Rachel Jendrzejewski

Rachel Jendrzejewski

Rachel Jendrzejewski (yen-shay-EFF-skee) is an experimental writer who frequently collaborates with choreographers, musicians, and visual artists to explore new interdisciplinary and performative vocabularies. Her work has been developed and/or presented by the Walker Art Center, Red Eye Theater, Public Functionary, In the Heart of the Beast, Padua Playwrights, Los Angeles Performance Practice, Tricklock...
Rachel Jendrzejewski (yen-shay-EFF-skee) is an experimental writer who frequently collaborates with choreographers, musicians, and visual artists to explore new interdisciplinary and performative vocabularies. Her work has been developed and/or presented by the Walker Art Center, Red Eye Theater, Public Functionary, In the Heart of the Beast, Padua Playwrights, Los Angeles Performance Practice, Tricklock Company, Joe’s Pub at The Public Theater, The Wild Project, Rhode Island School of Design, A.R.T., and ICA/Boston, among others. Published texts include ENCYCLOPEDIA (Spout Press), IN WHICH _______ AND OTHERS DISCOVER THE END (a collaboration with SuperGroup; Plays Inverse), AMBER (in the anthology I MIGHT BE THE PERSON YOU ARE TALKING TO: SHORT PLAYS FROM THE LOS ANGELES UNDERGROUND, Padua Playwrights), and--forthcoming in Fall 2023--MERONYMY (53rd State Press). She is a 2023-24 McKnight Fellow at Playwrights' Center; other honors include past Playwrights’ Center McKnight/Jerome Fellowships and three Core Writer terms; residencies at the University of Minnesota Institute for Advanced Study, Weisman Art Museum, MASS MoCA, and Everwood Farmstead; and grants from the Network of Ensemble Theaters, Dramatists Guild Foundation, PEN America, and Foundation for Contemporary Arts, among others. Rachel is a co-artistic director at Red Eye Theater in Minneapolis. MFA Playwriting, Brown University.

photo by matt regan

Plays

  • ENCYCLOPEDIA by Rachel Jendrzejewski
    Recommendations: 3
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    Cast: 
    2
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    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
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    Keyword: grief, caregiving + 8 more
    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
    Keyword: grief, caregiving, death, Surreal, coping, moon, poetry, music, women, labor
    Phases of the moon mark the passing of time for two inhabitants of a remote, dreamlike farm. Lua and Dal alternately support and dismantle their co–created reality as they navigate the magical swells of their daily routine. Encyclopedia explores the beauty and uncertainty of relational complexity — how we trust, how we grieve, how we teeter on the edge of an uncertain consensus, and how we ultimately have only...
    Phases of the moon mark the passing of time for two inhabitants of a remote, dreamlike farm. Lua and Dal alternately support and dismantle their co–created reality as they navigate the magical swells of their daily routine. Encyclopedia explores the beauty and uncertainty of relational complexity — how we trust, how we grieve, how we teeter on the edge of an uncertain consensus, and how we ultimately have only the thinness of our agreement with each other to construct and navigate reality. - Spout Press
  • PASSION by Rachel Jendrzejewski
    Cast: 
    10
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    Genre: experimental, movement/physical + 1 more
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    Keyword: feminism, transinclusive feminism + 8 more
    Genre: experimental, movement/physical, political
    Keyword: feminism, transinclusive feminism, gender, emotions, crying, Joan of Arc, Politics, climate change, charisma, women
    PASSION is a new performance exploring the space that our desire and longing inhabit while rehearsing perseverance. Responding to Carl Theodor Dreyer’s iconic silent film THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC, Rachel Jendrzejewski and Zoe Aja Moore collaborate to create an embodied investigation of the fraught relationship between gender and emotion, from Joan of Arc’s day to current political moments. Commissioned by Los...
    PASSION is a new performance exploring the space that our desire and longing inhabit while rehearsing perseverance. Responding to Carl Theodor Dreyer’s iconic silent film THE PASSION OF JOAN OF ARC, Rachel Jendrzejewski and Zoe Aja Moore collaborate to create an embodied investigation of the fraught relationship between gender and emotion, from Joan of Arc’s day to current political moments. Commissioned by Los Angeles Performance Practice and currently in development with CalArts Center for New Performance.
  • MEMORY LAWS by Rachel Jendrzejewski
    Recommendations: 1
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    Cast: 
    4
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    Genre: biography, experimental + 2 more
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    Keyword: Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Paderewski + 4 more
    Genre: biography, experimental, opera, political
    Keyword: Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Paderewski, Poland, nationalism, memory, collective memory
    An experimental rock opera on the life of Polish composer and statesman Ignacy Jan Paderewski, filtered through the lenses of 81 women. Commissioned by the Adam Mickiewicz Institute in Warsaw; developed in collaboration development with director Emily Mendelsohn, composers Chris Hepola and Jenna Wyse, and Tricklock Company.
  • Early Morning Song by Rachel Jendrzejewski
    Cast: 
    6
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    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
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    Keyword: climate change, science + 4 more
    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
    Keyword: climate change, science, women in science, trees, mortality, legacy
    Early Morning Song explores issues of mortality, legacy, and climate change. The piece revolves around an obscure woman scientist who is engaged in the impossible task of archiving her entire life, despite her knowledge that our planet likely will not be habitable by human beings much longer. The central figure is performed by six women; and the script is deliberately spacious, toward leaving ample room for the...
    Early Morning Song explores issues of mortality, legacy, and climate change. The piece revolves around an obscure woman scientist who is engaged in the impossible task of archiving her entire life, despite her knowledge that our planet likely will not be habitable by human beings much longer. The central figure is performed by six women; and the script is deliberately spacious, toward leaving ample room for the contributions of each creative team that brings it to life.

