Sarah lives and paints alone. When her night is interrupted by a horrific phone call, Sarah becomes haunted by the West Philadelphia house in which she was raised. COMET is equal parts memory-play and parable about Black girls growing up too fast. COMET interrogates the formative years of our imagination and the worlds we create to protect ourselves. How can we move past trauma that we can’t perceive into a future we couldn’t imagine?
COMET was the second Barrymore-eligible show of the 2024 season, including our accompanying art-exhibition featuring twelve brilliant creatives.
Thank you to the entire theatre community of Philadelphia for this honor.
Rayne founded Upstream Performance Collaborative with a $2,500 inclusive-community grant awarded during their time at Ursinus. It has grown into a scrappy, formidable collection of “young” emerging artists.
This is only the beginning!
"COMET was simply amazing! My fourteen year old son who is homeschooled and I were able to catch you in action at the Painted Bride on Friday night. This was our first theatre event for the year, and you did not disappoint. When I tell you that we were both mesmerized by your stage presence, performance, and creativity. Your character spoke to so many layers that we both experienced. Thank you for bringing real like to ART. Your gifts are beyond amazing! I'm looking forward to seeing you on the stage again."
"COMET is a very unique one person show about the relationship between a daughter and her father. The show presents a fresh take on the concept of a solo performance, delighting audiences with lots of heart, hope and nostalgia."
"[The Barrymore Award for Outstanding Original Performance is...] [w]ell deserved! Congrats! So glad I got to see this lovingly crafted and performed play."
"It was as if we were really watching the actor evolve or sometimes devolve into a traumatic memory."
"A rich piece of mixed media, multi-dimensional art. It felt like a dream (at times, a nightmare), throughout which the feelings were familiar, yet everything felt otherworldly in a fascinating and unsettling way. I was thoroughly engaged and intrigued throughout."
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COMET was the second Barrymore-eligible show of the 2024 season, including our accompanying art exhibition featuring twelve brilliant creatives.
Thank you to the entire theatre community of Philadelphia for this honor.
Written by Rayne
Directed by Ryan Rebel
Story by Ang(ela) Bey and Ryan Rebel
Stage Managed by Lindsey Silver
Performed by Rayne with Ciera Gardner, Jo Vito Ramirez, Ava Weintzweig, Ryan Rebel, Kash Goins, and Wendi Smith.
Exhibition Assistant & Choreography Consultant: Taylor Cawley
Assistant Stage Management: Ciera Gardner
Lighting Design: Bless Rudisill
Set Design: Andrew Robinson
Sound Design: Ava Weintzweig
Prop Design: Jo Vito Ramírez
Assistant Prop Design: Lindsey Silver
Production Manager: Ryan Rebel
Photography: Gregory Bissell
Production Photography: Anna Ryabova
Production Videography: Alex Wiles
Exhibition Artists: Karen Dorman, “LOW” Lucas O Woelk, Tania Maatouk, Hannah Dymowski, Shreya Ragavan, Amir Gad, Suni B Rose, Grant Schatzman, Laurie Rebel, Alison Lindley, and Taylor Cawley
COMET is supported by the Black Theatre Alliance of Philadelphia, The Painted Bride Art Center, crowd-funding, and private donors.
You can still donate to Upstream through Venmo. Every little bit helps support the artists responsible for COMET.
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Many world religions grapple with the End of Things through prophecy and poetry. In 1995, two Christian fiction writers and prophecy enthusiasts, Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins, released the first book in the “Left Behind” series. Their wildly popular sci-fi interpretation of the book of Revelation became the de facto contemporary Christian understanding of the end times. Many claim the Rapture is the only valid interpretation of God’s truth. This is extremely narrow and problematic, to say the least...
Upstream Performance Collaborative is creating an Afrofuturist dark comedy about the end times called WhatWhiteJesusDo?. Leeway Art & Change Grant Recipient playwright Rayne sought the insights of an intersectional, multifaith community to deepen the play’s development.
“Reading the Rapture” was a series of group dialogues about apocalypse and afterlife. Participants were from all backgrounds and discussed a variety of religious and secular texts. Rayne invited participants to share their questions, responses, and lived-experiences, to their comfort-- be they religious or secular.
Meetings were completely free, open to the public, and drop-in with no requirement for consistent attendance. Sessions were an hour and a half and took place on:
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Thursday, March 7th, 2024 - What is the Rapture?
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Thursday, March 21st, 2024- Prophecy
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Thursday, April 4th, 2024 - Prophecy: Part 2
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Thursday, April 18th, 2024 - Race & Religion
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Thursday, May 2nd, 2024 - The Body
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Thursday, May 16th, 2024 - Racism & Rapture
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Thursday, June 6th, 2024 - Fate
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Thursday, June 20th, 2024 - Paul
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Wednesday, July 3rd, 2024 - JOHN?
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Thursday, July 25th, 2024 - End Times
Click here to access anonymized session transcripts.
