Theater artist Rhodessa Jones and her Medea Project for Incarcerated Women are collaborating with Planned Parenthood Shasta Pacific (Planned Parenthood) to create BIRTHRIGHT, a performance work developed through a residency, workshops, and public forums.
The project marks the first time Jones has worked with the subject of women’s reproductive rights. Its goal is to give a public voice to Planned Parenthood clients without exploiting them and while keeping their identities confidential. Ideas and discussions from the workshops and discussion forums will become the performance material.
Jones is co-artistic director of the acclaimed performance company Cultural Odyssey. She is an actress, director, teacher, singer, and writer, who also is the founder and director of the award-winning Medea Project: Theater for Incarcerated Women, a performance workshop that is designed to help incarcerated women achieve personal and social transformation.
Founded in 1962, and with roots dating back to the 1920s in San Francisco, Planned Parenthood Shasta Pacific provides essential reproductive health care and sexuality education programs with the belief that all people have the right to make their own decisions regarding their reproductive and sexual lives. It delivers care and education to disadvantaged communities from San Francisco to Mount Shasta.