Two Degrees

A cool new play about frozen people on a thawing planet

Synopsis

Emma Phelps is a paleoclimatologist, focusing on ice in Greenland. In drilling and studying ice core samples, she sees first hand the symptoms of our changing planet, which makes the need to act all the more crucial and urgent. In addition to her growing sense of urgency for the planet, Emma, as a recent widow, experiences grief that compounds itself with each passing month. Now she's been asked to come to Washington D.C. to testify in a Senate Committee regarding climate change legislation, and in this intersection of science and politics, of politics and the personal, she finds more than just a little is breaking up under the strain of change.

cast

  2w/2m 

• Emma Phelps - 50. Climate scientist, who studies ice.

• Clay Simpson - 40. Lobbyist for a multinational mining company.

• Louise Allen - 50. Senator from Michigan. Old college classmate of Emma's.

• Jeffrey Phelps. 50. Emma's late husband.
  The actor playing Jeffrey also plays:
  Eric Wilson (Senator Allen's Chief of Staff)
  and
  Malik Peterson (an extreme weather
  carpenter in Greenland).

production history

March 2021 (Reading) PCPCA, InterPlay Reading Series, Director: Roger DeLaurier
April 2020 (Reading) Relative Theatrics, Laramie, WY.
March 2019 Tesseract Theater, Director: Brittany Gunn
October 2018 Prime Productions, Guthrie Theater, Midwest Premiere, Director: Shelli Place
July 2018 Theatrikos Theater Company, Arizona Premiere
April 2018 Boise Contemporary Theater, 5x5 Reading Series
February 2017     Denver Center, World Premiere, Director: Christy Montour-Larson
February 2016     Denver Center New Play Summit, Director: Christy Montour-Larson
November 2015   Greenhouse Reading Series, Workhouse Theater, Minneapolis
October 2015      New American Voices Series, American Actors UK, Tristan Bates Theater, Director: Rachel Fowler
April 2015          Caltech, Mach 33 Festival, Director: Joshua Wolf Coleman
March 2015        Athena Project Festival, Plays-in-Process, Director: Christy Montour-Larson
September 2014   Artemisia Theater, Fall Play Festival, Director: Carrie Lee Patterson
May 2014           The Road Theatre Company, Road Signs reading series. Director: Joshua Wolf Coleman
May 2014           Great Plains Theater Conference, Play Lab Reading. Director: Sonia Keffer.
(Honorable Mention: 2016 Kilroys List, Finalist: Coe College 2015 Play Festival)