King Lear

This project grew from my time living in the desert landscapes of Southern California, where the American West—both real and imagined—kept surfacing around me. Horses grazed in my neighborhood. Cowboy imagery from my father’s childhood in 1970s East L.A. resurfaced. On daily drives through the Antelope Valley to rehearse King Lear, I passed an old junkyard filled with discarded movie props and paraphernalia. The iconic Vasquez Rocks rose just off the 14 — its unmistakable formations have made it a favorite filming location for nearly a century. Movie ranches were tucked between rocks and dust and tumbleweeds.

Against this backdrop, I began reimagining King Lear as an American Western. Our production unfolded in a barren canyon populated by figures who felt pulled from both Westerns and noir films—individually iconic figures left behind, caught in the dangerous aftermath of not knowing.

At its heart, the project asks what happens when a person—or a nation—rushes forward without reckoning with what has been discarded. Lear’s unraveling mirrors the mythologies of the West: a fear of aging, a refusal to be seen as weak, a relentless drive to outrun loss. Like the retired gunslingers, who clung to toughness rather than vulnerability, Lear resists the tenderness that might save him.

This work invites audiences to slow down, to confront obsolescence, memory, and the cost of refusing grief. It asks us, in the spirit of Shakespeare’s closing plea, to “say what we feel, not what we ought,” and to recognize the fragile wisdom that can emerge only when we finally stop outrunning ourselves.

Performed by
Marcus Baldwin, Kenny Bernisky, Ivan Brizz, Fionn Rose Casper-Strauss, Antonia Cruz-Kent, Kyle DiGiorgio, Brian Drummy, Brenan Dwyer, Jorge Luis Figueroa, Garrett Gallego, Takalay Hamill, Ava Hase, Likun Jing, Lydia Li, Isaias Alexander Miranda, Ishika Muchhal, Tony Torrico

Creative & Production Team
Scenic Designer: Sirun Bakrajian
Costume Designer: Sonya Valentina Berg
Lighting Designer: Christine Ferriter
Sound Designer: Jacenta Yu
Video Designer: Kathleen Fox
Charge Scenic Artist: Janhavi Naik
Technical Director: Jake Siekman
Fight Director: Steve Rankin
Dialect Coach: Toni Smith
Dramaturg: Xiaoyue Zhang & Christine Ferriter
Stage Manager: Jordan E. Moore
Production Manager: Rob Chicou
Assistant Stage Managers: Gina De Luca & Jordie Marie Rippon
Assistant Production Manager: Jazzi Rhodes
Assistant Director: LaurenSage Browning
Assistant Technical Director: Todd Piedad
Assistant Scenic Designer: Amy Chiao
Assistant Scenic Artists: Rachel Armour, Megan Parish, & Cheyenne Knehans
Assistant Sound Designer: Yitong Amy Huang
Assistant Video Designer: Camilo Ramírez
Line Producers: Brooke Harbaugh & Angelina Jian
Poster Design: Guillermo Casanova