About Us

Mission

Those Women Productions gives the stage to unheard stories. We explore the intersections of gender, power, and identity, inviting all audiences to join the conversation.

Vision

We envision a world in which people of all genders and races are the protagonists of their own stories.

Values

We believe that stories matter.
We challenge stereotypes.
We eliminate financial barriers to theater attendance.
We aim to engage the heart, provoke thought, and instigate conversation.

As individuals and as the leaders of Those Women Productions, we dedicate ourselves to the ongoing work of unlearning racism and of forging an antiracist artistic practice. We recognize the limitations of our own perspectives, and so we actively seek to engage with others in our community whose experiences and points of view differ from our own. We are deeply grateful to our friends and colleagues who have shared and continue to share their wisdom with us and who help us find the courage to learn from our mistakes.

~ Carol S. Lashof & Elizabeth L. Vega

November 25, 2021

Land Acknowledgement

We live and work on the unceded ancestral territory of the Lisjan (Ohlone) people. We gratefully acknowledge the Lisjan community for their ongoing care of the land, and we support the work of the Sogorea Te’ Land Trust “to heal and transform the legacies of colonization, genocide, and patriarchy.” We invite our audiences to learn more and to consider donating to the Shuumi Land Tax (as we do) to support the critical work of this urban Indigenous women-led land trust: https://sogoreate-landtrust.org/

History

When we were as yet too young for other sorts of debauchery to hold much appeal, we fell in love with great stories. Mostly these were stories by Dead White Guys. Homer and Chaucer, Shakespeare and Sophocles, myths and folklore of every variety, we loved them all. To this day, we are subject to their power—they make our heads spin and our pulses race. But we also recognize that in these classic tales, the voices of women are often silenced and their lives relegated to the margins. That’s a sobering fact. And we’d rather stay giddy with the joy of tales worth telling. So, on International Women’s Day 2014 we formed THOSE WOMEN PRODUCTIONS to explore classic stories from new angles.

~ Carol S. Lashof & Elizabeth L. Vega
April 21, 2014

ESCAPE VELOCITY is recommended by Lily Janiak at SFGate to all those who want to “rocket away from sexism.”
“Shakespeare would have been proud to see his work take on new life in MARGARET OF ANJOU,” says The Daily Californian.
Lily Janiak of the San Francisco Chronicle profiles Artistic Director Libby Vega: ““There can be a tendency to say, ‘If their stories were interesting, we would know them already.’” But, Vega continues, “just because the story’s not being told doesn’t mean the story’s not there.'”
About MARGARET OF ANJOU, Sam Hurwitt of The Mercury News writes: “the experiment of creating the illusion of a Shakespeare play all about Margaret is a success.”
Berkeleyside features Those Women Productions: “Carol Lashof and Libby Vega aren’t ashamed to reveal their infatuations with the “dead white guys” who populate the Western Canon.”
BEST OF THE EAST BAY: On the occasion of our first birthday in 2015, The East Bay Express named us “Best Year-Old Theater Company.”
Theater critic Sam Hurwitt described our production of IN PLAIN SIGHT as “a provocative mix of voices and perspectives on these classic tales that may inspire the viewer to look back at the originals with new eyes.”
The Dramatist Magazine lauds Those Women for joining the fight for gender parity, “turn[ing] patriarchy on its ear.”
Our production of DISCLOSURE was highlighted in the San Francisco Chronicle’s feature on the “hot SF scene” at PianoFight.
About our inaugural production in 2014, the Daily Californian wrote: “JUST DESERTS is offering something surprisingly new, and drawing a new audience. It is absolutely worth seeing, with or without a grasp of Greek mythology. This play works on multiple levels, and satisfies as diverse an audience as it attracts.”
JUST DESERTS was also an Editor’s Pick of Theatre Bay Area Magazine, where critic Lily Janiak wrote, “Lashof ingeniously channels both what many treasure about Greek mythology–its pitting of evenly matched foes in debates that dig deeper and deeper as combatants seem to be going in circles–while also skewering its misogyny.”

Our Founders

Carol S. Lashof, Cofounder

Executive Director

Carol Lashof makes plays to change the stories we believe in because it’s the best way she knows to change the world we live in. Her work has been broadcast on BET (“Gap,” dir. Ryan Coogler) and NPR (“The Story,” dir. Martin Esslin) and staged on five continents from The Magic Theatre of San Francisco to Peking University in Beijing. Lashof is Professor Emerita at Saint Mary’s College of California, the Executive Director of Those Women Productions, and a member of the Dramatists Guild.

Elizabeth L. Vega, Cofounder

Producing Artistic Director

Elizabeth Vega is the Founding Artistic Director of Those Women Productions. She holds a BA in Liberal Arts from St. John’s College and an MFA in Staging Shakespeare from Exeter University where she studied at the Globe Theater in London. Directing credits include Troilus and Cressida at the Dell Theater in Stratford-Upon-Avon and the world premiere of Lashof’s Just Deserts for Those Women Productions. Vega has taught and directed around the Bay Area at such organizations as the San Francisco Shakespeare Festival and the Berkeley Rep School of Theater and currently serves on the faculty at Holden High School.

This Year's Associate Artists

Norman Patrick Johnson

Associate Artist

Norman Patrick Johnson works as an actor, director, dramaturg, and educator. He holds a BA in English Literature and Creative Writing from City College of New York and completed the Meisner Technique training program at the Bay City Studios in San Francisco. An Associate Artist with Those Women Productions, Johnson has, most recently, served as director and dramaturg for the world premiere of Nick Mwaluko’s “They/Them” for Shifting Spaces (TBA Awards Finalist, 2018). He is the director of the Middle School Drama program at The Berkeley School

Those Women Productions
A Feminist Community Theater
c/o P.O. Pack #288
1700 Shattuck Ave.
Berkeley, CA 94709

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