The Theory

The Point…and How to Get Back to It is an original play by LEC’s resident playwright, Ira S. Murfin. During its initial development, the script was given a staged reading as part of the Down in the New Chair festival at Chicago’s Links Hall in March 2008. This will be the full work’s premiere production.

The Point…and How to Get Back to It is an all-monologue play dealing with the way we tell our own histories and forge our own futures – who we remember ourselves to be, who we believe ourselves to be, and who we expect ourselves to be. The play looks at the elusive process of finding our way to, or back to, a specific point in time or space, and most especially at our inability to match that point up with another’s experience. The narrative separation of the five characters highlights both their perceived isolation and their yearning to find connection.

LEC Playwright in Residence: Ira S. Murfin

Ira S. Murfin has often served as a curator for the textual sources of the Laboratory’s collaborations and an authorial “outside eye” during the process of creation, as well as performing as an ensemble member. The LEC’s production of The Point…and How to Get Back will signal the first experiment with using a text generated entirely by a member of the Laboratory as the source material for a production. Murfin’s relatively straightforward script will become a foundation for creating one of the LEC’s signature performance events, notable for their ability to hold tight to the meaning and relevance of the original text, while opening within it new meanings and avenues of approach impossible on the page.




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