First Storyteller’s Festival: Embers Borne West

Join us for a staged reading of the new play Embers Borne West. It’s a time-shifting tale about intergenerational resilience and identity, as two very different generations of a Cherokee family move to Los Angeles, in 1927 and in the present day. Wenona and Duke Jacobs leave their small Oklahoma hometown for Los Angeles in the 1920s hoping to find a better life, but Wenona confronts unexpected challenges to her Native identity in a highly segregated city. One hundred years later, Wenona’s non-binary “great-grand-something” Jay makes the same move and contends with identity issues of a different sort. Transcending time but connected by place, Jay and Wenona eavesdrop on each other to learn more about themselves and a family where the men are proud and the women are survivors. Maddox K. Pennington’s play explores the intergenerational resonance of migration, assimilation, culture, identity, and grief with affection and ironic humor.

Stay after the show to participate in the audience discussion with the writer – a crucial part of developing new work!