Inventor Jorge Odón, Global Health Experts Mario Merialdi and David Milestone, and Director Claudia Weill join Playwright Chiara Atik and Editor Sonia Epstein to discuss Birthing Technology and BUMP

Clockwise from top left: Jorge Odón. Mario Merialdi, David Milestone, Sonia Shechet Epstein, Chiara Atik, Claudia Weill

Clockwise from top left: Jorge Odón. Mario Merialdi, David Milestone, Sonia Shechet Epstein, Chiara Atik, Claudia Weill

On June 2, following the 2:00 pm matinee performance of BUMP, the lively new comedy by Chiara Atik, audience members are encouraged to stay for an extensive discussion of many of the issues the play addresses, especially current birthing technology, devices for instrumental vaginal delivery  (IVD), the Odón device, and how medical devices get approved for clinical use. Joining playwright Chiara Atik  and director Claudia Weill will be Jorge Odón, the inventor of the Odón device, Mario Merialdi, Senior Director of Global Health at Becton Dickinson, and David Milestone, Acting Director for the Center for Accelerating Innovation and Impact, USAID, for a conversation moderated by Sonia Shechet Epstein, Executive Editor of Sloan Science & Film at the Museum of the Moving Image.

BUMP is the exuberant exploration of the evolution of women's understanding about and control over the childbirth process through the  stories of three separate quests for knowledge: a young expectant mother in colonial New England getting coached through her first pregnancy by a peppery midwife (inspired by the diary of Martha Ballard); a contemporary message board where new pregnant moms swap gripes, quips, and observations; and a grandfather/mechanic's invention of a device that could revolutionize how babies in distress could be safely delivered (the last inspired by the story of Argentine mechanic and inventor Jorge Odón). 

The World Premiere of BUMP is this year’s mainstage production of the EST/Sloan Project, EST's partnership with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to develop new plays "exploring the worlds of science and technology," an initiative now in its twentieth year.

About the Panelists

Jorge Odón

Jorge Odón

Jorge Odón is the inventor of the Odón device. For more than thirty years, he operated the El Rayel S.A. automobile alignment and wheel balancing service center in Lanús, Argentina. During that time he patented several products relating to car parts. In 2005, he had an idea for facilitating childbirths after seeing a YouTube video about how to pull a cork from an empty wine bottle. After developing several device prototypes, Odón’s big breakthrough came in 2008 when he presented his device to Dr. Mario Merialdi, then director of Reproductive Health at the World Health Organization. That meeting led to both traveling that December to the birth simulation center at Des Moines University in Iowa for a successful series of tests. The WHO then agreed to conduct a series of hospital-based tests of the device in three phases in Argentina and South Africa. In 2013, Becton Dickinson and Company (BD) licensed the development rights of the Odón device and developed a new prototype based on their pre-clinical studies. In March 2018, BD and WHO announced the results of the latest round of tests. The report concludes: “Delivery using the Odón device is therefore considered to be feasible.” BD will next pursue a randomized pivotal clinical trial before potential introduction in clinical practice.

Odón has won recognition for his invention that includes finalist in the First WHO Forum on Medical Devices in Thailand (October 2009); winner of one of the 19 awards in the international contest Saving Lives at Birth: A Grand Challenge for Development, in Washington (July 2011); recognition at world congresses and athenaeums in gynecology and obstetrics; first prize from INNOVAR 2011, and the gold medal from IMPI as best inventor of 2012.

Dr. Mario Merialdi

Dr. Mario Merialdi

Mario Merialdi, MPH, MD, is Senior Director of Global Health at Becton Dickinson (BD), with a special interest in Maternal and Newborn Health. Prior to joining BD, Dr. Merialdi served as the coordinator of Human Reproduction and as a Medical Officer in the Maternal and Perinatal Health Research Unit at the World Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland. He worked in the design, implementation and coordination of large multinational epidemiological studies involving research institutions in developed and developing countries. Dr. Merialdi’s research interests have been focused on issues related to the reduction of maternal and newborn mortality worldwide. He is a strong supporter of the need to foster international research collaborations between researchers from developing and developed countries.

