Welcome
I am humbled and honored to welcome you to our production of The Laramie Project. When we
began The Lincoln Legacy Project three years ago, I knew that we must include this play as part of
our exploration of intolerance and injustice in America. The story of Matthew Shepard had a seismic
impact on this country. In many ways, it was a watershed moment, opening America’s eyes to the
brutality and intolerance suffered so often by “the other.”
Following Matthew’s murder, the members of Tectonic Theater Project traveled to Laramie to
interview people from the town. Those interviews and the Tectonic team’s own reactions and
experiences formed the play, which endeavors to capture the ethos of a time and place but ends
up capturing so much more: a community stunned by violence and desperately trying to transcend
it. That struggle for transcendence can be felt most poignantly toward the end of the play, which
features the words ?X] ]??&\??]\?[??\??\\? ?] H ?[?[??[??X\?[????X\???X??[??^K[??\? ?XZ?? ?][??\?[? ?Y?\???][ ?? ?] [Z[] H[?Y\??K^ ?\??[??\?\?\?H ? ?YH?????YH?]?]?[ ?]\???X\???XZ?[??[?]?KZ[??\?[???H]?H ?\ ?[?YB???\? ?[??[??\??&\? ?][Y[?? Y?H
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