I took a little trip over to Next Act Theatre's Off-Broadway Theatre (located on the second floor of the white building across from the Milwaukee Public Market on Water Street) to get a glimpse into "Paradise" last night.
Next Act Theatre has a built its reputation on producing plays that get people talking and thinking, and I would agree that "Paradise" was successful in that role. In fact, I was still thinking about the play when I read the in the newspaper this morning about four back-to-back explosions that went off at two, crowed marketplaces in Baghdad on Monday. I have gotten to the point where I have started to almost block this kind of news out, but today I actually paused to consider all the people whose lives must have been changed forever because of those explosions.
Of course, if you live in the Middle East in the midst of where the fighting is happening, it is impossible to block it out. The play clearly demonstrates that the closer the characters got to the fighting, the more personally involved they became, and the more impossible it became to choose peace. The play did a good job of making the Israeli-Palestinian conflict more real to me and brought me more understanding of how people's minds are closed through their painful life experiences. Hope is gradually worn away, hate takes over, and people turn their sorrow into actions which cause more sorrow. Add money and family honor into the mix, and peace becomes a lost cause. The question is how this trend can be reversed.
"Paradise" is a dream, as well as an opportunity to see a play that will set your wheels turning. It runs until Feb. 25 at the Off-Broadway Theatre.
Jessica Laub was born in Milwaukee in the spring of 1970, thereafter spending her childhood days enjoying the summers on the shores of Lake Michigan and winters at the toboggan chute in Brown Deer Park.
Alas, she moved away to broaden her horizons, and studied out East for a few years at Syracuse University. After a semester "abroad" at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, she graduated with a B.A. in English and advertising.
After college, she worked at Glacier National Park, a ski hill in Steamboat, Col. and organic farms in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and California.
In 1995, Laub moved to Nicaragua where she worked on community gardens, reforestation and environmental education as a Peace Corps volunteer. While there, she learned to speak Spanish, pay attention to world politics and how to make tortillas.
Laub then returned to Milwaukee to join the ranks of the non-profit sector. Currently, she works at the United Performing Arts Fund (UPAF) and keeps busy by painting, throwing pots, reading, trying to understand her two-year old son, seeing performances and howling at the moon.