David Milestone

David Milestone

David Milestone is Acting Director of USAID Bureau for Global Health's Center for Accelerating Innovation and Impact (CII). CII applies business-minded approaches to the development, introduction and scale-up of health innovations. Since 2011, USAID, CII, and its partners have cultivated a pipeline of over 150 innovations and supported them on their path to deliver health impact—from improved maternal and newborn health to enhanced outbreak response for diseases like Ebola and Zika to strengthened health supply chains. David has also held various strategic marketing roles at Stryker, an $11B medical device company, where he led innovation and strategy initiatives in India.

Claudia Weill

Claudia Weill

Claudia Weill is a film, television, and theatre director. After graduating Harvard in 1969, she made 30 short films for Sesame Street (still on the air) and directed documentaries, notably This is the Home of Mrs. Levant Graham (Kennedy Journalism Award) and The Other Half of the Sky: A China Memoir, with Shirley MacLaine, released theatrically in 1975 (Academy Award Nomination). She produced and directed her first feature, Girlfriends, in 1979, which she sold to Warner Brothers after winning multiple awards at Cannes, Filmex, and Sundance. Next she directed It’s My Turn for Columbia Pictures, winning the Donatello (European Oscar) for Best New Director.

She directed mostly new plays at Williamstown, The O’Neill, Sundance, ACT, Empty Space and in New York at MTC, the Public and Circle Rep among others. In 1984, she was nominated for the Drama Desk Best Director Award for the premiere of Donald Margulies’ Found a Peanut, produced by Joe Papp at the Public Theatre. Moving to Los Angeles in 1985, she began working in television, directing episodic, cable movies and pilots. She is most well-known for multiple episodes of Thirtysomething (Humanitas and Emmy Awards), My So-Called Life, Chicago Hope (Reynolds Award), Once and Again, and TV movies, including Johnny Bull and Face of a Stranger (Gena Rowlands, Emmy Best Actress). Returning to theatre in the last few years, she directed the West Coast Premiere of Pulitzer Prize winner, Doubt, at the Pasadena Playhouse; Tape, Memory House, and End Days at the Vineyard Playhouse, Archy and Mehitabel at the Yard; Huck and Holden at the Black Dahlia; La Bella Famiglia at ACT; Twelfth Night, Act a Lady and Sweet Mercy at Antaeus; Melancholy Play and The Shore at the Pasadena Playhouse.

Chiara Atik

Chiara Atik

Chiara Atik is a graduate of the Obie Award-winning EST/Youngblood program, and a portion of BUMP had its origins as a short play written for Youngblood's monthly Sunday Brunch series, specifically its annual crossover with the EST/Sloan Project, the Youngblood Science Brunch. Her plays include I Gained Five PoundsWomen (a mashup of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women and HBO’s Girls) and Five Times in One Night, which was first produced at EST. She is the author of numerous articles for Cosmopolitan Magazine, Glamour Magazine, Refinery29, and New York, as well as the book, Modern Dating: A Field Guide. Her screenplay, Fairy Godmother, was on the 2016 Blacklist. Helen Estabrook (Whiplash) and Cassidy Lange will produce for MGM, which won the rights in a bidding war. Television: NBC’s Superstore.

About the Moderator

Sonia Shechet Epstein

Sonia Shechet Epstein

Sonia Shechet Epstein works at the intersection of science and culture. As Executive Editor of the Museum of the Moving Image’s website Sloan Science & Film, she produces all of its content. At the Museum, she also curates the ongoing series “Science on Screen” which pairs rarely screened films with discussions between scientists and filmmakers. Since 2014, she has been a mentor at NEW INC—the New Museum of Contemporary Art’s incubator for practitioners in art and technology.

BUMP began previews at the Ensemble Studio Theatre on May 9 and runs through June 3. You can purchase tickets here.

Sloan_Logo_Primary_Web.jpg
EST-Sloan.jpg