How to Make a Doll
by Marisa Caruso
September 19-20, 2025 | 7:30pm
Torn Space Theater: 612 Fillmore Ave. Buffalo, NY
An interdisciplinary development performance about mental health, the brain, and a mother-daughter-artist relationship blending research, memoir and absurdity by Marisa Caruso. Where do brain anatomy, dollmaking, depression and healing overlap? In this performance, video, tactile object manipulation, sound and text interplay for a curious exploration of mental health, family and the transformative power of creation.
“Most people begin life as a mother’s doll. We fight hard to become our own creations, but the image of ourselves we see reflected in infancy lingers. In an extraordinary new one woman show, which is, by turns funny, surprising, and wrenching, the mirrored relationship between mother and daughter becomes a space of time travel. Carolyn Caruso, mired in a severe depression continued to be a doll maker even as her children grew. In a vast pile of lost socks – the materials of her mother’s craft – performer Marisa Caruso sorts through the past to seek out the forces that delivered her mother into electroshock treatment. Scientific films, projected shadows, and an accordion are among her tools for conjuring a fragile journey into identity. The two Carusos, daughter and mother, one present, one absent, collaborate on this work of play and grief, confusion and insight. As audience members, we are drawn into the play’s transformative space, catching sight of our own mismatched memories among the sock pile.”
– Nancy Barton, NYU Professor & Director, Prattsville Art Center
Dramaturgy/Direction: Gerry Trentham, Glo McDonald, Kristin McCalley, Adrian Shirk, Rod Sauquillo
Lighting / Technical Design: Gabriel Faure-Brac / Moonstar Lighting
Scenic Design Consultant/Embroidery & Sewing: Bee Murphy
Sound Design: Eric Burlingame
Production Technician: Dan Toner
Projection Mapping: Brian Milbrand
Rigging: Greg Robertson
Video Documentation: Zak Noweihed
This project was made possible with support from Sugar City and the New York State Council on the Arts with support from the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.
Photo by Rachele Schneekloth