She Kills Monsters

She Kills Monsters, written by Qui Nguyen tells the story of Agnes Evans after losing her mother, father, and younger sister Tilly in a car accident. While packing away her sister's things, Agnes discovers a Dungeons and Dragons campaign (or module) Tilly wrote. Agnes enlists Tilly's old DnD friend to play through the module with her, to help her better get to know her sister and fight monsters within the game, while battling her personal demons outside of it.

Though the script itself is very funny, I knew I wanted to heavily contextualize the show around Agnes's loss of Tilly as that's something that is never absent from her mind. As a result, I decided to design the show around a found object style, building the set out of moving boxes filled with Tilly's old stuff and assemble the DnD monsters, costumes, and props out of household objects. 

This allowed us to be very playful with staging, props, and sight gags of different sorts throughout the show. And by taking something as mundane as cardboard and making it exciting and vibrant, we brought the audience on the same journey as Agnes: initially scoffing at the silliness of the world of Dungeons and Dragons, but by the end feeling completely invested.

The Tiamat

The largest staging challenge in the show was Agnes’s battle with the Tiamat, a 5 headed dragon.

Throughout the show, Agnes is hung up on the fact that she never felt that she really knew Tilly, blaming all the "stuff" that was in the way between them, whether that was their age difference, Tilly's obsession with DnD, or their difference in personality. Ultimately, Agnes needs to accept that the Tilly she knew was the only Tilly she'll ever get to know, she has to come to terms with that before she can move on. Therefore, in my eyes the Tiamat had to represent the all of the stuff that was in the way between Agnes and Tilly. So what better material to make it out of than the boxes filled to the brim with Tilly's possessions? 

I loved watching the Tiamat be revealed every night to the audience because it was such a perfect moment where puppetry, storytelling, and spectacle combined to not just create something cool, but also incredibly meaningful to the story and Agnes's emotional arc. 

Watch the Tiamat reveal in action:

Photo Gallery

Here are some selected production stills from the show. Click on any picture to see it enlarged. All photos were taken by Edward Hansen. Production credits and cast are listed below: 

CREATIVE TEAM:

• Written by: Qui Nguyen

• Director: Jacob Surovsky

• Stage Manager: Andrew Hulin

• Assistant Stage Manager: Ben Wendel

• Lighting Designer: Derek Christiansen

• Sound Designer: Glenn Schuster

• Composer: Tristan Heinicke

• Scenic Designer: Ruby O'Brien

• Costume Designer: Amrit Singh

• Costume Supervisor: Elliot Solomon

• Weapons Master/Technical Director: Robin Maegawa-Goeser

• Fight Choreographer: Patrick Stayer

• Dance Choreographer: L Maddox

Press

USC Annenberg Media, She Kills Monsters Set to Slay at USC