←Recommendations of The Volunteer

A powerful look at what we're willing to do for survival, even if it means sacrifice. Well done.

A chilling parable/"what if?" that so thoroughly explores the tendency towards dehumanizing one's enemies in exchange for survival and perpetuation of self-interest. Through her alternate reality, Rose effectively captures the fears and questions raised during the Cold War. The structure of the "guest lectures" gives a unique and theatrical framing to the piece without at all being didactic or obvious. On the contrary--this piece is subtle and full of humanity and nuance!

I had the opportunity to see a reading of THE VOLUNTEER at Stage Left Theatre in Chicago, and I was captivated by the dual sides of this story: the brain and the heart. What starts off as a thought experiment becomes a very emotional and humbling experience for everyone involved. This is an incredible play with certainty and a purpose of vision by the playwright that I would love to see in a full production.

THE VOLUNTEER is a fascinating examination of an oft overlooked, yet mortally relevant topic: U.S. nuclear policy. This alternate history offers an iconoclastic take on our understanding of the Cold War, taking the abstractions and institutions that define the United States' approach to nuclear warfare and challenging the audience to imagine it as a deeply personal and relational decision. With humor and heartache, this excellent play explores the past, present, and future dangers of the atomic bomb, asking all of us to consider what human cost we're willing to pay for security.

Rose has crafted an endlessly fascinating story out of a dangerous hypothetical. THE VOLUNTEER makes excellent use of theatrical conventions to persuade the audience to follow along. With great opportunities for inclusive casting, and Rose's trademark excellent dialogue, I would recommend THE VOLUNTEER to any company brave enough to face the play's many questions.

This play surprises you all along the way. It is funny till it's not. It is absurd until reality hits. It is way out there until it's grounded. Do yourself a favor, sit down with this play and go on a unique ride of your life that theatricalizes a thought that one man had to prevent nuclear war into a bloody theatrical reality.

This play presents a real-life hypothetical solution to the apocalyptic cloud of impulsiveness which all of us live under today. Though The Volunteer is about the potentiality and inhumanity of nuclear war, it also manages to be funny, moving and theatrical while avoiding being cumbersome or necessarily costly, making it ideal for smaller venues who want to do new, innovative work. Propelling the surprising (and even sometimes gruesome) plot twists, choice roles for actors and clean, often funny dialogue is a guiding urgency which the audience will take home. It's important. Don't just read it. Produce it.

I have had the pleasure of hearing two readings of this play; the first at Chicago Dramatists as part of the First Draft Reading Series and the second at Prop Thtr in Chicago. Both drafts made me catch my breath. Cassandra Rose deftly humanizes institutions and processes that are historically sterile and opaque to civilians like myself: the Pentagon, the Secret Service, and specifically "the biscuit" of nuclear war. Cassandra's heart-breaking characters make a play about the threat of nuclear war a play ultimately a play about hope and the importance of honoring our collective humanity while we still can.

Heard this as part of a Chicago reading series, and Cassandra builds an alternate reality I would both love to live in, and would also be immediately terrified of. The choices made around nuclear war become deeply personal in an intense and hilarious examination of what happens when killing becomes less a theory, and more a practice.

I had the good fortune of listening to this at its first public reading, and I could not more highly recommend it. The deep connection to all of the characters is one of its biggest strengths. There is a sense of urgency, fear, chaos, and at the same time, important interpersonal relationships that knit it all together into an excellent excerise in morality. The monologues are superb, the subject matter is well researched, and it's a damn fine work of art.