Tickets Now On Sale For The So-fi Festival At Westbeth

 

The So-fi Festival proudly presents its June 2019 festival at Westbeth, Home to the Arts (463 West Street, Room 1209, between Bethune and Bank St) June 6-23 2019.  Ayesha Jordan's Shasta Geaux Pop, hailed by The New Yorker as a  "glamazon hip-hop icon" will perform her interactive basement get-down dance party (most recently presented by The Highline and The Public Theater's Under The Radar Festival) June 14th at 830pm in Westbeth's Community Room a 75 seat venue, located through their sculpture garden at 155 Bank Street.  So-fi is a festival for cutting edge, low-fi, high concept, multidisciplinary solo work.  Westbeth is New York City landmark listed on the National Registrar of Historic Places since Dec 8, 2009, a home to artists and major cultural organizations including the New School for Drama, The Martha Graham Center of Contemporary Dance, the School for Poetic Computation. The space where So-fi will be housed was the location of Bell Labs' Boardroom where the first talking movie, the condenser microphone, the first TV broadcast, and the first binary computer were demonstrated.

The June festival includes 6 premieres, as well as revivals of 4 critically acclaimed remounts and 3 works in progress. World Premieres: Dad by Cara Francis (The New York NeoFuturists), Parlor Poems created by Natalie Johnsonius Neubert (Necessary Exposure: The Female Playwright Project) with permission from the Estate of the late Dennis Krausnick (Shakespeare & Co), Whiskey Flicks Live: King of New York by Michael Niederman (uniform) and Daniel McCoy (The New York NeoFuturists), Toys 101: The Last Class by Jonathan Alexandratos, Lost My Train of Thought by Tiny Box Theater. New York premieres: Abeyance by Tyler West (Glitter Gutter at The Slipper Room) Critically Acclaimed Revivals: Shasta Geaux Pop by Ayesha Jordan and Charlotte Brathwaite (The Public Theater's Under The Radar), The Assembly's The Dark Heart of Meteorology, By Steven Aubrey, Directed by Jess Chayes (HOME/SICK), St Kilda written and performed by Jody Christopherson (AMP, Greencard Wedding at HERE Arts Center), Directed by Isaac Byrne (The Other Mozart) and The Legend of White Woman Creek by The Coldharts (Edgar Allan). Workshops include Kyra Miller's BlueBeardGasLight (in association with The Muse Project, Artistic Director Jocelyn Kuritsky), Jonathan Torn's The Scientist: an Evening with John C. Lilly and phase(un)fazed by Natalie Deryn Johnson

Tickets are currently on sale and will be $25 per single ticket, $36 per two-show double bill ticket. There are 15 $15 tickets are available for Shasta Geaux Pop. (Please note that Westbeth is handicap accessible with ramps and elevators.) Nearest trains to Westbeth are (1,2,3 to 14th Street). Tickets can be purchased at https://www.so-fi-festival.com/, (888) 692-7878, or in person at the box office 30 minutes prior to show (463 West Street, Room 1209, between Bethune and Bank St). Full performance line-up listed below. For more info and a full festival calendar please visit: https://www.so-fi-festival.com/

  

ABEYANCE (New York Premiere)
An audio/visual comedy catastrophe on killing time

 Written and Performed by Tyler West

Performed in a unique style called "microphoned-mime" which combines pantomime and sound effects produced live by the actor. A man waits in the lobby for an important job interview and while he waits, everything goes wrong! Like getting trapped in a vending machine, farting bubbles, and losing his resume.
June 20th @7pm, June 23rd @ 2pm

Runtime: 50 min

TYLER WEST  is a self taught physical comedian! He's created his own work for several shows in Tucson, and has traveled across the nation from various Fringe Festivals with "ABEYANCE." You can also check him out regularly performing at the Slipper Room in New York. https://tyler-west.wixsite.com/abeyance

A CASE AGAINST PEACEFUL PROTEST

A vision of the future, in all its manifestations

 

Written and Performed by Eric Lawrence Taylor

?with live music by Tristan Dossett

A Case Against Peaceful Protest shows us both the terror that is to come but the joy that we will meet it with. An immersive piece that marries the spoken word, song and movement with ritual and digital media to show that audience what has been missing from the conversation.

This piece was developed at Abrons Arts Center.

