Taken Away: UpLift Physical Theatre

Taken Away – 2014
A production by UpLift Physical Theatre
Co-Creator, Co-Founder & Core Ensemble Member

In 2014, I co-created Taken Away with UpLift Physical Theatre, a company I co-founded and continue to collaborate with as a core ensemble member. The production was directed and produced by Joe Krienke, and created in collaboration with ensemble artists Jerome Yorke, Nicholette Routhier, Alyssa Hughlett, Moses Norton, and myself. Lighting design by Anthony Arnista and Michael Foster.

Following the success of Between the Lines, our ensemble continued its exploration of dramatic acrobatics—a hybrid performance language combining physical theatre, storytelling, and acrobatic partnering. In June 2014, Taken Away premiered to sold-out audiences at the Mad River Festival in Blue Lake, California.

Blending nonlinear collage storytelling with highly physical performance, Taken Away explores the porous boundaries between dimensions—where ghosts, spirits, guides, and demons walk beside us, shaping our lives and relationships. Through movement, gesture, and visceral imagery, the piece reveals patterns of falling, holding, catching, and being taken away, asking what it means to be supported, lost, or transformed by forces we cannot always see.

This work remains a foundational piece in UpLift’s repertoire and continues to influence our ongoing research into ensemble-based, physically rigorous theatre that speaks across language and experience.