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Liberty Bradford Mitchell, flanked by members of onstage rock band the Fluffers.

Liberty Mitchell Pens Show on Childhood With Her Father, Artie Mitchell

“The Pornographer’s Daughter,” Liberty Mitchell’s newest piece receives premiere at San Francisco’s Z Space.

Liberty Bradford Mitchell admits  that her family’s story is practically Shakespearean. Her father was Artie Mitchell, who teamed up with his brother Jim to become the Mitchell Brothers, infamously known for their work in the pornography industry. They produced and directed the 1972 feature-length porn film Behind the Green Door. Then in 1991, Jim shot Artie. Growing up in that environment is the topic of Liberty Mitchell’s one-woman play The Pornographer’s Daughter. “Exploring my family members as characters helped to objectify them and the events,” Mitchell says. “It ultimately brought me to a deeper understanding of their motivations and humanity.” Pornographer’s Daughter is playing at San Francisco’s Z Space Jan. 17–Feb. 16. (Coincidentally, the Mitchell Brothers’s O’Farrell Theatre, a strip club, is located two miles north.) Mitchell compares her family to Hamlet’s, saying, “It comforted me that my family story really wasn’t so unique as an archetype.”

 

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