June 14th @7pm, June 15th @ 7pm

Runtime: 45 min

Eric Lawrence TAYLOR was classically trained in acting at Fordham University. He is also a prolific multidisciplinary artist. His original works have been shown around New York City, including Abrons Art Center, The University Settlement, The Artist Co-op, and the Ashmolean Museum. https://www.ericlawrencetaylor.com/

 

BlueBeardGasLight

A folklorist prepares her version of an old, dark fairy tale, only to discover a disconcerting fun-house mirror image in her own partnership.

Written and Performed by Kyra Miller
Presented in Association with The Muse Project
Developed with Katie Pearl
Video Consultant Jeanette Yew
Puppets designed and built by Kyra Miller
Dollhouse set by Jei Olson

BlueBeardGasLight is very loosely based on a real-life married couple of folklorists and imagines a woman, accompanied in her work by her husband, suddenly doubting the bedrock of her marriage. As her suspicion and his secrecy begin to overwhelm her, her thinking about "BlueBeard" (the subject of her writing) begins to clarify. Alone in her children's abandoned nursery at night, she uses their toys and dolls to do "embodied research," exploring the murky emotional territory she cannot discuss with her husband. This work was originally incubated at The Muse Project, Jocelyn Kuritsky Artistic Director.

"Kyra Miller....a Philip Roth story come to life (if Philip Roth were a stunning woman)." -- NYMag, on Chosen, by Kyra Miller at Joe's Pub.

Runtime: 40 min

June 15th @ 830pm and June 18th @ 7pm

Kyra Miller is an actor, singer, writer and Alexander Technique instructor living in New York City. Most recently, Kyra played Rebecca in Rags at the Tony-award-winning Theatreworks Silicon Valley. She has worked at Seattle Rep, the Fifth Avenue Theater, A.C.T., Westport Country Playhouse, Southern Rep, the Philadelphia Theatre Company and the Pearl Theater Company. BlueBeardGasLight received a grant from the Muse Project and began workshopping at the Flea Theater last fall. Her solo work includes Chosen at Joe's Pub (with Matt Ray on piano), Bridge and Tunnel Troubadour (about Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel, directed by Barb Jungr) at Pangea. She studies singing with Virginia Grasso. MFA, University of Washington. Proud member AEA. 

http://www.kyramillernyc.com/

THE MUSE PROJECT seeks to disrupt the imbalance of opportunity and ownership of work for women actors through the development of challenging, actor-driven theater works and focused research into their participation in American theater. The initiative aims to shift the theater paradigm through the empowerment of women actors as creators and content generators. Notable achievements include the development and production of multiple theatrical pieces. Jocelyn Kuritsky's Muse project, Stet, written by Kim Davies, directed by Tony Speciale, and starring Jocelyn, premiered at Abingdon Theatre Company - in association with The Muse Project - toward the end of the 2015/16 season, and it enjoyed a successful, extended, Off-Broadway run. In October 2018, The Muse Project's first collection of "Mini Muses" (a kind of festival) was presented at The Flea Theater. Actresses Vanessa Aspillaga, Lynn Cohen, Jessica Frances Dukes, Déa Julien, and Kyra Miller all took part and presented. www.themuseprojectnyc.com.

Actress Jocelyn Kuritsky is the Producing Artistic Director of The Muse Project. She is also a founder and the actor-in-residence of the Lucille Lortel Award-winning immersive theater company, Woodshed Collective. www.jocelynkuritsky.com.

 

DAD (World Premiere)

A one-woman drag exorcist debate with my Dad, your Dad, and America's Dads.

NRA Rating: Z

Written and Performed by Cara Francis

Directed by Nessa Norich

In November 2016, on the eve of Trump's election, Cara's dad slipped into a coma. One week later, he died. He left behind a loving family, lots of colorful stories, an arsenal of hundreds of guns and enough ammo to get him through an apocalypse.

What is an American dad? When beloved dads become disgraced dads and presidents act like kings, what does a father figure symbolize? Will sacred dads, god our father, our founding fathers, the nuclear 1950's dad, or "daddies" have the answers for us? How can we celebrate the death of the patriarchy while still loving -- and mourning -- our dads?

"Dad" is Cara and her dad in his gun-stuffed home, at the end of his quiet cul-de-sac, in the middle of this tv-on-in-the-middle-of-the-night country we all call home, having a beer and trying to figure it out.

