LCT Awards “Spake” Top Prize in NKU’s “YES” Series

Panelists for the League of Cincinnati Theatres (LCT) have recognized Spake. by David L Williams, directed by Mike King, as the best production at the Northern Kentucky University’s YES festival, the Theater department’s 16th Biennial Year End Series Festival of New Plays.

In a packed Siberian church on a snowy day, a priest is eulogizing a 109-year-old town leader when the roof caves in, killing everyone inside. Only one speaker of the Ujide language remains: Nicholas, who’s still at college. His ex-girlfriend Jessica also has languages on the brain: namely finding a wellspring language, an idea that intrigued late Ithaca serial killer Edward Rulloff. The collapse begins an amazing sequence of events involving the untranslated Voynich Manuscript, a spell, the return of Rulloff and Nicholas’ dead sister, and a reversal of the Tower of Babel. A few flakes of snow will change the world forever.
Panelists described Spake as “a thought provoking and mystical journey into reincarnation and the power of language”; a “magical reality” play.