Sweatpants
Once upon a time, a human lived with a brand new, much smaller human. Their names, respectively, were Tired Green Sweatpants and Teensy Tiny Onesie. Life was going pretty much as expected, considering Sweatpants had just given birth and Onesie was still getting the hang of staying asleep for more than four minutes at a time.
Until Sweatpants’ mother left to close up the family cottage, leaving the parentally inexperienced and noise-sensitive Sweatpants alone with an inconsolable baby, some vague advice—and a mysterious and mystical creature who may or may not have their best interests at heart.
Sweatpants is a collaborative circus show featuring two excerpts of a modern fairy tale written by Sal Sawler and adapted by circus artist Vanessa Furlong. These two excerpts explore issues of parenthood, community, and neurodivergence.
Performers and crew include Vanessa Furlong, Rachele Manett, Marina MacDonald, Laura Selenzi, Maddi Adams, April Hubbard, and Torin Thibodeau, Steph Kincade and Sal Sawler.
Sweatpants is a collaborative circus show featuring two excerpts of a modern fairy tale written by Sal Sawler and adapted by circus artist Vanessa Furlong. Performers and crew include Vanessa Furlong, Rachele Manett, Marina MacDonald, Laura Selenzi, Maddi Adams, April Hubbard, and Torin Thibodeau, Steph Kincade and Sal Sawler.
The project was born from Sal and Vanessa’s desire to collaborate on a project during the relative quiet of the pandemic. Both collaborators share an interest in myths and fairy tales, are parents, and identify as neurodivergent. They had also recently read a brilliant non-fiction book by Amanda Leduc, called Disfigured: On Fairy Tales, Disability, and Making Space, which unpacks and challenges the ableism that is inherent in so many traditional fairy tales.
These common threads and shared experiences came together to inspire Sweatpants, a story about a single parent who struggles to care for their child due to the usual challenges, like sleep deprivation and inexperience, but also some extras, like trauma-induced noise sensitivity and anxiety. When Sweatpants attempts to push through these challenges alone, their anxiety comes to life as Judgy Green Fairy—an antagonist that Sweatpants must find compassion for in order to both heal and overcome intergenerational trauma.
The first sparks of this project occurred when Sal pulled a reversed Hierophant card from Vanessa’s tarot deck. While the Hierophant is generally tied to religion, the symbolism of the reversed card focuses on themes of defying tradition and seeking out new ways to live and be. These themes found their way into Sweatpants’ exploration of parenthood. While traditionally, humans raised children collaboratively, in modern times, the modern “tradition” or “way of being” focuses on nuclear families, which, for a variety of personal and systemic reasons, has resulted in many parents lacking strong support systems. The full narrative of Sweatpants challenges this norm and advocates for collective community care.
While Sal focused on developing and writing the fairy tale, Vanessa selected two excerpts and adapted them into a circus show that quite literally sends Sweatpants swinging, juggling, and tumbling through their parental challenges. While choreographing the show, Vanessa had the opportunity to experiment with some unconventional circus apparatuses and props. The playpen still features front and centre.
Vanessa workshopped these excerpts with a group of talented performers and members of the Halifax disability community in 2022. In fall of 2023, the show was workshopped in front of a Halifax Fringe Festival audience. This project was generously funded by the Canada Council for the Arts.
In future years, Sal and Vanessa hope to secure funding to develop the full project.
Showtimes at 7:00 PM and 9:00 PM
6:00 PM - 12:00 AM
7:00 PM
9:00 PM
This project was made possible through the generous support of:
