BIO

Claribel is a theater maker and teaching artist currently living in Olympia, Washington where she is happily collaborating on new projects, acting, directing, and dreaming about an original bi-lingual touring show for kids. As the Education Director at Olympia Family Theater Claribel finds constant inspiration in the eyes of young children experiencing the magic of live theater for the first time.  As a theater maker, arts administrator and teacher Claribel has worked at Penumbra Theatre Company, Teatro del Pueblo, Hamline University, Rybin Studio of Drama, Pillsbury House Theater, Open Eye Figure Theater, English Theatre Berlin and the English Theater of Rome. Claribel holds an MFA in theater arts from Sarah Lawrence College and is inspired by the work of Augusto Boal and the communities who use the tools of theater to create lasting, positive change.

INSPIRED BY

women who fly / women who make art / the sunset

The Originals is an adaptation of a screenplay written by Tamara Keeton (an Olympia native) that focuses on the true stories of the women who flew planes for the United States military during World War II.  The production will be a collaboratively devised theater project, led by a group of inter-generational women in Olympia that tells the forgotten story of the heroic women pilots who formed the Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron.

Created by collaborators Claribel Gross (Olympia, WA), Mekala Sridhar (San Diego, CA), and Emily Ritger (Chicago, IL). Inspired by Isabel Allende’s The Stories of Eva Luna, the piece is an irrational response to Allende and her characters. It is a myth, a collage, a reconstruction of women on the edges. Combining the fictional world with snapshots of the current news stream, the piece explores the limits of storytelling through a wide-range of theatrical devices, and seeks to expand what an ensemble-generated piece can be when created beyond the limits of location.