TOKENS was originally produced by the Blake Street Hawkeyes, Mixed Bag Productions & Whoopi Goldberg in association with Theater Artaud.

TOKENS ran for six weeks from May 16th, 1985 to June 30th, 1985 at Theater Artaud in San Francisco. This was at a time when a mysterious and fatal disease was reeking havoc in San Francisco; known then as "Gay Cancer," it was soon to be called AIDS (Auto Immune Deficiency Syndrome ) and now, HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus). Only later, after TOKENS was produced, was the transmission vector of the disease identified. The similarities of the HIV pandemic to the Great Plague of London; the mystery of transmission, the pursuit of fatuous and real treatments, the heroism and charlatanism it brought out in the population and governing institutions, was prescient, as it is again in the time of Covid. At that time of panic (1985) the Bay Area's performing arts community, reeling from the crisis, came together to make TOKENS a devastating act of catharsis in the theater.