A day in the world I see
A peek into the vision that inspired me to start Roguish Goblin Stories
Answering: What inspired Roguish Goblin Stories? Why are you so determined to make theatre your full-life career?
Last week knocked me flat on my back with a cold. The first one of the season (thank goodness I’d already gotten my flu shot!), and it was a doozy. I’m learning how to slow down before something like this happens, but this week was a good reminder that I have things still to learn about slowing down and resting.
So, this week, I’ve taken an honest re-assessment of what I needed to do to take care of myself, and de-prioritized getting a long to-do list done.
I shifted to reading, listening to some of the podcasts on my “to listen eventually” list, and a looooot of journaling.
A lot.
I’m revisiting the vision that inspired me to start my own theatre company, named because while it is focused on theatre, there’s more going on, and I don’t have words yet for what I can see.
Perhaps a worldbuilding company or a worldbuilding theatre is more appropriate.
Because the one thing that comes up, every time I remember the visions of what inspired Roguish Goblin Stories, is possibility.
One of the many journal pages I’ve scribbled out in the last couple weeks!
I love theatre because it’s a constant exploration of possibility.
Some plays are creative, exciting, attractive, hopeful visions of worlds that could be.
Some are cautionary tales.
Some are wild-card “what ifs”.
What I want to do with RGS is expand the time after each performance to collectively reflect on those possibilities, and dream together what parts of each story we want to bring into our lives, and which parts we want to leave on the stage.
And most importantly, create aligned action steps that we can take to actually get there. Because dreams are nice and all, but taking the steps towards making them our reality is how the change actually happens.
If you want to be a part of how the grows from the start, doors are already open for RGS.
The vision that inspired all this has returned to me so many times that I can’t remember the first time I experienced it.
I’m standing at the back of a huge garden. Raised beds with all the food that my family grows every year: tomato plants and bean walls, squashes sprawling, a rainbow of kale and lettuces, peppers, potatoes,
I smell the petrichor from the rain this morning. The specific scent that tomato vines have.
I see butterflies flitting between asters and daylilies.
I hear the bees buzzing around the zinnias that line the garden’s perimeter. The birds in the trees in the orchard down the path ahead.
And in the middle of those fruit trees, a stage.
Nothing fancy.
A simple home for stories.
Surrounded by gardens.
Physical and spiritual food, open to anyone who needs it.
A couple actors run fight call, swords flashing in the sunlight, ringing like bells as they collide in choreography. It’s the only job they have, because their acting here is salaried to support more than just their needs.
Folks watch from the balconies of the affordable apartments built on the other side of the gardens: homes for low-income, marginalized, and artistic folks. A Uni Ace flag hangs in the window of the aspec cafe on the ground floor.
Kids laugh as they play tag between the raised beds.
Parents chat nearby, keeping an eye on the littles while supporting each other.
Up the path, a couple teenage volunteers talk with a local retired veteran who just donated a box of memorabilia to the newly opened community museum. Another element of this worldbuilding theatre that’s focused on nourishing the community’s cultural memory.
The front of house staff check the wash stations in the garden before the show plays tonight. Here, concessions are whatever’s in season; picked fresh and washed right here.
Picnic tables dot the audience area, along with space for folding chairs and picnic blankets. The ASL team sets up in their spot down front. An usher sweeps the handicap seating nearby.
A breeze brushes across my face as I take it all in.
I can’t help but smile.
I have no idea how we’re gonna get there.
Or what “yes ands” and “yes buts” the Universe has in store along the way.
But I’m excited to keep moving towards that vision.
Together.
About Beks: Beks Roen (they/he) helps queer folks and allies find adventurous connection & remember they’re loved and not alone through queer theatre & Shakespeare.
After reading independently at 18 months old, accidentally becoming a professional Shakespeare actor within weeks of graduating high school, finding themself with funding to train in stage combat, and accidentally co-producing a virtual theatre festival during the pandemic shutdown, Roen realized that mayyybe engineering wasn’t the career right path...
They now produce queerly classic adventures, celebrating trans and aspec lives on their Substack and their theatre streaming platform Roguish Goblin Stories.
Find more about Roen on their website.
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