Closed Loop of Consanguinity | BorderLight 2026

Carol Laursen & Emily Liptow

I am always so grateful to have the opportunity to catch something I missed the first time around. Emily Liptow and Carol Laursen were developing Closed Loop of Consanguinity at Cleveland Public Theatre as part of Soft Launch last winter (where our elder child was also presenting) but we missed it. Here it is again!

Carol and I met at Ohio University and we performed together in Michael Frayn's Wild Honey in 1990, and later in Eight Impressions of a Lunatic for Red Hen Productions. I have directed her In Shakespeare. We are both citizens of Cleveland Heights, her children were child-minders for our children. I love Carol.

Closed Loop of Consanguinity is a brief, semi-improvised dance and movement piece in which the two artists explore the space and objects and each other and at times even the audience. The event begins with a voiceover inviting the audience to switch seats, to have a different perspective, and I kept thinking of that as I watched them, asking myself what their perspective was at any given moment.

After the show an audience member I was speaking with wondered what "consanguinity" means and I told them it's having a common ancestor, to be connected by blood.  I also admitted I looked that up before the show.

Consanguinity is on a double-bill with In Visible Orbit, created and performed by Greenhouse. They perform strenuous choreography to anxiety-inducing music, allowing us to bear witness to the physical toll the work takes on them, at the same time how dedicated they are to the performance. It's a celebration of grace and exhaustion, pain and exhilaration.

While I was there I ran into playwright Eric Coble. He strongly recommends H.O.P.E., Natasha Mirny's modern interpretation of the myth of Pandora. 

BorderLight Theatre Festival at Playhouse Square, July 8-11, 2026