now everyone says the economy is recovering and lawmakers don’t even pay lip service to the jobs crisis anymore. Hardly anyone is telling the story of the people behind the crisis. I was lucky to have fought my way back into the workforce while so many others have not.
Now my story can be their voice.
The show incorporates many different styles of performance and language, using different mechanisms to convey how each scene feels from the inside out.
Definitely one of the most fun aspects of the show are the clown scenes, which evolved from a dream I had of myself in a silent, black and white movie, as a Charlie Chaplin-esque figure begging for money on the subway in Times Square.
Through collaboration I’ve learned how to break the story open and carefully craft the unique way to express each part’s essential truth and let the story tell itself. I’ve learned that embracing other artists’ ideas only enhances the piece and makes it better. It’s definitely not all about me. It’s way bigger than me!
We’ve all been unemployed or had to look for a job at some point. I would like the audience to put themselves into a long-term unemployed person’s shoes and feel what it’s like to go through that struggle in today’s job market, not just understand the issue intellectually. I want them to think, “That could be me.”
If I can convince one person in the audience, that’s in a position to give someone a job, to give a long-term unemployed person a chance, then my work will be for a greater good. That would make it all, the good the bad and the ugly, worth it.
“Anyone who is willing to work and is serious about it will certainly find a job. Only you must not go to the man who tells you this, for he has no job to offer and doesn’t know anyone who knows of a vacancy. This is exactly the reason why he gives you such generous advice, out of brotherly love, and to demonstrate how little he knows the world.” B. Traven,Treasure of the Sierra Madre
Will Work For performs
Fri, July 11, 8:15pm, Sun, July 13, 6:30pm, Tues, July 15, 9:30pm, Wed, July 16, 6:45pm, Fri, July 18, 6:30pm
at Gearbox, 1021 7th St. NW, 3rd Floor, Washington, DC
Order online or call 866-811-4111.
— Dacyl Acevedo is an Actor and Writer residing in New York City. Recently, she finished production on featured roles in the upcoming independent short films, Los “Angeles” and Enemy Lines. She’s worked with prominent theater companies in New York, New Jersey and several DC area Theaters. She is a graduate of SUNY Purchase College.
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