Playwright and actor Heather Raffo explores the repercussions of violence—in her father’s homeland of Iraq and in American inner cities. She has performed 9 Parts of Desire, her solo show about the post-war lives of nine Iraqi women, all over the world, including Iraq, and adapted it into a concert with renowned Iraqi musician Amir El Saffar for The Kennedy Center. Recently, Heather wrote an opera libretto, Fallujah: The First Opera on the Iraq War, commissioned by the Annenberg Foundation and City Opera Vancouver that details the life of a US Marine who served in Fallujah. A resident artist at Georgetown University, performer and instructor at many universities and art centers, Heather also acts in films and remains at the helm of a movement inspiring young Middle Eastern women to tell their stories. Performance group members: Hadi Eldebek, Johnny Farraj, Gaida, LaMarcus Miller, and Milos Repisky.