Press for Cara Francis-

"Brechtian. Poignant"- New York Theatre Review, on Happy To See You by Cara Francis  

"Uncensored. Lovable. A brilliantly conceived and executed show that absolutely tickled the audience....impeccable comedic timing...raw sincerity....daring by current theater standards...deeply personal"- Theasy on The Soup Show, co-written and co-performed by Cara Francis

June 6th @ 830pm, June 7th @ 7pm, June 16th @ 330pm, (Father's Day), June 22nd @830pm 

June 23rd @ 330pm 

Runtime: 50 Min

Cara Francis (Writer/Performer) is a writer, performer and a comedian. An ensemble member of The New York Neo-Futurists from 2008-2017, she designed and performed in The Complete and Condensed Stage Directions of Eugene O'Neill, Vol 1 and 2 (Drama Desk Nom for Unique Theatrical Experience) and The Soup Show. Her installation work includes "Stand" (Brooklyn Museum, IPA), "Remote" (Trouw, Amsterdam, NE, New Museum, New York for AUNTSisdance, First Person View, The Knockdown Center) and "Happy To See You" (Print Screen Festival, Tel Aviv, Automata Arts, Collapsable Hole, Dixon Place, The Wild Project). She regularly writes and performs original music as your Fantasy Grandma (Bushwig, NY Comedy Festival at Carolines, Catch Performance Series, Hollywood Improv). www.carafrancis.squarespace.com

Nessa Norich (Director) is a director and performer who trained at the Lecoq school for physical theater in Paris. She has been a writer and ensemble member of the award-winning theater company, the NY Neo-Futurists since 2014. She has collaboratively created over a dozen original works of theater in the US and Europe, at such notable venues as the Institute for Contemporary Art, The Battersea Arts Center, and the British Film Institute in London, the Edinburgh Fringe, Showbox Festival in Oslo, the New Orleans Fringe Festival, and NY Live Arts and Joe's Pub in New York City. Her work has received critical acclaim in the Huffington Post and the NY Times and has been recognized with a 2016 NY Innovative Theater Award. She has also been the resident DJ for Diana Oh's Infinite Love Party (Bushwick Starr) and Clairvoyance (A.R.T). Nessa has also taught Devised Theater at Columbia and Pace Universities and facilitates mindful movement for children and adults.

 

Lost My Train Of Thought (World Premiere)

An interactive theatrical story that unfolds through card catalogs, dollhouse miniatures, Radioptican Magic Lanterns, and an antique wind­up tin train.

Written and Directed by Joy Tomasko

Performed by Sarah Murphy

Designed and Co- presented by Tiny Box Theater

Tiny Box Theater presents an original story that invites the audience into the action. A reclusive author sends a librarian a copy of their latest book. Within its pages, she finds a special request and a set of clues. The author, the librarian, and an audience of readers must finish a series of stories and return something long overdue. Tiny Box Theater's newest piece will unfold using objects of nostalgia: repurposed card catalogs, dollhouse miniatures, Radioptican Magic Lanterns, and a wind-up tin train. The show has one beginning and several possible endings, depending on chance and the choices of the audience. Lost My Train of Thought explores how we catalog time: is it borrowed, bought, saved, stolen, wasted, or lost?

June 8th @ 330pm, June 9th @ 2pm 

Runtime: 45 min

TINY BOX THEATER- was founded by Sarah Murphy, Justin Steeve, and Joy Tomasko in 2015. They originally met last century during undergraduate studies in theater at Drew University. Tiny Box Theater works are a theatrical hybrid of a pop-up book, diorama, radio play, live performance, and toy theater. Our small, portable venues invite individual audiences to get close. The characteristics of the boxes themselves help inform the story and the style in which it's told. We create original stories, develop interactive moments, craft visuals, record and design audio, and perform the works live. Tiny Box Theater asks our audiences to reimagine what stories look and sound like and to find theatricality in small moments. Collaborators have included artists Anthony Baus & Patrick Byrnes, performer Nico Grelli, musician Eric Holm, voice-over artist Elizabeth Klett, comedian Jason Planitzer, and designers/box operators Maeve O'Sullivan & Grace Trimble. Tiny Box Theater has performed at the NYC, Boston, and Toronto Figment Festivals, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, at Luna Stage in New Jersey, the LIC Arts Open in Long Island City, and Madison Square Park's Kids Fest. https://tinyboxtheater.com/

 

PARLOR POEMS (World Premiere)
A multidisciplinary sound-experience in a Victorian-era parlor hosted posthumously by Dennis Krausnick

