The world premiere of Sojourner ZY: An Asian American Science Fiction Fantasy co-produced by ShadowLight Productions, New Performance Traditions/Paul Dresher Ensemble and the Presidio Theatre will be given March 2-5 at the Presidio Theatre. Sojourner ZY is an original play written by Eugenie Chan with new music composer Paul Dresher performed by ShadowLight Productions in its signature large-scale cinematic shadow theater style directed by Larry Reed.
In a not-so-distant future, the Earth Federation has sent out spaceships to scour the universe for the resources necessary to sustain an environmentally depleted and damaged Earth. We follow the mission of Sojourner ZY, who pilots the last surviving spacecraft, as he communicates with Earth Federation’s Mission Control and with his wife scientist and devoted children, who struggle to survive in Earth’s ever-more precarious environment. And as he desperately tries to sack strange new worlds of their resources, he confronts uncomfortable choices and unforeseen consequences.
Audiences will be surrounded in a primal, yet futuristic landscape of sound from composer Dresher’s invented instruments, cinematic-scale shadow puppet imagery and a fantastical story that follows the interplanetary journey of the space traveler Sojourner ZY. On his journey, he encounters a dizzying array of uniquely adapted and strange civilizations. The story is told via projected and live shadow sequences with dialogue and songs and seeks to address vital issues of all time—race, gender, identity and the environmental crisis.