Metropolitan Playhouse Will Present Zero Boy as Johnny Z

Obie Award winner Metropolitan Playhouse presents Zero Boy in the persona of Johnny Z, loveable gangster, hosting this week's sonic storytelling and improvisational repartee:

CONSPIRACY, STARRING JOHNNY Z
Thursday, May 14, 2020 at 8 PM, EST.
Running Time: 30 minutes

Available via Zoom and YouTube:
www.metropolitanplayhouse.org/virtualplayhouse

Viewers will have the opportunity to make written or spoken suggestions, and Zero Boy will turn them into a vocal improv scenario.

Entertainer and 'vocal cartoonist' Zero Boy introduced Johnny Z through his stand-up solo in 2019's NY International Fringe Fesival: The Gangsterlogues! Johnny's story of rise from timid boy of the Lower East Side Streets to hitman with a heart of...tin, maybe, was another feather in the popular downtown entertainer's cap.

Zero Boy is an East Village icon renowned for his unique blend of sound and mime, the results being akin to a performed comic book. A prolific entertainer, his solo comedic routines have been featured throughout the U.S. and Europe in traditional theater, vaudeville, burlesque, festivals, stand-up comedy, television, radio, film and digital media. His vocal acrobatics have been featured in Fox and Friends, Good Day New York, MTV and was the evil Dr. Drago on Nicktoon's Alien Dawn. His unique sound talents and character voices have led to performances on numerous radio shows and he regularly performed on NPR's The Next Big Thing.

The VIRTUAL PLAYHOUSE began on March 28, 2020, with a reading via Zoom of Alice Gerstenberg's "He Said and She Said." The playhouse has continued with weekly Saturday readings since. Beginning with Gerstenberg's "Hearts," the program is simultaneously broadcast on New York's Pacifica Radio Station WBAI, 99.5 FM. For this period of social distancing, with Metropolitan Playhouse's facility closed, actors read parts to the camera from their homes, using the Zoom platform, which enables all characters in a scene to be onscreen simultaneously. Weekly readings are in progress, with mid-week programing in development, all drawn from the rich trove of lost American theater. The playhouse is honored and fortunate to be able to continue its mission of exploring America's diverse theatrical history during these trying times. The presentation of the forgotten one-act plays is an ideal way to pursue the theater's mission and extend its current season, devoted to plays and themes of DISSENT.

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