United Solo Festival Presents I AM A MAN By Dazie Grego

San Francisco--Bay Area performance artist, poet, and actor, Dazié Grego returns to the stage to offer audiences I AM A MAN, a multidisciplinary performance based inquiry into Queer masculinity. This performance takes place at Theater Row 410 W 42nd St, New York, NY 10036

"I AM A MAN," A story of the love, pride and the violence that transforms sissies into men. This original work is Grego's protest response to the slaying of Jorge Steven Mercado, a Puerto Rican teenager whose killer solicited him for sex, believing him to be a female. When it was discovered that Mercado was, in fact, male, he was murdered, decapitated, dismembered and burned.

I AM A MAN takes a unique look at masculinity from a gay male perspective. "Historically, we have been conditioned to define gender and sexuality norms from the viewpoint of the heterosexual community," Grego explains, "but maleness exists regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. I AM A MAN maintains a core identity-based in manhood while bending the ideologies around what it actually means to be a man."

Over the past decade, Dazié has created multidisciplinary performances at The National Queer Arts Festival, The Fools Fury Festival, Woman on the Way Festival, Radar L.A. and The Murmuration Festival. After being awarded Best of San Francisco Fringe for his solo work titled "Nigga-Roo," Dazié, makes Theater Row his home as he offers his New York City debut. I AM A MAN is the culmination of Dazié's extensive work as a solo artist along with his contributions to the DeepDickollective (DDC) and Pomo Afro Homos. Through I AM A AM MAN, Dazié concentrates and combines his profound abilities as a spoken word artist, playwright, actor and activist. Unafraid and grounded Dazié pushes beyond the rhetoric, as an unapologetic, thought-provoking and deeply harrowing artist and thinker.

Don't miss I AM A MAN. Dazié Grego's insightful dissection of queer masculinity, performed at 9:00 pm on October 22nd at the Theater Row.