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'What's Eating Katie?' Musical

Event Details

March 3, 2017 7:00 pm-9:00 pm
March 4, 2017 7:00 pm-9:00 pm

Bowker Auditorium

UMass Amherst Campus

Handicap access available
Free admission
Event website
Contact:
Kate Leddy
kleddy@umass.edu
914-309-1233

"What's Eating Katie?" is a musical written by Dina Zeckhausen, founder of the Eating Disorders Information Network, with composer Bryan Mercer. Katie meets Ed as she is preparing for her first day of college and all that it entails (new people, places, parties and, of course, warnings about the infamous "Freshman 15”). Seemingly kind and charming, Ed coerces her into extreme dieting with the promise that her problems can all be solved by one simple thing: being skinny. Katie’s literal struggle with an actor representing the eating disorder allows the audience to see and hear what it sounds like inside Katie’s head. Between scenes are hilarious “commercials” that parody the extreme diet, fashion, fast food and fitness industries around us. The show as a whole uses satire and musical numbers to expose our society’s body image issues and confront common misconceptions about eating disorders.

There is a terrible stigma that eating disorders are a "white woman's disease" and a major goal of the cast has been to demonstrate how mental health can affect any race, gender, sexuality, etc. and especially can be triggered by the prejudices that compromise identity (i.e. anorexia can rid a transgender man of breasts/menstrual cycle which they feel don't align with the body they identify with). These are topic we have been discussing throughout rehearsals and that we would like to share with the audience when we have our post-play discussion with a therapist from Walden Behavioral Care.
 

We invite you to join us on March 3rd and 4th at 7:00 in Bowker Auditorium for free admission to the show and the talk back session afterwards with the cast and a staff member from the Walden Behavioral Care Center in Amherst. RSVP on our Facebook event page and if you have any questions please contact wekumass@gmail.com

Directions:

Bowker Auditorium is located within Stockbridge Hall. https://fac.umass.edu/Online/default.asp?doWork::WScontent::loadArticle=...

Event Category

Diversity Theater Performance
Theater