The News
An epic, multigenerational saga about a Sri Lankan-Australian family makes its US stage debut this month. “I put my soul on a plate,” playwright S. Shakthidharan told The New York Times. His own family emigrated to Australia in 1984 to escape Sri Lanka’s bitter civil war, leaving his mother with memories too painful to talk about. Counting and Cracking spans half a century, is performed in English, Tamil, and Sinhalese, and features 19 actors from around the world.
For Shakthidharan, it marks years of attempting to understand the island’s painful history as well as his family’s story, resulting in a play in which “the personal and political are inextricably entwined,” The Times wrote.