parsley
BY CAITLIN GEORGE
the piece
X. I would if I could.
C. You could. I can’t.
Therein lies the difference.
X. Not terribly different, and yet –
How do you win when the deck is stacked against you? And in times like these,
what was it your mother used to say? Does he really expect you to listen while
he is going on about snails? Are you selfish?
Performed in English and Spanish, Parsley is a snapshot of the same two people, C & X, across three distinct points in history; then, before, & ago. Each era is different - some have corsets while others boast maternity leave - but for C nothing much changes. Her mother is still dead. Her sisters, gone or run off. Her brother, away. Her overbearing ‘over-caffinated mall-cop’ type uncle, still imminent. And as always X is here, needing. Always he needs more of her than she wants to give; his baby, her house, the kingdom.
“X - Te amo realmente. Te amo realmente and I want a baby. ¿En qué momento esas dos cosas dejaron de ir de la mano?”
Is that really too much to ask? He didn’t choose to be this either but now that we’re here, here we are. Where else is there to go?
The space between the hope of expectation and the disappointment of reality creates a chasm between them which they try desperately to cross. As they navigate social constraints against their own ambitions, they exhaust the options of custom and end up wrecked and ruined.
Well, she does. He’ll be fine.
Parsley by Caitlin George & directed by Jonathan Taikina Taylor is a dissection of the theatrical forms and stories that were told to us as all of history. We dig through the graveyard of the fallen and forgotten women towards forgotten knowns, greedy Generals, and our mothers’ fury. Working backwards we scrape off the plaque of canon to exhume what power is in a woman’s herb.
C
My mother always used to tell me that parsley is a woman’s herb. Not the plant, that la hierba era para las mujeres. I’ve no idea what that means.
As far as I can tell parsley is a bit of green people put on top of one-pot meals in restaurants, to tart them up, make them look more appealing, before being immediately kicked to the outskirts of the plate by whoever is wielding the fork. To later be abandoned to the compost with the leftover mess of uneaten scraps.
I don’t think that’s the parallel she was trying to draw.
I doubt she even knew what she meant. I’d ask her, my sisters and I would ask her. We never really got an answer. I couldn’t tell if she didn’t want to elaborate because my dad was there or because we were invariably eating dinner. Men aren’t great with talk of blood and other things that might ooze out of bodies. La salud femenina no es un tópico apropiado durante la comida.
in development
The SuperGeographics have developed Parsley with support from the following institutions and residencies;
2025 IRT Theater 3B Residency, New York, USA
2024 Teatro La Memoria, Santiago, Chile
2021 Catwalk 2021 Artist Residency, New York, USA
QCR Retreat, New York, USA
2020 The NET MicroGrant