Miami Theater Company Stages Provocative Play About Slain Gaza Activist

True Mirage Theater is presenting “My Name is Rachel Corrie,” starring Celia Voges and directed by Daniel Gil, in its new black box theater home in Kendall. The show runs two weeks beginning Friday, June 12 and through Sunday, June 21. (Photo courtesy of Emily Rodriguez/True Mirage Theater)

More than two decades after activist Rachel Corrie was killed while attempting to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian home in Gaza, a Miami theater company is bringing her story to the stage.

True Mirage Theater is presenting “My Name is Rachel Corrie” in its new black box theater home in Kendall after having been a nomadic company for almost a decade. The play, running for two weekends through Sunday, June 21, draws from the activist’s actual diaries and messages.

In 2003, Corrie was crushed to death by an Israeli Defense Forces armored bulldozer in Gaza. The Washington state native had traveled to the city of Rafah with the International Solidarity Movement, intending to use her own body to block the unlawful demolition of Palestinian civilian homes. The killing of a young, white American woman by IDF forces sparked an international incident, with even U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro calling into question the Israeli military investigation that declared her death accidental. Palestinians hailed her as a martyr; a street in the city of Ramallah was renamed in her honor.

More than two decades after activist Rachel Corrie was killed while attempting to prevent the demolition of a Palestinian home in Gaza, True Mirage Theater company brings the play, which opened in London, to its Kendall black box theater. (Photo courtesy of Emily Rodriguez/True Mirage Theater)

In 2026, the home that Corrie died to defend no longer exists. Its owners, the Nasrallah family, were forced to move elsewhere in Rafah when the IDF eventually succeeded in destroying their home. And Rafah itself has been all but destroyed by Israeli bombardment, bulldozers and controlled destruction in a post-October 7 war that has resulted in formal accusations of genocide leveled against the country’s leaders before the International Court of Justice.

The play, which premiered in 2005 at London’s Royal Court Theatre, was edited by actor and director Alan Rickman (known for portraying Severus Snape in the “Harry Potter” films), and journalist Katharine Viner from Corrie’s diaries and emails.

The True Mirage production marks a number of milestones for the cast and crew. It’s the Miami premiere of the play and the inaugural production in the company’s new black box theater in Kendall, a venue so new they’re still in the middle of renovations according to director and company co-founder Daniel Gil. And it marks the professional debut of its lead actress Celia Voges, who plays Corrie. The New World School of the Arts grad, a veteran of the company’s youth productions currently pursuing a BFA in acting from Boston University, says she was drawn to the unconventional nature of the play, as well as its current events relevance.

True Mirage Theater’s production marks the professional debut of its lead actress Celia Voges, who plays Corrie. The New World School of the Arts grad, a veteran of the company’s youth productions currently pursuing a BFA in acting from Boston University. (Photo courtesy of Emily Rodriguez/True Mirage Theater)

“I love how this play uses her own words to humanize her, and so immediately, once I read it, I fell in love with it, and I was really honored that they asked me to be a part of it.” Voges says. “The fact that it’s taken from her writing, from her diaries and emails and calls that she’s sent to people – I thought it was really interesting, because I feel like there’s not a lot of plays that are like this about someone who is, I would say, very politically relevant.”

That relevance is what motivated Gil, director of “Rachel Corrie” to stage the play. “I chose to do the play because I think it’s crazy that nobody is really offering a different perspective on the situation (in Gaza), especially with what we’ve witnessed for the past three years,” he says “I think it’s really sad that us, being the little theater company that could with the tiny budget that we have, are taking that chance.”

True Mirage is accustomed to pushing the envelope. Gil and his wife Darcy Hernandez-Gil founded the company in 2018 to stage work that other drama houses in Miami wouldn’t touch. They’ve put on plays about dead teens (“Ride the Cyclone”), musicals based on horror movies (“Carrie, The Musical”), and held festivals focusing on BIPOC playwrights. An upcoming production will premiere “Forgive Us,” a controversial play by Thomas Dane following a couple driven to crisis over an undisclosed rape conviction.

An IDF soldier (played by Isaiah Andrade) stands atop a tower in True Mirage Theater’s “My Name Is Rachel Corrie.” (Photo courtesy of Emily Rodriguez/True Mirage Theater)

Even so, Gil knew that in Miami, more than most places, staging a play about a pro-Palestine activist killed by Israeli soldiers would attract controversy.

The South Florida metro area is home to the second-largest Jewish community in the U.S. by population. In such a climate, Gil has considered that he and True Mirage could be blacklisted, lose benefactors or worse. He has already received at least one threatening phone call in regards to “Rachel Corrie” from an anonymous source that claimed to “have some pull” with another local theater company.

Yet he finds the idea of not offering a counter-perspective on Gaza unacceptable considering the images and videos that have flooded social media in the wake of Israel’s invasion. “The only difference between my child or your child and a child born in Gaza is where they were born, and I think everybody that’s watching this that doesn’t have some sort of bias or anything attached to it – religious or otherwise, financial or otherwise – they would feel the same way. I mean, the slaughter that’s going on, it’s just there, it’s on your phone. It’s literally everywhere, and there’s no way to hide it anymore.”

Constructed from the real journals, emails, and writings of American activist Rachel Corrie, the play offers an intimate portrait of a young woman searching for meaning, humanity, and moral responsibility in an increasingly divided world. (Photo courtesy of Emily Rodriguez/True Mirage Theater)

Voges also hopes that her performance will help people find insight on the situation, and on what drove Corrie to do what she did. “We don’t come to the theater just to escape from our reality, but also to see other realities, and see even our own reality in a different perspective, and I feel like whether or not you agree with the politics that she believes in or any of her core beliefs, I think it’s just interesting to watch somebody else’s perspective on a very topical event happening in the world, especially now.”

WHAT: “My Name is Rachel Corrie”

WHEN: 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 5:30 p.m. Sunday through June 21.

 WHERE: True Mirage Theater, 8780 SW 133rd St., Miami

 COST: $30

 INFORMATION: 786-474-4811 or truemiragetheater.com.

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