Peace activist portrayed in South one-woman play

By Remy McCool/south news editor

Lauren Kirkpatrick plays peace activist Rachel Corrie, who was crushed to death by a bulldozer when she traveled to the Gaza Strip to protest the demolition of many Palestinians’ homes by the Israeli government. The one-woman play is rare for most TCC productions. This will be Kirkpatrick’s seventh TCC performance.
Lauren Kirkpatrick plays peace activist Rachel Corrie, who was crushed to death by a bulldozer when she traveled to the Gaza Strip to protest the demolition of many Palestinians’ homes by the Israeli government. The one-woman play is rare for most TCC productions. This will be Kirkpatrick’s seventh TCC performance.
Photos by Jason Floyd/The Collegian
Photos by Jason Floyd/The Collegian

Rachel Corrie was crushed to death by a bulldozer on March 16, 2003, while protesting the demolition of the home of a Palestinian family whom she had befriended.

Her story will be told in My Name is Rachel Corrie, which opens on South Campus in the Joe B. Rushing Center for the Performing Arts at 7:30 p.m. Feb. 20-22.

However, Corrie is much more than her death. A 23-year-old college student at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash, Corrie was an American peace activist, traveling to the Gaza Strip in an effort to prevent Palestinians from suffering the loss of their homes at the hands of the Israeli government.

“Rachel Corrie herself is just such an intriguing and phenomenal person,” said Lauren Kirkpatrick, who plays the lead.

While reading the script, Kirkpatrick has found several similarities between herself and Corrie and, thus, a connection to the character she is portraying.

“I’m so much more vulnerable in this play than in any other play I’ve done,” she said.

This will be Kirkpatrick’s seventh production on South Campus, where she is a religion major and theater minor.

South drama instructor Melinda Benton-Muller chose the play because she thought students could relate to Corrie and found it fitting with Women’s History Month. To her knowledge, this will be TCC’s first one-woman show performed by a student.

“I try to choose shows that I think will be relevant to the audience one way or another,” she said.

Kirkpatrick hopes the audience will see Corrie for who she was rather than the political issues that surrounded her circumstance.

“It is a political play, to an extent, and I think people might get caught up in that,” she said. “But they can look past that and look at what she stood for and what she represented.”

Tickets are $6 for general admission, $3 for non-TCC students and seniors and free for TCC students, faculty and staff. South does not require reservations. Tickets will be sold beginning 30 minutes prior to the show. No late seating is allowed. Call the South box office at 817-515-6687 for more information.