Conceived, Designed and Directed by Natalie Johnsonius Neubert

Featuring the poetry of Dennis Krausnick

The Victorian parlor was traditionally considered to be the most elegant room in the house, and reserved for leisurely greeting important company. Parlor Poems invites audiences to return to that time. Using projections of photographs and images from Victorian-era estates and symbolic set pieces, the Westbeth performance space will be transformed into a Victorian parlor where the audience will enjoy light refreshments (tea favors and teas). Once everyone has settled into their seats, there will be an immersive sound installation of readings from Dennis Krausnick's final book of poetry, sharing the quick wit and profound wisdom culminated from a life creating theatre in the woods of the Berkshire hills, where he spent many years living at The Mount, the opulent Victorian home of Edith Wharton. Technology plays an important role in creating the atmosphere for the installation. Mixing contemporary media (sound and projections) with traditional elements (food and storytelling), the division between time and geography are erased, allowing modern audiences to experience tea time or cocktail hour under the same pretense as the Victorian aristocrats living a life of leisure.?

June 8 @ 2pm, June 9 @7pm

Runtime: 40 min
 

NATALIE JOHNSONIUS NEUBERT is a theatre-maker, sound artist, and curator. She has worked throughout New York at such venues as Ensemble Studio Theater, The Ohio Theater, Urban Stages, The Culture Project, Performance Space 122, Galapagos Art Center, Dixon Place, The Brick Theater and with companies including Target Margin Theater and This is Not A Theatre Company, as well as in site-specific pieces created for the NY Public Library and the NY Botanical Gardens. Outside of New York, her work has also been seen and heard at Bridge Lane Theatre (London, UK), The Colonial Theatre (Pittsfield, MA), Belcourt Theatre (Nashville, TN), Chaffin's Dinner Theatre (Nashville, TN), and at the Miami Light Project as part of the Filmgate Interactive Film Festival. She studied acting at the British American Drama Academy and Shakespeare & Company; and received her BA and MFA from Sarah Lawrence College where she studied Theatre, Writing, Dance, and Music.  

Dennis Krausnick was a founder of Shakespeare & Company and served as its Director of Training from 1993 to 2018. Krausnick held an MA from St. Louis University and an MFA in Acting from NYU. As a Master Teacher of text and rhetoric, and as a teacher, director or guest-artist, he worked in theatre training programs across the country including NYU, ACT, Boston University, Emerson College, Wake Forest University, Southern Methodist University, University of Washington, MIT, University of Pittsburgh, University of Tennessee, Chapman University, Bradley University, University of South Carolina and Western Carolina University. As a director, his Shakespeare credits include most of the Shakespeare canon. He also directed the award-winning television special about Edith Wharton, Songs from the Heart. Krausnick adapted the fiction of Edith Wharton and Henry James for the stage creating numerous one-act and full-length plays all of which have been produced one or more times at Shakespeare & Company as well as by other theaters. Krausnick was awarded the 2006 Bingham Chair of Humanities by the University of Louisville in recognition of his accomplishments as a Master Teacher of Shakespeare Performance

 

phase (un)fazed

One girl dances and talks her way through cosmic metaphors of black holes, atomic romance, and the physics of falling in search of answers on compatibility, compassion, and integrity of self.

Created and Performed by Natalie Deryn Johnson

with a sound score by Rhys Tivey

What do Steven Hawkings and tuning forks have to do with my love life? Natalie has long wished to be a Steinway, reads quantum physics like a love story and is now in search for the frequency of personal alignment. In a desire to explore resonance, compatibility, and integrity of being, Natalie turns to her dancing body and voice. She weaves whimsical and radical correlations between poetic phenomena and human connection while moving in and out of lushness. At times her body and voice speak in tandem (metadance). At times her voice is only heard in the recording, featured and then nearly swallowed in the atmosphere of exhales, musings and melodic murmurs of a sound score composed by Rhys Tivey.

"Natalie is a force of nature, one of those dancers who remind me of wild horses, unstoppable in their frenzy. Her style of movement is both quirky and unique."-Lois Greenfield

Runtime: 50 min

June 13th @ 830pm 

June 15th @ 2pm 

NATALIE DERYN JOHNSON is an improvisational movement artist, poet, photographer based in New York City. In 2018 she was chosen to partake in the Once Upon Water Residency in Toronto and was in residence at the Atlantic Center for the Arts for her solo work. Patient History, a story exploring chronic illness and elevation, premiered at Mister Rogers as her first movement memoire. She has worked with famed dance photographer Lois Greenfield and regularly performs with Christina Noel and the Creature. Her work with Albert A. Garcia premiered at BAM, Dixon Place and Bowery Poetry Club. She holds a Scholastic National Gold Key in Photography and received her BFA in Dance Performance and Choreography from UC Irvine. She dances in the rain and can be found collaborating with a variety of artists in a variety of contexts, from galleries to basements, from stage to film.

