Anne
Gridley

Biography

Anne Gridley is a two-time Obie Award-winning actor, dramaturg, and artist. As a founding member of Nature Theater of Oklahoma, she has co-created and performed in critically acclaimed works including Life & Times, Poetics: A Ballet Brut, No Dice, Romeo & Juliet, and Burt Turrido.

In addition to her work with Nature Theater, Gridley has performed with Jerôme Bel, Caborca, 7 Daughters of Eve, and Big Dance. She served as a Dramaturg for the Wooster Group's production Who's Your Dada?, and has taught devised theater at Bard College. Her drawings have been shown at H.A.U. Berlin and Mass Live Arts.

Artist Statement

In a way, Watch Me Walk is the show I never wanted to write. Growing up, I saw my mother deal with her disability every day. Her mother, who died two years before I was born, had the same disability. Because I was an active child, who ran 5K races starting at the age of eight, it was assumed that I did not inherit "the disease." But what exactly was this disease? Family mythology offered no concrete answers, nor did the medical community.

My mother and her mother were studied by the NIH in the '70s, and were misdiagnosed with a neurological ailment called Spinocerebellar Ataxia. "Just tell them it's like MS," my mom said to tell my classmates who wondered why she used mobility aids.

In my thirties, my balance started to falter. Other people commented on the way I walked, though I didn't notice any change. I thought it was my shoes. My mom's neurologist confirmed that I had, in fact, inherited the disease. Finally, in 2017, I had genetic testing that revealed a proper diagnosis: Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia (HSP). HSP is a rare degenerative neurological disease that affects between ten and twenty thousand people in the U.S. Because it is a rare condition, it is known as an "orphan disease." While there are nearly one hundred different types, they all share progressive spasticity and weakness in the legs, caused by a gradual atrophying of the upper motor neurons. There is no cure.

Watch Me Walk is a meditation on inheritance, legacy, and resilience told in three parts. Using my own experience, the odd language of doctors, and the completely unhinged comments made by strangers in public, it begins as a playful, provocative expression of life with HSP — and my particular affection for the Alinker walking bike. From there the work ventures into my family's history and the unique ways my grandmother and mother confronted (or didn't) their condition. In the end, we'll play some music, do a little dancing, and climb a very tall ladder.

I intend to confront the audience's own perceptions of disability, pity, and injustice. While I am shaped by my experience as a disabled person, I am not defined by it.

— Anne Gridley, July 2024