Mother Road, a world premiere from Oregon playwright Octavio Solis, is a modern sequel of The Grapes of Wrath. Weaving the threads of the Dust Bowl migrations of Okie farmers to California with the more recent migrations of Mexican farmers to the U.S., this story follows William Joad, a cousin of Tom Joad (protagonist of The Grapes of Wrath) who stayed and farmed in Oklahoma and Tom Joad's descendant, Martin Jodes, who was born in Mexico. After meeting in California, they set off on a road trip back to Oklahoma, down Route 66, the Mother Road.
In reading about the background and development of this play, OSF included a recent New York Times article about the largest round of deportations we've never heard of. And they were right, I'd never heard of this! In the 1930s, deep in the throes of the Great Depression, Herbert Hoover enforced a "jobs for real Americans" effort by rounding up and deporting almost two million Mexicans in southern California. They called this "repatriation," even though around one million of those deported were actually American citizens. So appalling.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/08/13/the-time-a-president-deported-1-million-mexican-americans-for-stealing-u-s-jobs/
This was one of two plays Bill Rauch directed in his last year as Artistic Director. It is sad to see him go. As this was closing weekend, he was in the audience, along with a few other OSF company members. The most recognizable one was Daisuke Tsuji from Cambodian Rock Band, with his Cyclos jacket on.
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