Dark Comedy
About Tiny Edens
Tiny Edens is a play about mortality, autonomy – how we live, and die. Willa is a high school English teacher with a terminal cancer diagnosis she’s determined to meet on her own terms. Her adult children—Dylan and Roz—want to help, but have different ideas about what “help” might mean. Dylan wants to support his mom but the impending loss paralyzes him. Roz wants to save her—and can’t help but feel that her mother is giving up, both on her and on life.
Willa has to make some difficult decisions about what she’s willing to do — and what it means to live with joy, even in this precarious moment. Knowing that she doesn’t want to pursue aggressive treatment, Willa consults with Vic, a no-nonsense death doula, to help her prepare for what comes next.
Tiny Edens invites audiences to witness a woman choosing presence over panic, joy over fear, and connection over control. It’s a story about living fully—especially at the end—and about finding beauty in the smallest, everyday things.
Sponsored by Rita Lowndes
TIRA PALMQUIST is known for plays that merge the personal, the political and the poetic. Her most produced play, Two Degrees, premiered at the Denver Center, and subsequently produced by Tesseract Theater in St. Louis and Prime Productions at the Guthrie (among others), and is available to be licensed through TRW Plays. Tira’s newest play Tiny Edens was commissioned by Prime Productions in Minneapolis. Tiny Edens had its first public reading at the Park Square Theatre in St. Paul as part of Prime’s Prime Voices: The Playwright Series. Tira has taught writing at the Orange County School of the Arts, at Wesleyan University and at the University of California-Irvine. She is a member of the Playwrights Union (an inclusive group of writers working in theater, film and television that actively fosters growth for LA-based writers) and is a member of the Dramatists Guild.
About Playfest
Orlando Shakes PlayFest is a two week long annual festival that provides a place for writers, theater professionals, and audiences to connect and share ideas that promote thought-provoking stories. Audiences experience staged readings of six new works over two weekends and participate in the development of new plays, conversing with playwrights, directors, and actors while absorbing groundbreaking new works.
Orlando Shakes is a core member of the National New Play Network, a nationwide organization devoted to developing new work through the New Play Exchange, rolling world premieres, the Producer-in-Residence Program, and annual conferences. Orlando Shakes prides itself on active participation within the national new play community while engaging its local audiences in the latest and greatest in playwriting.
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