Is This a Room is the astonishingly true story of Reality Winner, the 25-year-old former Air Force linguist who was surprised at her home by the FBI on June 3, 2017. The play’s text is taken from the FBI transcript of her interrogation – and from these pages, Tina Satter has wrought an extraordinary human drama between Reality (Emily Davis) and the agents who question her. In this theatrical thriller, Reality’s life is upended before our eyes, and we’re left questioning American values and the very nature of the truth.
Is This a Room dwells in a nebulous other-region, even now that it has moved uptown to Broadway. The 75-minute thriller is conducted in suspended time: You don't leave the show so much as you wake from it, shaking off its foggy, clinging, chilly mood. Satter and her company have built a highly choreographed event around a found text, the verbatim transcript (with redactions) of Winner's arrest at her home in 2017. Satter hasn't changed a single word, revealing the exquisite way lowercase-r reality can 'write' a text. On the page, the unscripted lines already throb with subtext and sing with terrifying overtones.
Is This A Room is a gripping, highly recommended piece of theater, and also an unexpectedly intricate ballet. The 70-minute, deservedly multi-award winning play, which opens on Broadway tonight at the Lyceum Theatre, is an enactment of the transcript of what was said when the FBI first came to the Augusta, Georgia, home of former Air Force linguist and intelligence contractor Reality Winner on June 3, 2017.
2019 | Off-Broadway |
Vineyard Theatre Off-Broadway World Premiere Off-Broadway |
2019 | Off-Broadway |
Vineyard Theatre Off-Broadway Return Engagement Off-Broadway |
2021 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
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