Video–The Real Story of the Migrant Mother

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In December 2023, the Irvine Theater Company collaborated with the Great Park Gallery to present The Real Story of the Migrant Mother—A New Play. The production told the story of Florence Owens Thompson, the subject of Dorothea Lange's iconic 1936 photograph, revealing little-known details about her life and her often-complicated relationship with the famous image.
 

The play was staged inside the Great Park Gallery amidst an exhibition of Dorothea Lange's photography. The production sought to provide deeper insight into the people captured in Lange's work. Key features of the production included:
 

• A "reenactment" style based on historically cited events and interviews from both Dorothea Lange and Florence Owens Thompson.
• A "brain-based" acting approach rooted in neuroscience and memory induction, developed by the Irvine Theater Company's artistic director.
• AI models used for dialogue development to authentically recreate Dorothea Lange's speech patterns.
• A talkback session following the performance to discuss a neuroscientific perspective on memory, the unique creative process by the company, and the historic events depicted in the play. 

The Real Story of the Migrant Mother reimagines the day Dorothea Lange captured her famous 1936 photograph and the decades of misunderstanding that followed. Told through interwoven timelines, the play explores the contrasting memories of Lange and Florence Owens Thompson—the woman in the picture—and how a single image shaped both of their legacies.

From Lange’s Berkeley studio to Thompson’s modest California home, and through the voices of Thompson’s children and renowned neuroscientist James McGaugh, the story examines how memory, identity, and truth are constructed over time. The play asks audiences to reconsider who gets to define history—and how a photograph meant to inspire compassion became both a national symbol and a personal wound.

In March 1936, Lange spotted Florence Owens Thompson in a camp of destitute pea pickers in Nipomo, California. Lange reported that Thompson, a mother of seven, told her the family was living on frozen vegetables and birds the children had killed, and had sold their car tires for food. The resulting photograph, dubbed "Migrant Mother," became an iconic symbol of Great Depression-era suffering and helped spur food aid to the camp.

Florence Owens Thompson came forward in 1978 and gave a very different account of the day.
 

• She recalled that Lange promised not to publish the photos.
• Thompson denied that her family had sold their car tires for food, as her husband and two oldest sons were away getting the radiator repaired.
• She felt the iconic photograph exaggerated her family's poverty, and she was offended by the inaccurate captions that accompanied her picture in the newspaper articles. 
• She resented the fame and widespread use of the photo, often citing that she never received a penny from the image (which became government property).
• Thompson and her family had already left the camp by the time the government-sent food aid arrived. 

The Real Story of the Migrant Mother invited audiences to see beyond an image—to experience how memory, art, and empathy shape our understanding of truth. By revisiting one of America’s most iconic photographs through the lens of neuroscience and lived experience, the play revealed that history is not a fixed record, but a living dialogue between perception and remembrance.

This production became a defining moment for the Irvine Theater Company. Audience members expressed deep appreciation for the show’s emotional resonance and its thoughtful intersection of art, history, and science. In many ways, The Real Story of the Migrant Mother served as the origin story for ITC’s ongoing commitment to a civically minded theater—one that uses storytelling not only to entertain, but to awaken reflection, empathy, and community dialogue.

Through this first experiment in brain-based performance, ITC discovered the power of theater to bridge fact and feeling, and to remind us that the stories we inherit are never complete until we question—and reimagine—them together.