Silient Sky by Lauen Gundersen

In 1912, the astronomer Henrietta Leavitt discovered the distance between stars and other intergalactic objects, most especially the planet Earth and Milky Way. Ultimately named Leavitt’s Law, this finding changed our understanding of the size and scope of the universe and would inform and influence future discoveries, such as Hubble confirming the countless number of star systems while identifying the Andromeda Nebula as a galaxy. Leavitt was barely credited for her work during her lifetime. The Swedish mathematician Gösta Mittag-Leffler nominated her for a Nobel Prize in 1926, five years after her death, an honor that became moot given that it is not posthumously awarded. This did not stop the astronomer Harlow Shapley from self-nominating for the Nobel while cribbing—in effect pirating—Leavitt’s research. Unfortunately, Shapley’s selfish gambit was(is) common. Throughout history women have been unrecognized for their accomplishments while men have pilfered these discoveries to burnish their own reputations. Leavitt’s story is jointly unique and altogether familiar. With respect to the latter, again, she is one of hundreds of female-identifying scientists whose work has been overlooked—two other examples are also recognized in Gunderson’s play: Annie “Jump” Cannon and Williamina Fleming. Yet Leavitt’s story is as exceptional as her astrological discoveries. She has quite literally provided us galactical perspective—we know our place, and by extension that of the Earth/Milky Way, precisely because of her findings. The field of astronomy and “humankind” are indebted to her.

This production will tell Leavitt’s story through Gunderson’s dramatic prose. We will honor the period in which it is set since the narrative is contingent on its sociocultural moment—1900 to 1920, when the suffrage movement was at its apex and culminated with the nineteenth amendment to the constitution. The costumes and mise en scéne should authentically represent this important time in US history, thereby inviting the use of projections to communicate different locations and given circumstances. We have chosen the proscenium theatre for this production because Silent Sky has an eternally grand and ethereal expanse that will transport the audience’s imaginations to the heavens while continually reminding them of the irreducibly human experience at the play’s core. The story is ultimately about relationships: colleagues (the female-identifying scientists); familial (Henrietta/Margaret/their father); gendered (men/women—Pickering and what he represents is omnipresent); romantic (Henrietta/Peter) and so forth. The audience’s experience of the characters and how they interrelate are foundational to the production; the elements of design will support their development and delivery. The soundscape will intersect with the production’s visual language to achieve this outcome. Original music and an elegant sound design will underscore key segments of the storytelling toward establishing and sustaining the production’s rhythm, tempo, color palate, and tonality. The audience’s experience will paradoxically extend to the heavens while remaining deeply human and decidedly earthbound.