AMA/GILDA/SOLSTICE to be Presented At Exponential Festival 2025

Three artists will present three unique short pieces on a split bill at The Exponential Festival. Kenneth Keng / Sophie Zmorrod / Lal Ensari will present AMA/GILDA/SOLSTICE. 

Kenneth Keng: AMA

AMA is Ask Me Anything but it's my grandma asking and the audience answering and also she's dying and also my country is about to be invaded for the second time this century.

Written by Kenneth Keng

Directed by Annaporva Green

Lighting design by Zee Hanna

Stage Manager: Laila Gerstmann

Cast: Emma Callahan​​

Photo by Kelsey Cheng

​​Find them: @kennethbestopped kennethkeng.com

​Thanks to Aya Ogawa, Flako Jimenez, Caden Manson and Sibyl Kempson for invaluable early developmental advice, and to my ama, Benita Go, continually driving our family to brighter shores.

​A participatory silent monologue about the difficulty of intergenerational communication despite trilingual fluency, interrupted by the invasion of the Philippines by the Japanese Imperial Army. A lecture on the combat capabilities of the World War 2 Era Japanese Type 94 Tankette, drowned out by the sound of an air pump inflating a life sized replica thereof. An invitation to participate in choosing who gets to be the Philippines' next colonizer.​

​Content warnings: war, mention of historical sexual violence.

Sophie Zmorrod: "Gilda, with an Olive"

In the final act of Giuseppe Verdi's acclaimed opera Rigoletto, Gilda waits inside of a body bag onstage for her cue to die. She has some time to think about her life choices.​

Written and Performed by Sophie Zmorrod

Directed by Margaret Lee

Featuring Live Music by Eamon Goodman, Gunnar Manchester, and Katie Chambers

Produced by Kunal Kamath

Sound Design and Music Direction by Eamon Goodman

Lighting Design by Zee Hanna

Scenic Design by Goran Popovich

Stage Managed by Cliff Hoitt-Lange

Image Design by Ellen Carpenter

​​​Find them: ​@gildawithanolive​​

​​While waiting inside of a body bag onstage for her cue to die, Gilda has some time to think about her life choices: namely, why she just sacrificed herself for the dickwad Duke who stole her heart (and also kidnapped her- it's casual). While the relentless canonical event of her sacrifice persists each night, she turns to the music, her audience, and extremely dirty martinis for answers, comfort, and perhaps even, liberation.​​​

LAL ENSARI: winter solstice

winter solstice is a site-specific gathering that aims to bring some lightness, joy and celebration into the darkness of winter.​

Written and directed by Lal Ensari

Performed by Sophia Nelson, Soraya Omtzigt and Lal Ensari

Poster by Elif Özkoç

​​​​Find them: @lalensari

The show aims to bring people together and encourage all that is in the space to be witnessed, shared and celebrated. In the dark solitude of winter, and in the winter of my heart, all that I feel and experience can feel serious and profound- I want this performance to be a reminder that even the most shameful and/or sacred experiences we have are shared. Let's come home to ourselves, together.

The Exponential Festival is a 501c3 January performance festival for NYC-based early-career artists working in experimental performance. The participants in this multi-artist, multi-venue festival are committed to ecstatic creativity in the face of commercialism. Exponential is driven by inclusiveness and a diversity of artists, forms, and ideas coupled with utopian resource-sharing, mentoring and the championing of risky, rigorous work in eclectic fields. theexponentialfestival.org

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