Virtue (Film)
When her boss outsources her job to the Philippines, Keira must train Efren, the Filipino man who's replacing her. As she searches for answers about the legitimacy of her replacement, she's forced to confront questions of her own value.
This is a film adaptation of my stage play that was filmed by Cowboy, Bear, Ninja 100% in lockdown during May 2020. The actors were sent iPhones and sound equipment to film, and a full crew directed them via Zoom. It was an insane experiment truly doing something that had never quite been done before — making a film via Zoom, but not using the Zoom platform to film. My favorite part of the process by far was writing full office scenes with the offstage characters from the stage play; I’ve lived with those characters in my imagination alone for so many years, so to bring them to life was thrilling. And to have such a huge creative container during a time when we were unable to create in groups is absolutely the thing that got me through Covid-19.
Setting
New York City and Manila, Philippines
History
April 2015 - Workshop + Reading with the Terra Nova Groundbreakers Group, directed by Sam Buntrock
March 2019 - Liz Smith Reading Series with the Miranda Theatre Company, directed by Valentina Fratti
May 2020 - Made into a film by Cowboy, Bear, Ninja and Cowboy + Cougar
“YOU are the one who is different. There are many millions of people on earth who live like me, but only a small handful who live like you. Being from America is not the standard from which everything else is different. It is the exception, not the rule.”