Carole Eglash-Kosoff was born during the Great Depression and wants everyone to know that she has seen all this shit before. “At 92,” she says, “you can say damn near anything.” She’s taking advantage of her status as an elder to remind people struggling with today’s harrowing political landscape that “we’ve been through it, we’ll survive it, chill out.”
Eglash is the writer of plays, novels, and a plethora of essays exploring history. Her upcoming show at Center Stage Theater takes audiences on a comedic journey of her almost century of experience watching the country churn and spill and right itself again.
“All history has its origin somewhere else,” she says. “What I find interesting isn’t the [historical] event, but how did we get there? How did we get to Donald Trump? How did we get to the situation in the Middle East? Go back to 1945 when the concentration camps were emptied and nobody wanted those half a million people…. Drop them in the middle of a cluster of Muslim countries — it’s not going to work.”
The Rahn Coleman Trio provides musical underscore to the show, which touches on hot-button issues such as racism, abortion, and immigration — all through a non-political lens. Instead, Eglash focuses on the need for productive dialogue. “When WWII started, there were different points of view, but people would come together, talk about it, and resolve things. We can’t even resolve the TSA squabble,” she says. “This country was started by seven million white guys who all looked alike. Now we have 350 million people, none of whom look alike, and we have to learn, if the country is going to move forward, to talk to each other without anger.”
See I’ve Seen This Sh*t Before on Saturday, April 25, at 8 p.m. and Sunday, April 26, at 2 p.m. at Center Stage Theater (751 Paseo Nuevo) in Paseo Nuevo. See centerstagetheater.org. Check out caroleeglashkosoff.com to learn more about the artist.
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