 

RHYS TIVEY is a Brooklyn based Composer and Sound Engineer. Rhys is a multidisciplinary singer, trumpeter, songwriter, producer, and movement artist. He has released two albums under his name, bridging influence from modern jazz to indie soul. He has performed his work at NYC venues like The Cutting Room, Mercury Lounge, Manderlay Bar, and Cornelia Street Cafe. Most recently he has created ambient sound work for a gallery performance entitled "What does this have to do with the universe?" Rhys also performs experimental trumpet and voice looped ambient soundscapes. He accompanied Gagosian Gallery's unveiling of John Chamberlain foil sculptures at Longhouse Reserve, and co-created the show "Looks, Sounds, Smells like the The Universe" with artists Hap Tivey and Quinn Tivey, his brother and father, at Real Tinsel Gallery in Milwaukee, incorporating movement by Natalie Deryn Johnson into performance. Tivey and Deryn comprise a sound and movement performance duo that has also performed for Sarah Entwistle's exhibit at Signs and Symbols gallery in NYC.

 

Shasta Geaux Pop
Come celebrate the icon Shasta Geaux Pop completely uncensored in her signature brand of basement get-down party.

Written and Conceived by Ayesha Jordan
Created in collaboration with Directed by Charlotte Brathwaite
Music Direction, Production, Performance: Justin Hicks
Music Production, Djing, Performance: Dj Avg Jo

Costume Design: Abigail DeVille

If Millie Jackson, Roxanne Shante, OutKast and Monty Python had a baby in the year 3030 you'd get Shasta Geaux Pop! Completely uncensored and outrageously hilarious this icon brings you her signature brand of basement get-down party. If Bubble Yum met Colt 45... Crazy, irreverent and uplifting Shasta keeps it real with her gospel of laughter and her free flowing emcee style. With satire, contagious energy and sexy southern charms Shasta tackles naughty topics and pays sonic homage to the 80s/90s classic era of Hip-Hop teleporting the listener to elevated highs.

Shasta Geaux Pop has most recently been performed at the High Line. Shasta's also been presented in Amsterdam, Under the Radar Festival, Off Center Festival, La Jolla Playhouse's Without Walls Festival, Cincinnati CAC, and The Bushwick Starr.

"...a mesmerizing stage production combining edgy humor, social commentary, blazing Hip Hop, dynamic performance art and hilarious audience participation…"--City Beat, 2017

"Created by Brooklyn-based actress/performer/playwright Ayesha Jordan and director Charlotte Brathwaite, Shasta takes the beats of '80s and '90s hip-hop, soaks them in satire, and sprinkles on the sex." – Cincinnati Magazine, 2017

"A glamazon hip-hop icon"- The New Yorker

June 14th @830pm at 155 Bank Street, Westbeth Community Room

Runtime: 60 min

Ayesha Jordan is a NYC based multidisciplinary artist who often uses characters and stories to create indelible moments for cerebral and visceral experiences. Jordan's characters each represent a facet of herself and act as a tool to playfully disguise herself, and to uniquely connect with guests. She most recently performed Shasta Geaux Pop at the High Line. Shasta's also been presented in Amsterdam, Under the Radar Festival, Off Center Festival, La Jolla Playhouse's Without Walls Festival, Cincinnati CAC, and The Bushwick Starr. Ayesha performed in the Broadway production and tour of Eclipsed at The John Golden Theatre and The Curran (SF). Jordan also performed in both Failure Sandwich and Ludic Proxy, by Aya Ogawa, Home by Geoff Sobelle, Stairway to Stardom and Harold I Hate You, by Cakeface (HERE, Ars Nova & Triskelion), and Platonov: Or the Disinherited by Jay Scheib (The Kitchen). In 2015 she created Come See My Double D's at JACK (NY).www.ayeshajordan.com

 

CHARLOTTE BRATHWAITE (Canada/Barbados/UK) was named as one of the "up-and-coming women in theatre to watch" by Playbill. Brathwaite is known for her unique approach to staging classical and unconventional texts, dance, visual art, multi-media, site-specific installation, video, film, performance art, plays and music events. Her work has been seen in the Americas, Africa, Europe, the Caribbean and Asia and ranges in subject matter from the historical past to the distant future illuminating issues of race, sex, power and the complexities of the human condition. 

