rain falls special on me
by Lane Michael Stanley
3M | 2F | 1TGNC
When it rains in Austin, Texas, the best place to stay dry through the night is behind the theater. Weather and circumstance bring together Mikey, Snake, Miss Candace, Motor, Mac, and Julie - all of whom are on the street for different reasons, here now to navigate their relationships, dreams, and often, survival.
This play exists thanks to years of stories from hundreds of individuals. Some come from friends and acquaintances of Lane’s, met through transitional housing and substance abuse recovery programs. Some come from community workshops of this and other writing with people experiencing homelessness in Austin, Texas and Baltimore, Maryland. Community members have responded to drafts, participated in readings, and shared lived experience as the primary research sources for this play. Many stories were shared through Port Recovery, Helping Up Mission, Challenger Street Newspaper, Street Lit at the Austin Resource Center for the Homeless, Angel House, Terrazas Branch Library, Trinity Center, First Austin Baptist Church, Mobile Loaves and Fishes, and under the 6th Street bridge. In particular, this play would not exist without the contributions of Marcilas Jackson, Linda Jackson, Billy Shaw, and Pirate Joe.
People experiencing homelessness are already part of the theater-going experience for audiences of many theaters, especially those in downtowns. May this play be an opportunity for any theater to start conversations with their city's homeless communities, to invite them in, to share space and stories, to create together.
Productions
Ground Floor Theatre, Austin, TX
directed by Patti Neff Tiven
September 10-26, 2021
Development History
Aye Defy - New York, NY
Reading
directed by Graham Schmidt
July 29, 2020
University of Texas New Theatre - Austin, TX
Reading
directed by Andrea Hart
March 8, 2020
Terrazas Branch Library - Austin, TX
Monthly workshop with people experiencing homelessness
September-December, 2019
Trinity Center - Austin, TX
Reading
May 31, 2019
HBMG Foundation’s National Winter Playwrights Retreat - Creede, CO
Reading
January 5, 2019
Praise
“rain falls special on me presents many stories and helps everyone understand the culture of homelessness as it grows all around us. In this the play is an ethnography, but one illuminating that culture in a stage presentation.”
-CTX Live Theatre
“…the most fragile and complex insight into the vivid lives being lived all around our homes and workplaces by Austin's unhoused population.”
-Broadway World
Read rain falls special on me on the New Play Exchange, or contact Lane for the script.
Reading at Aye Defy in NYC, directed by Graham Schmidt. Keith Randolph Smith as Mikey, David Zayas as Snake, Becca Blackwell as Motor, Cat Palacios as Julie, Nate Miller as Mac, Lana Dieterich as Miss Candace, and Maya Quetzali Gonzales reading Stage Directions.