Excavating the Rising Star is a 90-minute original documentary play about a group of female archaeologists that excavated previously-unknown hominid fossils in South Africa in 2013 + 2018. Using their interviews with the women and oral histories from six of the “Astronauts” (conducted by playwright Ash Singer)and set in a futuristic museum that is encouraged to lean into the power of the imagination, IVP composes a script that investigates how our perception of history determines our future.