College student Lotus is struggling to understand her place in the universe. She’s also trying to find her birth mother, who left China on horseback and rode to Kazakhstan where she gave birth and left the baby at an orphanage.
Lotus (Sarah Chang) was adopted when she was 6 months old by a white, American couple. Her adoptive mother (Holly Roach) is afraid of how finding her birth mother will impact her relationship with Lotus, and her adoptive father (Josh Harrison) is reluctant to upset his wife.
True North Theatre’s “Cosmogenesis: The Story of Us” at the Versant Power Astronomy Center & Maynard Planetarium at the University of Maine is more than a play. It is a multimedia extravaganza that melds live performances with film, music and the galaxy. It’s also a world premiere.
Rebecca-Sophia Strong is credited in the program as being the “creator, playwright, creative director and executive producer” of the show.
“My work is guided by the question: How might we generate solutions that nourish the children of all species for the next thousand years?” Strong wrote in the program. “In everything I create, I seek to awaken a sense of aliveness and wonder — in myself and in those who engage in the work.”
True North previously collaborated with the planetarium in March 2023 to present Lauren Gunderson’s “Silent Sky,” the story of Henrietta Leavitt and her female colleagues who studied photographic plates of the stars taken by telescopes. They were not allowed to look through the telescope because they were women.
The projections in that production were quite simplistic compared with those used in “Cosmogenesis.” Strong and her creative team at the Fiske Planetarium at the University of Colorado Boulder essentially made a movie, complete with soundtrack, that is shown on the dome of the Orono planetarium as the actors perform.
This is one of the most diverse casts True North has pulled together. Two of the actors are members of the Penobscot Nation, one is Black and Chang is of Taiwanese descent. Director Angela Bonacasa brings together 10 actors who create a close ensemble that works together beautifully in the tight confines of the planetarium. Strong added a Penobscot origin story about Gluskabe, a culture hero for the Wabanaki people, that helps localize the story.
Chang takes the audience on an insightful, if not always happy, journey through her life and the cosmos. She gives an open and honest performance of a young woman trying to determine her place in the world.
Lotus, together with fellow students — Alan (Adrian Sockalexis), Theo (Josh Wescoat), Ruth (Nina Paradzick) and J. Lewis (Patrick “Patty” Morris) — attend classes taught by two engaging professors Sophia (Rebekah Novak) and Xavier (George Loring) and one curmudgeon, Mr. Edwards (Tellis Cooling).
Novak, who was last seen earlier this year in Penobscot Theatre Company’s production of “Dial M for Murder,” does much of the explaining of just how vast the universe is as a cosmology professor. That could have been a dull, slow slog but she is so charming and delightful in the role that the audience, like her students, is transfixed. Loring is equally engaging as a teacher who uses movement to help students understand their places in that universe.
“Cosmogenesis” is a unique and immersive experience that is beautiful and challenging and rewarding in every aspect. True North deserves a standing ovation for bringing such a vibrant, thoughtful and visually stunning piece of work to life.
“Cosmogenesis: The Story of Us” will be performed at 7 p.m. Friday and at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. Saturday at Versant Power Astronomy Center & Maynard Planetarium at the University of Maine. For more information, visit astro.umaine.edu.