“A few months ago, I saw The Living Theatre’s revival of The Brig. I wanted to create a piece in that same setting - a military prison. However, I didn’t want it to be about the military or the politics of the day. I was looking for a counter. The surrealist painters noted that when two objects seemingly unrelated were brought together a third event took place. That third event was surrealism. I don’t see APIS as surrealistic, although there are moments that are surreal. I have borrowed from the surrealists the notion of combining two elements to create a third. I don’t know why it came to me, but I applied the world of the honey bee to that of a brig.

The foundation of the play is bees. Drones are born for the sole purpose of mating with the queen which they do in flight and fall to earth dead from the encounter. Workers work to gather pollen and nectar and, at the end of the season, kill any remaining drones who have not mated in order to perserve the honey. If the queen dies, new queens are hatched and fight to the death until one survives, at which time the hive flies off with her to find a new home. Work, sex and death - all too familiar to humans.

The insect world is inhabited by drama. It makes the human world look tame in comparison. Upon beginning rehearsals my premise was simple - ‘If humans had motivations of the honey bee what drama would unfold?’ We’re into the third week of rehearsal with a cast of ten. For the first two weeks I kept my cast in the dark. They knew they were prisoners in a cell but they did not know they were bees.”

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