Holding a larger-than-life butterfly above her heart, Toddy Walters floated and twirled across the stage at Thunder River Theater during a dress rehearsal on Wednesday.
Alone at first, she was soon joined by other women, also holding butterflies. They swirled around one another until the music faded. They dispersed, and the opening vignette of the performance was over.
VOICES executive director Renee Prince approved: “Beautiful!”
Lead butterfly Toddy Walters is probably better known for a less graceful performance. She voiced several South Park characters, including Winona Ryder.
Sitting next to her in the dressing room before the rehearsal was another butterfly, Sandra Prado. Growing up in Mexico City, Prado was a “troublemaker teenager,” she said, and her family encouraged her to try dancing. She landed in a Polynesian class.
“I immediately knew that it was for me,” she said. “It was my world. My passion.”
There will be no Ryder impressions or Polynesian dances for this performance.
Prado, Walters and seven other women came together to produce this theater project, “Wetlands.”
“It's what's called devised theater,” Walters said. “From the beginning, each woman had an idea of what she wanted to do.”
“Everyone creating their own pieces — what we wanted to project and tell to the audience,” Prado said. “But Renee is the one that came to help us to connect it all together.”
That’s Renee Prince, executive director of VOICES.
“Instead of starting with a playwright and a script, we start with people's stories and ideas and experiences,” she said. “And then we create new, original theater for the stage through that devising process.”
In the United States, Prince said, about 4 of every 5 works for theater are written by men. That’s why VOICES puts women at the center of the stage.
“Our goal at VOICES is to amplify often-silenced voices through the arts," she said. "And so what we're doing with this project is we're just trying to bring a little more equilibrium.”
The nine contributing artists create very different types of art. As Walters pointed out, their collaboration produced a wide range of creative expression.
“We call it a kaleidoscope of a show,” she said. “We have aspects of dance movements, song, puppetry. We have some levity — a couple of comedic pieces. So, there's a real spectrum. You can expect beautiful music and really tight storytelling that’s deep.”
The theme of the show is empathy.
“One of the things that I talk about in my piece is how women are like wetlands because we absorb runoff from the world,” she said. “We're empathic, and therefore we are able to absorb other people's hurt and sorrow and, hopefully, transfer it through, and let it go.”
"Wetlands" was pushed back about two years due to COVID-19. Last fall, Prado returned to the stage for the first VOICES performance since 2019. "Wetlands" will be the second.
“I was incredibly surprised that even though the COVID was stronger at that time, we had a full house at that time,” Prado said. “So I expect the same this time.”
As the sun set outside Thunder River Theater on Wednesday, the cast and crew remained on stage and behind the scenes, polishing the kaleidoscope of a performance that is "Wetlands."
"Wetlands" opened Friday at Thunder River Theater in Carbondale and will be performed there again Saturday. It will also be staged May 7 at Wheeler Opera House in Aspen.
Editor’s note: This story was produced with assistance from the Public Media Journalists Association Editor Corps, which is funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the American people.