 

Presented at both national and international venues her work has been seen in New York at The Whitney Museum of American Art, The Park Avenue Armory, The Public Theater/Under the Radar Festival, the Bronx Academy of Arts & Dance (BAAD!), The Living Theater, Joe's Pub, La MaMa E.T.C, The Highline, Jack Performance Space, Bushwick Starr, BRIC Arts Center, Central Park Summer Stage, the Studio Museum of Harlem, 651 Arts, D.C. Arts Commission 5x5 Projects (Washington D.C.), The International Festival of Arts and Ideas (New Haven), FORM Festival (Arcosanti), Moss Arts Center (Virginia), MDLive Arts (Miami), Segerstrom Arts Center (Orange County), Wow Festival (San Diego), Contemporary Arts Center (Cincinnati), Right About Now Festival (Amsterdam, The Netherlands), Test! Festival (Zagreb, Croatia), Het Veem Theater (Amsterdam, The Netherlands), Scarlett Project (Port of Spain, Trinidad), Culture Station Seoul 284 Festival (Seoul, Korea), Aarshi Theater (Kolkata, India), Hebbel am Ufer (Berlin, Germany) and The Chale Wote Festival (Accra, Ghana) among others.

 

Brathwaite is a 2019 Creative Capital awardee, a 2019 United States Artists Fellow and a 2019 Rockefeller/Bellagio resident. Other awards include: the Prelude Festival Franky Award, the Brown Institute Magic Grant, the Princess Grace George C. Wolfe Award, the Julian Milton Kaufman Prize (Yale), and the National Performing Network Creation Fund. She has continued collaborations with noted artists such as Meshell Ndegeocello, Peter Sellars, Flutronix, Ayesha Jordan, Justin Hicks, Kyle Abraham/AIM, Tamar Kali, Guillermo E. Brown/Pegasus Warning, Sanford Biggers, Greg Tate, Burnt Sugar Arkestra and others.

 

She received her MFA at Yale School of Drama and her BA in Physical Theater at the Amsterdam School for the Arts (the Netherlands). She has been a Visiting Professor at Amherst College, The University of Fortaleza UNIFOR (Brazil) and Visiting Artist at Williams College, New York University and Barbados Community College. Brathwaite is currently a freelance director and Associate Professor of Music and Theater Arts at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

 

ST KILDA

A horrific Scottish sound immersion/excursion with live foley looping
Written and Performed by Jody Christopherson
Directed by Isaac Byrne

Sound and Foley Design by Andy Evan Cohen

Voiceovers by Michael de Roos

Dialect Coach Chloe Dirksen
 

After the death of her Grandmother, an American woman travels to an abandoned island off the coast of Scotland and unearths a dark family secret. 

Steeped in Scottish folklore and told in a tradition as ancient as its subject matter, this tale of supernatural horror is performed and technically executed entirely by Jody Christopherson. Foley instrumentation, live singing, looping and distortion pedals create a multi-layered soundscape in near darkness. Instruments include violin bows on bowls of water, cigar box guitars, pie tins full of salt, folk singing and more. This narrative is inspired by the 1930 evacuation of Hirta, St Kilda's only inhabitable island, and the role that music plays in women's narratives.

 
"One of the funniest, spookiest experiences I've ever had at the theater. With the timing of a seasoned comedian, Christopherson sparkles as a story-teller, breathing exciting new life into this oldest of art-forms. She's a visionary in the theater world and legendary story-teller." - The Theatre Times

"A not-so-typical, one-woman performance that completely blew away the audience. . . .an amazing sight for the senses." - Woman About Town

"Chilling." - Theasy

"The most enjoyable evening of theatre we've had in a long time . . . imaginative magic . . . a tribute to what Artaud called the "Alchemy" of the theatre. -Travalanche, New York

 "If you like Laurie Anderson, try St Kilda"- Minneapolis Star Tribune

June 6th @ 7pm, June 7th @ 830pm, June 9th @ 830pm, June 21st @ 830pm.June 23rd @ 7pm 

Runtime: 55 min

 

