Brooke Totman

Brooke Totman holds a B.A. in Theatre from the U of O, was a company member of The Groundlings in Los Angeles, and is a professional acting teacher/coach. She was last seen at 21ten in the solo-show, The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe, directed by Samantha Van Der Merwe of Shaking the Tree. Other stage credits include Laughing Wild and Matt & Ben (21ten) and Detroit (Portland Playhouse). Selected film credits include MADtv, The Benefits of Gusbandry, Portlandia, and Documentary Now!

Alex Lathrop

Alex trained in the theatre department at UCLA and with private scene study coach, Doug Warhit. He spent much of his time in Los Angeles acting in national commercials and made his stage debut at the Knightsbridge Theatre in Glendale. He just completed filming his first major feature role and is thrilled to be reconnecting with the stage in Orange Flower Water.

Briana Ratterman

Briana is an interdisciplinary artist whose work can be seen on stage and screen. Recent credits include work at Shaking the Tree (ALThe Brother and The Bird, Fucking A, _the Wolf, The Caucasian Chalk Circle), Imago (Where’s Bruno) and 21Ten (Piercing the Veil, Danse Macabre). She also appears in commercials and the newly released feature film Beth + Jeremy and Steve.

About the playwright

Craig Wright

Craig Wright is an acclaimed playwright and television writer known for his sharp, unflinching portraits of ordinary people in extraordinary emotional circumstances. Orange Flower Water is one of four of his plays set in Pine City, Minnesota—alongside Molly’s Delicious, The Pavilion, and Melissa Arctic—each exploring the complexities of small-town lives, love, and loss. Wright’s plays have been produced across the country, earning him a reputation for creating intimate, deeply human dramas that resonate far beyond their local settings.
In addition to his work for the stage, Wright has enjoyed an impressive career in television. He was a writer and producer on Six Feet Under and Lost, created the series Dirty Sexy Money and Greenleaf, and contributed to Brothers & Sisters. His writing, whether on screen or in the theater, is marked by compassion, candor, and an unblinking look at the choices that define us.

Orange Flower water Interview with the Craig Wright

From Steppenwolf Theatre’s 2003 Production ~ Read full article at Steppenwolf.org

Ed Sobel: This is one of several plays that you refer to as a trilogy, and they are all set in Minnesota. What is it about this part of Minnesota or the people that you find there that makes you want to write about them?

Craig Wright:First of all, the kind of city in Minnesota that I write about is only marginally a real town. It’s just as much a landscape inside me. The reason I write about Pine City is that there’s an emotional lexicon, a philosophical lexicon, that I only have access to when I go to that place. It’s a free, but contained, imaginative state in which I am able to operate, all about the beauty of the world and the complexity of peoples’ behaviors within. How the natural beauty of things draws us towards actions that have less than beautiful consequences. The constant correlation between beauty and pain.

ES: It seems to me that the theme of romantic love is always present in your plays, regardless of what else you’re writing about. What is it about the subject of love that compels you as an artist?

CW: While I do write a lot about love, you don’t see a lot of “family” in my plays, and that’s because my family ended at a very early age. So most of my life has been about what I would call voluntary affiliation, or romantic love if you like. Romantic love is all about people that aren’t our relatives, for whom we elect to have affection. If you’re not going to write about family, then you have two other options: you can write about politics, or you can write about love. Also, my favorite kind of scenes to write are courtships. I love watching people get to know each other, and awake to each other, and investigate the possibility of feelings they have. I love watching people open up in the light of each other’s company, like little flowers. Orange Flower Water is more about the after effects of that moment, but it is in there all the same.