[NoHo Arts District, CA] – A NoHo Arts theatre review of “Traveling With Angels” written and performed by J. Rene Pena, directed by Kimleigh Smith of Embrace Your Cape Productions as part of the Hollywood Fringe Adjacent – A Festival of Solo Shows.
J. Rene Pena is a successful and very busy actress with numerous TV and film credits to her name, but this is her first foray into writing and solo work. However, never in a million years would you ever know this was her first time, just how excellent and beautifully crafted “Traveling with Angels” truly is.
This really is the retelling of a life, from her very beginnings as a small child in Gallup, New Mexico, growing up amongst a myriad of tribes in the “Indian Capital of the World,” located as it is in the heart of Native American lands, with Navajo, Zuni, Hopi, and many other tribes all around it. We are treated to stories of the annual parade with every North American, central and southern tribe imaginable walking the main street of Gallup and filling up a young girl’s spirit and soul with the magic of belonging. Stories of her mother and aunts and cousins and of her beloved grandmother who is now one of her angels. All shared with wonderful detail, brilliant humor and a deep sense of longing for those who have passed. But Ms Pena’s stories are also filled with light and love, she has an uncanny talent for infusing joy into every word and the effect is deeply touching and inspiring.
The beautifully recounted history is centred around the culture of Ms Pena’s Native American history, but it’s also mixed with her own individual story, her own path. How she met, married and then traveled with her husband all over the world. Injecting her uniqueness into every place they lived together. Her adventures, her inspirations, her ability to adapt to everything that is thrown at her. Each chapter of her life seems punctuated by a passing though and these are who become her angels, her guides and her spirits. As she unfolds her story she brings with her a suitcase. Emblazoned with the art of her tribe of choice and reflecting her own vibrant soul with its colors. This suitcase is like her heart. It’s tough, but vintage, warmly colorful, uniquely decorated and full of secrets she is ready to share. And she brings it with her to every moment of the life she shares with us…and when her angels ‘become’ she dances and sings her heartbreak with an ancestors voice.
This is a gorgeous show. Her life is seen through the eyes of a woman full of the strength of those who have loved her and who she has loved. These angels are with her still and I swear they were with us all in the theatre that night. There’s sadness of course to loss, but this wonderful show helped me see my own losses in a different way. People die, they leave us no matter how hard we want them not to, or how hard they hold on. I feel connected to my own angels through my memories and the objects I surround myself with. Perhaps the books and furniture I have in my home are my own versions of Ms Pena’s suitcase. I know I often linger with them, leafing through books and remembering. It’s more than a comfort. It’s a way of honoring my own angels and of feeling watched over by them still.
“Traveling With Angles” is a tribute to Ms Pena’s incredible life, and what a glorious arc it has taken. But it is also a prayer of thanks to where she came from. The places, as well as the people and the way she writes about all of them make me yearn to meet them, wish I could go back in time and watch her as a child, waiting on the curb for her favorite tribes to pass by in the parade wearing their beautiful ceremonial costumes and scaring her… just a little.
If you ever have the chance to see “Traveling with Angels,” and I believe you might as J. Rene Pena performs the show fairly regularly, then I urge you to go…and go with a heart as open as this marvelous performer.
Watch the A Funny Way Of Looking With Michael J interview here.