Cannibal Galaxy: a love story
A new play by Charise Greene
Directed by Jenn Haltman

June 8-17, 2018
New Ohio Theatre
New York, NY

It’s business as usual at the Washington D.C. Science Museum where the employees’ personal lives keep getting in the way. Jo wants a child but is unable to secure an inseminator. Chet longs to make love, but dating kinda sucks and gaming is way more awesome. Claire searches for purpose by digging directly toward the center of the earth. Vadim prioritizes the needs of others but wouldn’t know his own if they crawled into bed with him. Eloise lives in a treehouse and brushes her teeth with space particles. When chaos ravages a perfectly average day, these co-workers are flung into a cosmic galactic shift, rearranging their internal cartography. In these desperate times, Cannibal Galaxy: a love story is a new play about how we keep breathing as America eats itself alive.

NEW YORK INNOVATIVE THEATRE AWARDS

REVIEWS

"It’s a surprising exploration of the impossible space between us. It’s a harrowing look at how the everyman deals with self-implosion after an unexpected catastrophic supernova-style life event. While our “cannibal” galaxy devours the smaller ones in its orbit above, America seems to be eating itself below. The play questions if our violent collisions and interactions permanently leave vast distances between us that can never be traversed. It’s a riveting work where both the micro- and macrocosm share the stage, where the milky way feels present in the room as well as the smallest human quarks, leaving us clinging to the gravitational force field of…love? Jenn Haltman’s direction of this interesting work is highly inventive. Her use of spatial relationships between animate and inanimate elements is simply brilliant. I loved the way she used the space at the New Ohio Theatre creating worlds within worlds and the unexpected ways that she broke the fourth wall — constantly expanding the universe of the play and its characters. Her vision for the piece is evident in each masterful moment and the attention to detail of the emotional through line...[This] production...is a discourse on our own hunger — for connection, for belonging, for filling the empty space within. Cannibal Galaxy: a love story operates like the Mars Rover collecting data about the surface of things and hinting at the caverns and mysteries that lie undiscovered beneath." —Jacquelyn Claire, Stage Biz

"Well-produced, well-acted...[Greene's] characters' candid discussions excavate spot-on truths about our current society...Each of the cast members skillfully maneuvers from dramatic to comedic moments and makes the emotional scenes feel authentic and nuanced, provoking sympathy for the characters, despite their flaws. Cannibal Galaxy tackles familiar ground in a new way, and director Jenn Haltman and her team use this unique script as an impetus to create an unusual and innovative theatrical experience that stays in your memory long after the lights come up." —Adrienne Urbanski, Theatre Is Easy

"Lavishly designed and performed with compelling honesty." —Jara Jones, Theater That Matters

"Cannibal Galaxy: a love story benefits from strength of concept and cast-demographic." —Chris Behmke, My Entertainment World

INTERVIEWS

• Go See a Show! Podcast — Hosted by Robert A. K. Gonyo featuring Charise Greene, Jenn Haltman, and Becca Schneider

• Your Program is Your Ticket Podcast — Hosted by Sean Chandler featuring Jenn Haltman and Becca Schneider

• Ask a Director with Hannah Wolf — An Interview with Jenn Haltman

• People You Should Know with Zack Calhoon — An Interview with Jenn Haltman

• People You Should Know with Zack Calhoon — An Interview with Charise Greene

HISTORY OF THE PLAY

An Ensemble Studio Theatre Sloan finalist, Cannibal Galaxy: a love story was developed by Fault Line Theatre, and Xavier University held a professional workshop in September 2017 directed by Tiffany Nicole Greene, for which it received rave reviews. Our June 2019 production at the New Ohio Theatre was the New York Showcase Premiere. View the press release here.

We believe that art is a powerful tool for change, and given our country’s current climate of violence, we were eager to bring people together and reflect upon what has become a national epidemic. With every violent act that occurs on our soil, we are reminded how terrifyingly important it is to tell this story right now. Learn more about the project by watching our fundraising video below.