Penny Sterling's MOUNTING WASHINGTON Added to United Solo Festival Lineup
World's largest solo theatre festival features Mounting Washington on April 5 in United Solo Festival at Off-Broadway's Theatre Row.
By: A.A. Cristi Feb. 10, 2025
Rochester storyteller Penny Sterling's one-woman show, Mounting Washington, the Story of a Mountain & a Miracle, has been accepted into the 18th annual United Solo Festival, the largest solo theatre festival in the world.
If Saturday, April 5 at 2 PM's performance at New York City's Theatre Row on 42nd Street is a sell-out, an additional performance will be announced. Pre-sale tickets will be soon be available at https://unitedsolo.org/the-18th-annual-united-solo-theatre-festival/mounting-washington-the-story-of-a-mountain-a-miracle/.
Sterling has a lot of work to do in the meantime. Not on the production itself – she's already performed that to rave reviews at the Rochester Fringe Festival in 2023 and 2024, as well as at the 2024 Cincinnati Fringe.
“I'm absolutely thrilled to be invited into this prestigious, Theatre-District festival, whose alumni include some incredible performers,” says Sterling, citing Ed Asner (Lou Grant, Elf, Up), Sharon Lawrence (NYPD Blue, Joe Pickett), and Austin Pendleton (Short Circuit, My Cousin Vinny) as examples. “The fly in this ointment is that United Solo provides no financial support, so that each show must pay all its own expenses. Those include food and lodging in NYC – not just for myself – but also for my musical director (multi-instrumentalist singer/songwriter Linsey Rogers) and my stage manager/kazoo player (Bri Landrum). I want to ensure that we all have the funds we need to survive, so I'm going to need lots of help!"
To that end, Sterling will be hosting various fundraising events in the next few months, beginning with “Penny's Foignant Fundraiser” (funny + poignant = foignant) at Muck Duck Studio (595 Blossom Rd # 317, a creative empowerment space) on Saturday, February 22 from 6-9 PM. Ariel Allen-Lubman, aka Boy Jr., will open. General admission tickets are $20 at https://www.simpletix.com/e/foignant-tales-tickets-204120 (sliding scale and gift tickets are also available).
Donations will also be gratefully accepted at Penny's GoFundMe page.
Additionally, Fuego Coffee Roasters (1 Woodbury Blvd.) and Melo Coffee & Kitchen (696 University Ave.) are roasting a special edition coffee to help raise funds for Penny throughout February. Husband-and-wife owners Renée and Tony Colon will donate $5 for every $20 bag of Penny's Foignant Blend purchased.
“Penny is a dear friend of mine, and I love what she's doing,” says Renee. “I am very proud of her and excited to support her.”
Sterling's fervent hope is that Rochester will continue to embrace her journey in the performing arts, but also as a late-blooming transgender woman. The two are inseparable, really, as her work reflects the struggle to live an authentic life in hilarious, poignant, and very honest ways.
“I look at this as my mission, my ministry, if you will, in the world,” she says. “I believe that trying to change people's minds is impossible unless you first change their hearts. My endearing, open, and engaging stories serve this purpose, giving people what is sometimes their first encounter with a trans woman, and helping them see that I'm just another person working my way through the world. Except maybe I'm a little bit funnier than most. Seriously, everyone who sees me says everyone should see me.”
Although Sterling had previously been involved with theatre, comedy, and improv troupes, she began writing and performing her own shows as a result of encouraging family and friends to ask questions about her transition. Her responses became the framework for her first show in 2016, Spy in the House of Men: A One Woman Show with Balls, which earned her national critical and audience acclaim. From there, she created Parents & Children, Husbands & Wives: It's all Relatives with singer/songwriters Mike and Mel Muscarella (of the band Violet Mary), SHMILF LIFE (her take on dating – or lack thereof – as an older transgender woman), and Someone No One Can See (with PUSH Physical Theatre), along with award-winning monologues in a recent production of The Vagina Monologues.
Sterling's latest work, Mounting Washington, the Story of a Mountain & a Miracle, is based on her pre-transitional quest to become the least toxic man she could possibly be, instead of the “sarcastic, bitter, unhealthy” man that she had been for the first 40 years of her life. That endeavor culminated in the improbable and inexplicable decision to ride a bicycle to the top of Mt. Washington in New Hampshire – known to bicyclists everywhere as "The World's Toughest Hillclimb" -- and the miracle that occurred at the top. Sterling tells this charming, slightly goofy, and fascinating story as she pedals that same bike on stage, angling up to 12, 18, and finally 22 degrees, sharing the perspectives she gained as she gained altitude.
Sterling is well aware that she's taken a leap of faith in accepting United Solo Festival's invitation but also knows that failure is not an option.
“Every time I do something out of fear, no matter how it turns out, it also brings me more fear,” she says. “Every decision based in faith, whether I'm 'successful' or not, has always brought me one step closer to a life that is second to none.”
United SoloTM is a resident company at Theatre Row on 42nd Street in New York City dedicated to the genre of one-person performance. Its goal is to present solo pieces, both local and international; discover original scripts; bring creators together; exchange perspectives; and inspire creativity related to solo performance. The United Solo Festival, the world's largest solo theatre festival, presents a selection of local and international productions including storytelling, puppetry, dance, multimedia, improv, stand-up, magic, musical, and drama. Since its inaugural year in 2010, United Solo has featured more than 1,600 productions from all over the world. In 2021, United Solo launched a new virtual platform (United Solo Screen) to present shows for its global audience and theatre enthusiasts.
PENNY STERLING (she/her/hers) hasn't always been Penny, but she has always been funny. She received her BA in Drama from Ithaca College in 1981 and has performed on stages and in comedy clubs across New York and in Canada. Penny is an accomplished storyteller in more than one way: she's an Emmy-nominated television producer/director and the former head writer of The North Pole Times website, as well as a published author (Voices • The Art and Science of Psychotherapy, the quarterly journal of the American Association of Psychotherapy). Penny spent the first half-century of her life as a man, getting married and divorced, raising children, and trying to ignore the part of her soul that kept telling her "this is not who you are!" In April of 2014, she finally admitted to herself that she was transgender, and 18 months later, she began living her authentic life – much to the surprise of most of her family and friends. Her answers to their questions resulted in SPY IN THE HOUSE OF MEN: A ONE-WOMAN SHOW WITH BALLS in 2016, with 40+ performances through 2020 in Rochester, Buffalo, Syracuse, Ithaca, Corning, NY; Washington DC, Richmond, Cincinnati, Minneapolis, and Columbus. Her reputation as a must-see performer has continued to grow as additional shows garnered both critical and audience acclaim. A storyteller, comedian, actor, inspirational public speaker, playwright, singer/songwriter, 988 Suicide Crisis Counselor, TEDX talker, and competition chili cook (retired), Penny lives in Rochester, NY, with her cat, Contessa Sonja Grismonelda Isidora Purrington-Smölket von Füfensbaugh (aka "The Foof"), and two ghosts who only speak German. Or at least, they only speak German when she's around. Penny never refuses stage time. Or fruit pie.
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