KIDNAP ROAD
by Catherine Filloux
While Ingrid Betancourt, a former senator and anti-corruption activist, was running for President of Colombia, she was kidnapped by the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias (FARC), a Marxist revolutionary terrorist organization. This story is a theatrical imagining based on those events. The Woman narrates through “intrusive memory,” a symptom of PTSD, grappling with an ever-present series of moments in her life as the play moves in time and place via fragmentary scenes in a variety of locations. The Man shifts kaleidoscopically between roles including FARC commanders and guards; the Woman’s deceased father; her children, who are growing up without her; God; and her lover, a fellow hostage.
- Cast Size: 1M 1W
- Running Time: 90+ minutes
- Royalty Rate: $75 per performance
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About the Playwright
CATHERINE FILLOUX is an award-winning French American playwright and librettist who has been writing about human rights for many decades. Filloux’s play “How to Eat an Orange” was commissioned by INTAR, with the premiere at La MaMa in New York City. “White Savior” is nominated for The Venturous Play List. Catherine’s plays have been produced around the U.S. and internationally including: her livestream web drama “turning your body into a compass” at CultureHub, NYC; “whatdoesfreemean?” at Nora’s Playhouse, NYC; “Kidnap Road”, La MaMa, NYC; “Selma ‘65”, La MaMa and U.S. tour; “Luz”, La MaMa and Looking for Lilith in Louisville, KY.
“Dog and Wolf” (59E59 Theaters/Watson Arts, NYC and “Dog and Wolf” Community Outreach Project.); “Killing the Boss” (Cherry Lane Theatre, NYC); “Lemkin’s House” (Rideau de Bruxelles, Belgium; McGinn-Cazale Theatre & 78th Street Theatre Lab, NYC; Kamerni teatar 55, Sarajevo, Bosnia); “The Beauty Inside” (New Georges, NYC and InterAct, Philadelphia; also translated into Arabic for a workshop at ISADAC in Rabat, Morocco; and produced in Iraq, in Kurdish by ArtRole.) “Eyes of the Heart” (National Asian American Theatre Co., NYC); “Silence of God” (Contemporary American Theater Festival [CATF], WV); “Mary and Myra” (CATF and Todd Mountain Theater, NY); “Arthur’s War” (commissioned by Theatreworks/ USA, NYC); “Photographs From S-21”, a short play produced throughout the world; “Escuela del Mundo” (commissioned by The Ohio State University, Columbus, and Ohio tour.)
Filloux is the librettist for four produced operas: “New Arrivals” (Houston Grand Opera, composer John Glover); “Where Elephants Weep” (Chenla Theatre, Phnom Penh, Cambodia, composer Him Sophy) and broadcast on national television in Cambodia; “The Floating Box” (Asia Society, NYC, composer Jason Kao Hwang) an Opera News Critic’s Choice and released by New World Records. Catherine is co-librettist with composer Olga Neuwirth for the opera “Orlando” which premiered at the Vienna State Opera and is a Grawemeyer Award winner. Filloux’s new musical “Welcome to the Big Dipper” (composer Jimmy Roberts, co-book writer John Daggett) was a National Alliance for Musical Theatre finalist and received a workshop at the Redhouse Arts Center in Syracuse, NY. Opera in development: Thresh’s “L’Orient” (composer Kamala Sankaram, choreographer Preeti Vasudevan.)
Catherine has traveled for her plays to Bosnia, Cambodia, Guatemala, Haiti, Iraq, Morocco, and to Sudan and South Sudan on an overseas reading tour with the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program; Filloux was invited to Belfast, Northern Ireland for the Henry Smith Artist in Residence Programme with The Derry Playhouse. She served as a Juror for Sarajevo’s MES International Theater Festival and developed the Oral History Project “A Circle of Grace” with the Cambodian Women’s Group at St. Rita’s Refugee Center in Bronx, NY. Her plays have been widely anthologized and written about. Filloux was the Playwright Facilitator for the International Playwright Retreat at La MaMa Umbria in Italy and is a Fulbright Senior Specialist. She received her French Baccalaureate in Philosophy with Honors in Toulon, France, and her M.F.A. at New York University, Tisch School of the Arts, Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing, NYC. Catherine is featured in the documentary film “Acting Together on the World Stage” and is the co-founder of Theatre Without Borders.
ALSO BY CATHERINE FILLOUX
“There is nothing more dangerous than a feminine feminist”
When I read the description of Kidnap Road, I expected a bit of an exaggerated political drama but it was much more than that. This play will thrust the audience into a contemplation of identity, power, and female strength as it retells the real story of Ingrid Betancourt, a presidential candidate in Colombia who was kidnapped in 2002 by the FARC guerrillas and held captive for over 6 years. It is a mind-altering story of captivity, the reality Ingrid faced when her security, freedom, personhood, and family were stripped away from her, thoughtlessly, inhumanely.
“Kidnap Road” is not only about captivity, it is also about the internal, mental war that prevails long into her time under the shackles of the FARC. It will introduce the audience to the complexity of Colombian political history. Ingrid came and went as a strong woman: she was demonstrably human. Throughout the play, Betancourt’s sense of reality, purpose, and resilience is continuously challenged as before her kidnapping, she was one to fight against corruption and the rights of the people, but after her extensive time under inhumane captivity, all of her ideals and political principles become almost meaningless in her contemplation. Her captors dehumanize her, she is reduced to a number— nameless. And over time, through conversations with God and a friend, Ingrid begins to question her place in the world.
This play is an especially heavy piece to read as a Latin American woman who is and has been aware of the violence that prevails in South America, and, at times, it could be particularly challenging to read the retelling of Ingrid’s real, 6-year long nightmare. “Kidnap Road” provides an emotional and peace-disturbing ride down a long and winding road of female strength and resilience. The only downside: you will spend hours reading about Ingrid Betancourt’s story after finishing this retelling of her strength.
Review Kidnap Road.