BETWEEN THE SEAS Festival Returns To NYC

BETWEEN THE SEAS is thrilled to announce the 2019 line up for its festival celebrating Mediterranean performance. BETWEEN THE SEAS runs from Thursday, May 16 - Sunday, May 19. The performance schedule is Thursday - Friday at 8 PM; Saturday and Sunday at 5 PM & 8 PM. Performances are at Theaterlab (357 West 36th Street, between 8th & 9th Avenues. 3rd Floor; A/C/E or 1/2/3 to 34th Street). Tickets are $20; students/seniors $15 with valid ID. Tickets can be purchased by calling OvationTix on 212.929.2545 or online at www.betweentheseas.org.

BETWEEN THE SEAS, the only festival in New York celebrating Mediterranean performance, is a four-day platform that brings together contemporary performing artists from the Mediterranean region and American artists whose work and identity relates to the Mediterranean. Through programming that highlights traditions, aesthetic trends and societal issues in the Mediterranean region, BETWEEN THE SEAS seeks to familiarize NYC audiences with a younger generation of Mediterranean artists who are shaping the cultural landscape in their countries and communities.

Because 2019 marks the 30th Anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the 20th anniversary of the dismantling of Yugoslavia and creation of the nation of Kosovo, Saturday and Sunday's offerings focus on the Balkans with works by NYC-based Romanian playwright Saviana Stanescu and Kosovar playwright Jeton Neziraj ("the Kafka of the Balkans" Theater der Zeit).

The 2019 program also includes contemporary theater and dance from Sardinia; documentary theater from Lebanon, as well as new work from NYC based choreographers Rebecca Tomas and Dalit Agronin.

BETWEEN THE SEAS festival program details:

Thursday, May 16 at 8 PM
Giovanna, also called spring by Valentino Mannias (Sardegna Teatro)
Theater, Italy, 70 mins

Today, unbound from social and family constrictions, are we really free to make a choice about our love? Giovanna, also called spring weaves storytelling and folk Sardinian music to tell the story of the director's grandmother by three of Sardinia's most charismatic actors/musicians.

Friday, May 17 at 8 PM
Nosotras Somos choreographed by Rebeca Tomas (A Palo Seco Flamenco)
Flamenco Dance, NYC, 60 mins

Featuring three fierce (and female) flamenco dancers, three musicians, three platforms, and three walls, "Nosotras Somos..." is an original, site-specific Flamenco production created by artistic director, Rebeca Tomas. The show will pay tribute to female empowerment and showcase choreographies that range from traditional Flamenco to original compositions set to voice recordings, spoken word, and a mixture of rhythms and sounds.

Rebeca Tomas is a Recipient of LMCC MCAF awards, Jerome Foundation Travel & Study Grants, Arts Westchester Arts Alive Grants, NYFA 2013 Fellowship in Choreography.

Saturday, May 18 at 5 PM
Dalit Agronin's through the eyes of; Sara Pischedda's 120 grams; and Sara Pischedda and Luca Castellano's WelcomeTUItaly (Balletto di Sardegna)
Contemporary Dance, NYC/Italy, 60 mins
Presented in collaboration with IDACO nyc

Female choreographers Dalit Agronin (NYC) and Sara Pischedda (Sardinia) question notions of beauty and the societal norms around them. Agronin's through the eyes of deals with the idea of beauty. What does this word mean? Why is my idea of beauty different than the next persons? Who decides what is beautiful or not? This work braves these questions and begins to discover the answers.

Similar questions are raised in Pischedda's 120 grams: Will people really see me if I don't look as I am expected to look? How much space is my body expected to occupy, how much is it allowed? To what extent we let the words that might define our physical appearance become a definition of our identity? To what extent are we letting our looks define who we are?

Also on the bill is Balletto di Sardegna's WelcomeTUItaly, choreographed and performed by Sara Pischedda and Luca Castellano, which uses humor, provocation, and cliche to tear down the myths surrounding Italian identity as seen from the rest of the world.

Saturday, May 18 at 8 PM (Balkan focus)
The Internationals by Jeton Neziraj, directed by Aktina Stathaki
With Ino Badanjak, Nicole Cardoni, Calaine Schafer
Theater, Kosovo/Greece/NYC, 70 mins

Bill Clinton, Mother Teresa, Marina Abramovich, NGO workers, and nameless civilians parade through the 26 different vignettes of Jeton Neziraj's play that talks about the war in Kosovo and the role of the international community in building the new nation. Using facts, satire, actual and imaginary events and encounters, Neziraj exposes the hypocrisy of those profiting from war and pays tribute to its countless anonymous victims. The play premiered in 2016 in Prishtina. This marks its NYC premiere.

Sunday, May 19 at 5 PM (Balkan Focus)
New York With an Accent (Writing/Performing the Immigrant Experience) by Saviana Stanescu
Theater, Romania/NYC, 50 mins

Award-winning playwright Saviana Stanescu, author of the acclaimed plays Aliens with Extraordinary Skills, Lenin's Shoe, Ants, For a Barbarian Woman, Waxing West, talks about writing/performing her immigrant experience after 30 years since the Fall of the Iron Curtain.

Using monologues, production pictures and Stanescu's photos of the American Flag displayed in NYC in the aftermath of 9/11, NEW YORK WITH AN ACCENT (Writing/Performing the Immigrant Experience) investigates the power of symbols/objects to perform identity, patriotism, and post-traumatic community engagement. An imaginary dinner with Marx might conclude this political yet humorous autobiographical performative lecture.

Sunday, May 19 at 8 PM (Balkan Focus)
No Demand No Supply by Sahar Assaf
Theater, Lebanon, 60 mins

No Demand No Supply tells the story of four Syrian women who survived the biggest sex-trafficking network in the history of Lebanon in 2016. Using the words of the women, it sheds light on the sex-buyers who frequented the two brothels east of Beirut where the women were kept captive for years.