GUTHRIE THEATER TO PRESENT A STAGED READING OF THE SURGE, BY JESSICA BLANK AND ERIK JENSEN
Told in Minnesotans’ own words, the new documentary theater piece was co-commissioned by the Guthrie and The Public Theater in January 2026 and explores the impact of Operation Metro Surge on Minnesota
Two weeks, January 5–17, 2027, in the Dowling Studio
(Minneapolis/St. Paul) — The Guthrie Theater (Joseph Haj, Artistic Director) today announced it will present a staged reading of The Surge, a new documentary play by Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen, directed by Blank and produced in association with The Public Theater. Conceived as a direct artistic response to Operation Metro Surge, the presence of an estimated 3,000 U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in Minnesota, The Surge addresses their actions in the Twin Cities, the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, and the collective response that emerged as Minnesotans came together to protect and care for one another. Readings of The Surge will be held January 5–17, 2027, in the Dowling Studio. Single tickets go on sale December 9 exclusively through the Box Office or online at guthrietheater.org.
Artistic Director Joseph Haj said, “As we approach one year since Operation Metro Surge, we have an opportunity to reflect on a moment that profoundly affected communities across Minnesota. The arts help us understand ourselves, our neighbors and our common humanity, and The Surge captures this unprecedented chapter of our state and nation’s history through the voices of Minnesotans themselves.”
Blank and Jensen’s documentary work focuses on directly impacted individuals at the heart of larger social justice issues. Their plays are created from interview transcripts and primary documents. They adhere to journalistic standards in preserving the language of the interview subjects and accurately representing the facts, while turning true stories into emotionally impactful and resonant works of art.
Between January and March 2026, Blank and Jensen conducted extensive research in the Twin Cities, interviewing more than 40 people — clergy, doctors, teachers, union leaders, police officers and more — whose experiences shaped the story unfolding across Minnesota, with 16 individuals’ stories featured in the play. A workshop and private readings of the play (originally titled North Star) were held at the Guthrie in May 2026, and excerpts were featured as part of Public Forum: Cities Under Siege hosted by The Public Theater at The Delacorte Theater in Central Park in July 2026. The Surge is slated to have an engagement at The Public Theater’s Martinson Hall in winter/spring 2027.
In a statement earlier this year, Blank and Jensen stated, “Our documentary theater work is conceived as an act of service to the communities we interview. Our lives have been changed by what we’ve seen in Minnesota: both the organized brutality imposed on ordinary people and those people’s extraordinary response of care, protection, mutual aid and love. We are honored to have the opportunity to uplift the voices of the diverse Minnesotans impacted by and responding to this moment, and we believe their stories carry great lessons for our nation as a whole.”
Biographies
Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen (Creators) are a multihyphenate, married creative team whom The New Yorker calls “among the foremost practitioners of documentary theater in the U.S.” They have spent over two decades creating documentary theater that wrestles with the most urgent issues of our time.
Their award-winning work includes The Exonerated, a play based on interviews with death row exonerees across the U.S.; Aftermath, the first major American theatrical work to tackle the impact of the Iraq war on ordinary civilians; Coal Country, based on interviews with survivors of the 2010 Upper Big Branch Mine disaster; The Line, a rapid-response documentary play based on interviews with New York City medical first responders at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic; and numerous others.
Though currently based in Brooklyn, both artists have deep Minnesota roots and a strong personal connection to the state. Jensen was born in Detroit Lakes and grew up all over northern Minnesota before attending high school in Apple Valley. Blank came to the Twin Cities to attend Macalester College, then the University of Minnesota, and lived in South Minneapolis before moving to New York. They are also narrative filmmakers, television writers and actors, and Blank is a professor at The Juilliard School. They maintain artistic ties to the Twin Cities; their most recent feature film, Brooklyn, Minnesota, starring Jensen and Amy Madigan, was filmed in and around Minneapolis in 2023 with a Minnesota creative team and crew. The film won the 2024 Minneapolis St. Paul International Film Festival (MSPIFF) and will be screened theatrically in Minnesota and New York City in late 2026, with a streaming release slated for 2027.
Land Acknowledgment
The Guthrie would like to acknowledge that we gather on the traditional
land of the Dakota People and honor with gratitude the land itself and the
people who have stewarded it throughout the generations, including the Ojibwe
and other Indigenous nations.
The GUTHRIE THEATER (Joseph Haj, Artistic Director) is an American center for theater performance in Minneapolis, Minnesota, dedicated to producing a thrilling mix of classic plays and bold new work while cultivating the next generation of artists and theatergoers. Under Haj’s leadership, the Guthrie is guided by four core values: Artistic Excellence; Community; Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility; and Fiscal Responsibility. Since its founding in 1963, the theater has continued to set a national standard for excellence in the field and serve the people of Minnesota and beyond.
Located
on the Mississippi River in the historic Mill District, the Guthrie houses
three state-of-the-art stages, production facilities, classrooms, dramatic
public spaces and Indígena by Owamni, a one-of-a-kind dining destination led by
James Beard Award-winning Chef Sean Sherman. Open to the public six days a
week, the Guthrie welcomes audiences and visitors from the Twin Cities, the
region and around the world to experience exceptional theater, breathtaking
architecture and riverfront views at one of Minneapolis’ most notable civic and
cultural resources. guthrietheater.org
THE PUBLIC THEATER continues the work of its
visionary founder Joe Papp as a civic institution engaging, both on-stage and
off, with some of the most important ideas and social issues of today.
Conceived over 60 years ago as one of the nation’s first nonprofit theaters, The
Public has long operated on the principles that theater is an essential
cultural force and that art and culture belong to everyone. Under the
leadership of Artistic Director Oskar Eustis and Executive Director Patrick
Willingham, The Public’s wide breadth of programming includes an annual season
of new work at its landmark home at Astor Place, Free Shakespeare in the Park
at The Delacorte Theater in Central Park, the Mobile Unit touring throughout
New York City’s five boroughs, Public Works, and Joe’s Pub. Since premiering HAIR in 1967, The Public continues to create the canon of American Theater and is
currently represented on Broadway by the Tony Award-winning musical Hamilton by Lin-Manuel Miranda. Their programs and productions can also be seen
regionally across the country and around the world. The Public has received 64
Tony Awards, 197 Obie Awards, 63 Drama Desk Awards, 66 Lortel Awards, 36 Outer
Critics Circle Awards, 13 New York Drama Critics’ Circle Awards, 72 AUDELCO
Awards, 6 Antonyo Awards, and 6 Pulitzer Prizes. publictheater.org