    This piece was conceived and developed in collaboration with Red Eye Theater, with support from the NEA and Playwrights' Center. Read more about the development process: http://redeyetheater.tumblr.com
  • MERONYMY by Rachel Jendrzejewski
    Cast: 
    5
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    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
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    Keyword: memory, technology + 3 more
    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
    Keyword: memory, technology, labor, internet, mortality
    What happens when ancient mnemonic devices collide with hyperspeed technology? What structures and transactions of thinking are innate to being human–and which ones are we rapidly exporting? MERONYMY is a kaleidoscopic portrait of memory in the Information Age.

    This play was originally developed through an experimental collaboration with installation artists Megan and Murray McMillan, composer...
    What happens when ancient mnemonic devices collide with hyperspeed technology? What structures and transactions of thinking are innate to being human–and which ones are we rapidly exporting? MERONYMY is a kaleidoscopic portrait of memory in the Information Age.

    This play was originally developed through an experimental collaboration with installation artists Megan and Murray McMillan, composer Peter Bussigel, and five actors from the Brown/Trinity Consortium. MERONYMY is the text that emerged and continues to be re-imagined for different performative contexts. Megan and Murray’s large-scale installation and subsequent works reflecting on the collaborative process (a single-channel video, site-specific video installation, and series of photographs) have continued life under the title THE REMAINS OF SOMETHING WHOLE.

    A publication of MERONYMY, with an introduction by Murphy Chang, is forthcoming from 53rd State Press in Fall 2023!
  • Amber by Rachel Jendrzejewski
    Recommendations: 1
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    Cast: 
    2
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    Genre: experimental, movement/physical + 1 more
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    Keyword: bees, climate change + 3 more
    Genre: experimental, movement/physical, political
    Keyword: bees, climate change, philosophy, music, women
    Amber is 1/3 of THE HIVE PROJECT, which brings music and performance to bear on three short poetic dramas that straddle the boundaries between humans and bees. Engaging with philosophical issues linked to the long and rich history of human-bee interactions, these plays seek to shed light on those habits of thought that prevent us from responding adequately to the interlocking environmental crises of our time,...
    Amber is 1/3 of THE HIVE PROJECT, which brings music and performance to bear on three short poetic dramas that straddle the boundaries between humans and bees. Engaging with philosophical issues linked to the long and rich history of human-bee interactions, these plays seek to shed light on those habits of thought that prevent us from responding adequately to the interlocking environmental crises of our time, such as the “hive-collapse” syndrome decimating bee populations world-wide. THE HIVE PROJECT was initiated by Padua Playwrights and also includes short pieces by Guy Zimmerman and Gray Palmer.
  • Bacteria by Rachel Jendrzejewski
    Recommendations: 2
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    Cast: 
    2
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    Genre: experimental, political
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    Keyword: dreams, Relationships + 2 more
    Genre: experimental, political
    Keyword: dreams, Relationships, social justice, women
    David sleeps and Abital dreams as the outside world incessantly rings. A fleeting portrait of calling and volition.
  • In Which _______ and Others Discover the End by Rachel Jendrzejewski
    Cast: 
    7
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    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
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    Keyword: climate change, global warming + 5 more
    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
    Keyword: climate change, global warming, technology, science, body, death, mortality
    Emerging from a densely layered collaboration between performers, audience, visual environment, and sound, IN WHICH _______ AND OTHERS DISCOVER THE END grapples with the current generation's collective, unconscious anxiety that the world may in the foreseeable future be uninhabitable for humans. Taking inspiration from scientific discoveries (the identification of a new knee ligament, a new class of...
    Emerging from a densely layered collaboration between performers, audience, visual environment, and sound, IN WHICH _______ AND OTHERS DISCOVER THE END grapples with the current generation's collective, unconscious anxiety that the world may in the foreseeable future be uninhabitable for humans. Taking inspiration from scientific discoveries (the identification of a new knee ligament, a new class of mathematical shape, the previously unknown mating spot of the blue whale) that are continually updating what we think we know, IN WHICH... asks us to acknowledge that we live in a world of uncertainty through an expansive rumination on the ways we embody polarity, mystery, mortality, discovery, and change.

    IN WHICH _______ AND OTHERS DISCOVER THE END originally was a collaboration between performance collective SuperGroup; experimental playwright Rachel Jendrzejewski; installation artist Liz Miller; art rock band Brute Heart; performers Angharad Davies, Hannah Kramer, and Stephanie Stoumbelis; lighting designer Heidi Eckwall; and process correspondent Hannah Geil-Neufeld.

    Publication by Plays Inverse is forthcoming in July 2018!
  • it's [all] highly personal by Rachel Jendrzejewski
    Cast: 
    7
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    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
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    Keyword: change, dance + 5 more
    Genre: experimental, movement/physical
    Keyword: change, dance, interdisciplinary, ritual, risk, meditation, community
    This collaboration between contemporary performance ensemble SuperGroup and experimental playwright Rachel Jendrzejewski explores the subtle changes that shape us as we navigate our seemingly contradictory needs for ritual and risk. Primarily drawing on movement and voice, the performance layers abstract and symbolic gestures with weaving narratives, multiplying patterns, and elusive signals to tell the complex story of everyday life.