Jody Christopherson (Writer/ Performer) has been called "a talent to watch, not to mention a pleasure to hear" (Time Out NY) "the ANTITHESIS of the manic pixie dream girl" (Zouch Magazine) and a "Rock Monster" (Brooklyn Rail). Her work has been performed in 28 cities in 6 countries and nominated for 7 Innovative Theater Awards. Works include Greencard Wedding, AMP, Necessary Exposure: The Female Playwright Project and Because You Are Good (based on interviews with Clove Galilee). Additional performance credits include: the award-winning monodrama The Other Mozart by Sylvia Milo, Directed by Isaac Byrne, The Reenactors by Juliana Francis Kelley Directed by Tony Torn at Abrons Art Center,  Primary by Gracie Gardner at IRT, Habitat by William Leavitt at The Kitchen. She is the recipient of a New York Society Library Grant, underwritten by Alexander Sanger, for her show AMP. The equipment used in St Kilda was also underwritten by Mr. Sanger and The New York Community Trust. She is originally from Omaha, Nebraska.

 

Isaac Byrne has received the New York Innovative Theatre Award for Outstanding Direction twice and productions he has directed have been nominated for a Drama Desk Award, an Off Broadway Alliance award, 25 NYIT awards, and 11 Planet Connection Awards. He also performs regularly with the Aztec Economy theatre company in the touring show Butcher Holler Here We Come. He studied acting with renowned acting teachers including Fred Kareman and Matthew Corozine in NYC and Terry Martin in Texas. He has taught acting at the University of the Arts, the New York Film Academy, and the Matthew Corozine Studio. He will graduate with an MFA in Theatre: Directing from Texas State University in May 2019. Directing credits include: The Other Mozart by Sylvia Milo, AMP by Jody Christopherson, Tar Baby and 52 Man Pick Up, both by Desiree Burch

 

THE DARK HEART OF METEOROLOGY
A disgraced weatherman presents a barely-multimedia presentation - part bargain-basement TED Talk, part happening - about natural disasters, large and small.

Co-presented by The Assembly

Jess Chayes - Director

Nic Benacerraf - Scenic Designer

Asa Wember - Sound Designer

Simon Harding - Video Designer

Devin Fletcher - Stage Manager

Stephen Aubrey - Writer

Emily Caffery - Associate Producer 

Rich Lovejoy - Performer

 

Intrepid weatherman Franklin Elijah White is traveling across the country on an increasingly quixotic journey, aided only by a slide projector and whatever visual aids he can find in the backseat of his car. Battered by personal tragedy and heavy winds, he's taking shelter here for the night, and he comes bearing a simple but devastating message: the weather is going to kill us all. Every single one of us.

The Assembly reimagines our beloved 2009 hit for the age of climate change. A comedy about trying to hold it all together when the sky is falling down.

"The Dark Heart of Meteorology....is a delight, featuring a tour de force performance by the fine indie theater actor Richard Lovejoy....Aubrey's script is tight and smart and insightful and often hilarious, and Jess Chayes's deft direction serves it well." – Martin Denton, nytheatre.com

"Chayes's direction of Meteorology is astute, nimbly intertwining life lessons with levity. With such talent onboard, there do not appear to be many storms that this company cannot weather." – Doug Strassler, Show Business Weekly

"A cutting-edge young theater collective." – The New York Times

June 16 @ 830pm, June 20 @ 830pm, June 21 @ 7pm 

Runtime: 60 min

 

THE ASSEMBLY is a collective of multi-disciplinary performance artists committed to realizing a visceral and intelligent theater for a new generation. Assembly members unite varied perspectives in service of wide-reaching, unabashedly theatrical and rigorously researched ensemble performances, crafted to spark conversation with our audiences. Our work embraces the complexities of our present moment; it is a call for empathy and engagement. From workshops to productions to post-performance discussions, The Assembly is dedicated to rooting its artists, audiences, and peers in a profound sense of community. Since 2006, The Assembly has created ten original works that have been seen in Edinburgh, Connecticut, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and throughout NYC at La Mama, The New Ohio and IRT (through the Archive Residency), JACK, Horse Trade, and others. We've explored topics such as the ruthlessness of capitalism in the Gold Rush and the Dot-Com Boom and the politics of 1960s radicals. A feature article about the company was published in TDR in 2016. https://www.assemblytheater.org/

 

 

THE LEGEND OF WHITE WOMAN CREEK
A thirteen song cycle of love, betrayal and revenge sung by the ghost of Anna Morgan Faber.

