Nature

Created and produced by TigerLion Arts, Nature is an outdoor experience like no other. An award-winning ensemble of actors and musicians brings audience members into a playful and deeply moving journey through their natural environment. The experience is filled with music, song, story, and celebration as scenes unfold around them in this feast for the senses.

 Led by director Markell Kiefer (Guthrie Theater, all Tigerlion Arts productions) the professional ensemble features Jason Rojas (Guthrie Theater, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Ten Thousand Things) as Thoreau; Tyson Forbes (Guthrie Theater, Ordway, Jungle Theater and all TigerLion Arts productions) as Emerson; Norah Long (Guthrie Theater, Skylark Opera, Nautilus Music-Theater) as Mother Nature, along with Twin Cities actors Paul de Cordova, Alex Barreto Hathaway, Kimberly Richardson, Chelsie Newhard, Thallis Santesteban, Eric “Pogi” Sumangil, Nathan Gebhard and bagpiper Ryan Behnke.

The play will take place alongside the rolling hills, the grassy expanses, the native trees and plantings at Lebanon Hills Regional Park, the largest park in the Dakota County park system. The story is an original work collaboratively created and performed by Tyson Forbes, a direct descendant of Ralph Waldo Emerson, and directed by Markell Kiefer. The play explores humankind's relationship to nature through the eyes of two of Americas great environmental voices, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. Forbes says, “I have always felt honored to be an Emerson descendent. I feel an intimate responsibility to his lineage, and for years I have imagined a play that could bring his spirit and teachings, along with that of his friend and fellow author Henry David Thoreau, to a broader audience. When I read their work, I find answers to burning questions on how to live my life more deeply and responsibly in this world. They were both radicals of their time, calling on their peers to think for themselves and be agents of change. I believe their words and ideas are as necessary now as they were then.”