At the center of No Candy is a multi-generational community of Bosnian Muslim women who survived the Srebrenica genocide and, years later, open a gift shop for tourists who visit the Srebrenica memorial. While No Candy is very much about how trauma inhabits the body and shapes a community, it is also about the persistence of humor, art, and absurdity in an unimaginable time.
What made me want to write No Candy is that I’ve been thinking about the communities comprised solely of women, and why they are formed, how they function, and what is the presence of men, if any, if it isn’t physical. And in August 2014, when the Yazidi community came under persecution by ISIS and the women forced into sexual slavery, I began to think about the female community again, but in the context of ethnic and gendered persecution. I was reminded of the Bosnian Muslims during the Bosnian War, specifically during the Srebrenica genocide. And it was through this landscape of Bosnia that gave me access to explore this particular kind of trauma and how a community of women sustains and rebuilds itself years later after the war. While trauma functions as a baseline within the play, what I am more interested in exploring in the lives of these women is how a community rebuilds itself through humor and absurdity. In my conversations with Bosnian artist Sejla Kameric, who was a teenager during the Bosnian war, she very much insists on the duality of lightness living alongside atrocity and trauma. That during the war, there were sunny days, babies being born, theater being produced, and somewhere, some teenager was listening to Nirvana in their headphones and ignoring their parents. There’s a kind of absurdity in that duality, of living during war, and I believe in it. I believe it is at the center of these women in the play and at the core of their recovery.
We are so excited about this collaboration! What is unique about the collaboration behind NO CANDY is the creative exchange between Chicago and New York. Before I left for Columbia University’s MFA program, I was working regularly with a community of actors, designers, and directors. However, since being in New York, I’ve met some really stellar group of designers and producers. And so, I’d like to take the opportunity of my thesis to nurture my relationships in both cities and create a partnership between the two groups of collaborators! It is the hope that with this kind of collaboration, the play will have the opportunity to be seen and produced in both.
We need your help to make this production happen! Since we will be rehearsing with a phenomenal team in Chicago, we’re looking to raise $2000 to help cover the costs of bringing them to New York and performing throughout the week. Your donation will help us from buying metro card to our actor, to cover our always-expensive rehearsal space, to building our fantastic set,
A little goes a long way and will be very much appreciated!
No Candy will be performed at The Signature Theater in New York April 28th at 2:30pm, April 30th at 7:30pm, and May 1st at 2:30pm.
About the Playwright
Emma Stanton
is a Chicago and New York theater artist, with an interest in documentary and
site-specific theater. She has worked with such companies as Redmoon Theater,
American Theater Company, About Face Theatre, Double Edge Theater, Steppenwolf
Theatre Company, Oracle Theater, 600 Highwaymen, En Garde Arts, and
Walkabout Theater Company, of which she is Associate Artistic Director. She was
a recipient of a Civics and Arts Foundation Playwriting Award for Emerging
Artists in Chicago and most recently, her play Bojko and The Glacier was a
semi-finalist for a Princess Grace Award. Currently, Emma is working on a
commission by Bosnian artist Sejla Kameric, teaching a documentary theater
class at Wadleigh High School for the Performing Visual Arts in Harlem, and in
April 2016, her play No Candy
(directed by Devon de Mayo)will be
presented at The Signature Theater in New York as part of Columbia University’s
graduate playwright thesis festival. Her mentors for her thesis are David Henry
Hwang and Caridad Svich. BA: Boston College; MFA: Columbia University, 2016.
www.emmadalbeystanton.com
About the Director
Devon de Mayo is the co-founder and co-artistic director of Dog & Pony Theatre Co. Most recently, Devon served as the Resident Director for the Broadway production of The Audience under director Stephen Daldry. Her directing & devising credits include Guerra: A Clown Play (performances in Chicago, New York, Albuquerque, Madrid, Bogota and Mexico City); The Whole World is Watching (Dog & Pony); The Twins Would Like to Say (Dog & Pony, Steppenwolf Garage Rep); and As Told by the Vivian Girls (Dog & Pony). Her directing credits include: Jet Black Chevrolet (side project); Lost in Yonkers (Northlight Theatre); Compulsion (Next Theatre); Everything is Illuminated (Next Theatre); An Actor Prepares (TAPS, University of Chicago); Roadkill Confidential, The Further Adventures of Hedda Gabler, Clouds (Dog & Pony); Infiltrating Bounce (Luminaria Festival, San Antonio); Second Story (Serendipity Theatre Collective); Crumble (Lay Me Down Justin Timberlake) (Finborough Theatre, London); Constriction (Collaboraction, Sketchbook), 52 (Canal Cafe, London); and Laba Laba (Bali, Indonesia). In addition to the University of Chicago, Devon teaches at Northwestern University and previously served as the Director of Education at Northlight Theatre. She received her MFA in Theatre Directing from Middlesex University in London and has studied at the Russian Academy of Theatre Arts (GITIS) in Moscow and the Indonesian Institute for the Arts in Bali.
The Cast
Amber Robinson, ASJA
![]()
Lucy Carapetyan, FAZILA
![]()
Carolyn Malloy, OLENA
![]()
Jessica Thigpen, ZLATA
![]()
Abby Pajakowski, MAJA
![]()
Lorraine Freund, UMA
![]()
Andrew Hager, ORIC
![]()
