118: Almost 13 With Joan Kane

Joan Kane (director, writer, performer, educator) recently performed her script of Almost 13 in the Edinburgh Festival Fringereceiving a five-star review. She also got favourable reviews for her direction of Safe and what do you mean in New York and Edinburgh.

  She is the founding Artistic Director of Ego Actus Theatre Company. Off Broadway, she directed Sycorax at HERE, Play Nice! at 59e59 theatres, and I Know What Boys Want at Theatre Row. She directed Six Characters in Search of an Author in Oslo, Norway and Kafka’s Belinda in Prague.

 Joan was awarded Best Director in the United Solo Festival where she has directed six pieces. She was named to the Indie Theatre Hall of Fame by nytheatre.com. 

 She has also directed plays and readings at the Lark, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Urban Stages, Workshop Theatre, Nylon Fusion, Abingdon Theatre, Oberon Theatre, the Samuel French Short Play Festival, T. Schreiber Studio, and many others. Joan is an alumni of the LaMama directing and playwriting symposiums in Umbria, Italy.

 She is a member of the Playwright/Director unit at Actor’s Studio, the League of Professional Theatre Women, the Dramatists Guild, and the Society of Stage Directors & Choreographers

 Some key points from our interview:

·        How she believes that being broken is ok 

·        How in the summer of 1969 she witnessed a gang member being murdered and she was then raped by the murderer to silence her

·        How she became a selected mute after these traumas, as she was too scared to speak out

·        How a friend encouraged her to go for therapy at high school as she was having obtrusive dreams

·        How she was encouraged at a writing retreat in Italy to share her story

·        How it took her many years to write her story down due to shame and denial

·        How writing has been her escape from trauma and her therapy too

·        How she’s passionate about storytelling and wrote “Almost 13” which are her memories of a young girl’s violent summer in Brooklyn and plays all 10 characters herself 

·        How she believes we can all have horrible things happen to us, but we can survive them too

Review of Almost 13  - “Joan Kane sets an example to others to face up to their stories and to be prepared to share them in order to disseminate, perhaps dissipate and gain some healing through the process”



Hosted by Madeleine Black, the show will share stories of all the amazing people Madeleine has met on her own journey as an author/speaker and these stories will heal, motivate, inspire and bring hope when they share their wisdom and knowledge with her.

She really believes in the power that comes when we share our stories, that in fact we are not story tellers but story healers. Tune in to discover what helped them to stay unbroken and together we will discover that none of us are broken beyond repair.

You can find out more about Madeleine, her story and her memoir, Unbroken,  from her website: https://madeleineblack.co.uk/


You can listen to the full extended series of incredible stories on https://www.buzzsprout.com/1386718

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Watch Short Vlog Versions on our You Tube Channel HERE