Theater The Man Who Failed to Fly Thu–Sat, Apr 9–11, 8pm Teatro Santa Ana Biblioteca Pública Reloj 50A 100 pesos

Did I fail to fly, or have I succeeded in staying?
By Fran Rowe

New York City in late summer 2001, was still a time when the fall of the World Trade Center waited in the wings. At that time, living in the East Village, I was writing a one-act play: The Man Who Failed to Fly.

On September 10, three days before the scheduled opening, the cast met for dress rehearsal. It was to be held on the open-air stage of the East Village Sixth Street Garden. Lively Mexican music reached the streets and neighborhood people were drawn in to the pre-event. In the story, an American advertising man, Sterling Britmore, falls captive to an unthinkable notion—to remain in an enchanted Pacific Coast fishing village in Mexico, a place where his brief vacation is ending. He imagines leaving his driven life behind him and he struggles with all the conflicts that attend it…a universal theme.

On the morning following dress rehearsal, the curtain rose instead on 9/11, an American Tragedy. We wept, we struck the set and swept the dust of all our sorrows from the stage floor.

After eight years, copies of the play’s scripts rose like spirits from unexpected places. It was time for The Man Who Failed to Fly to ascend. The story gained substance with the additions of Acts II and III and at last, like a hopeful amendment, I added to the title: (a love story). Written and directed by Ana della Marina Rego, The Man Who Failed to Fly (a love story) premiers in Teatro Santa Ana.