Co-Presented with The Coldharts

Created and Performed by Katie Hartman

Created and Directed by Nick Ryan

Since the late 1800's, inhabitants of western Kansas and eastern Colorado have claimed to have seen and heard the specter of a woman singing to herself at twilight, as she wanders along a dry, cracked stream-bed known as White Woman Creek. Some say she was killed, some say she killed herself, others say worse… but to hear the truth, you must hear Anna's song for yourself. The Legend of White Woman Creek is a music-theatre piece inspired by a ghost story that weaves a tale of frontier life and peril through thirteen original folk songs, based on the traditional music of the era.

Listen to The Legend of White Woman Creek: https://thecoldharts.bandcamp.com/album/the-legend-of-white-woman-creek

"A series of magnificent narrative songs, performed just perfectly... An absolute triumph of music, production and mischievous willingness to unnerve." - Edmonton Journal

"Her voice is a trained heart-tugging tool, and she expertly controls her vast range. Hartman can move from soft murmurs to cries so powerful you'll need to have some tissues handy for when she really lets loose. - CBC

"Splendidly moving vocals, exquisite guitar artistry and rich emotional range convey genuinely epic storytelling. This production evokes an atmosphere, forlorn, spectral and sacred." -Minneapolis Star Tribune

 

June 13th @ 7pm, June 15th @ 330pm June 16th @ 7pm, June 22nd @ 2pm, June 23rd @ 830pm

Runtime: 60 min

Katie Hartman is a Brooklyn-based singer, songwriter, actor, and theatre-maker. Recent New York credits include Edgar Allan at Soho Playhouse and Torn Page, Bread Arts Collective's RISE AND FALL and 3 Sticks' new folk opera, VESTIGE, both at the Brooklyn performance space, Cloud City. Katie is co-artistic director of the Coldharts, an international touring theatre company that creates ensemble-devised, new music theatre inspired by the American Gothic. While living in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Katie worked with Four Humors Theater Company, Bedlam Theatre, Theatre de la Jeune Lune, and on the Mainstage of the Brave New Workshop Comedy Theater. She is a founding member and producer of the Twin Cities Horror Festival, the largest performing arts festival in North America dedicated to the genre of horror.

Nick Ryan is a founding member and resident playwright of Four Humors Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He has written eight shows with the company including 'The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha' which premiered at the Dowling Studio in the Guthrie Theatre in May of 2016. 'Endurance,' a show he wrote in collaboration with Split Knuckle Theater, premiered during the 2010 Connecticut Repertory Theater Nutmeg Summer Series and received a Connecticut Critic's Circle Award for its run at Longwharf Theater in New Haven in 2015. Nick was the co-creator of an immersive adaptation of Jule's Verne '20,000 Leagues Under the Sea' for Children's Theater Company in Minneapolis which ran for three hundred performances in the summer of 2015. He graduated from the University of Minnesota - Twin Cities with a BA in Theater Arts, where he was the two-time recipient of the Arthur Ballet Award for Playwriting. Nick currently resides in Brooklyn where he is Co-Artistic director of The Coldharts.

 

The Scientist: An Evening with John C. Lilly

A journey to the mind of John C. Lilly: dolphins researcher, float tank inventor, psychedelic explorer, and interstellar diplomat

Written and performed by Jonathan Torn

Live music written and performed by Freddy Katz

Mediums used: Text, live music, slide show

Runtime: 2 hours, 15 min, including intermission

June 12th and 19th @ 7pm

So-fi and the estate of John C. Lilly present a workshop of The Scientist: An Evening with  John C. Lilly, a solo performance with music, sound, and images. The Scientist depicts the spiritual and experimental journey of John C. Lilly, one of the most creative and controversial thinkers of the 20th century. His early groundbreaking research on the brain led him to encounter government mind control conspiracies, mind-expanding drugs, sensory deprivation and inner space explorations, and inter-species communication with dolphins, whales, and silicon-based extraterrestrial life forms.  Skeptics and believers alike will find food for thought in his remarkable and often harrowing story. Featuring live guitar improvisation by Freddie Katz.

Jonathan Torn lives in Flagstaff, AZ. His work has been seen in New York at The Brick, Chain Lightning, Torn/Page, and Tribeca Lab Theater.

 

TOYS 101: THE LAST CLASS (World Premiere)
On the last day of a high school English class, the text becomes the teacher, their action figures, and their Queerness.

Written and Performed by Jonathan Alexandratos

TOYS 101: The Last Class - After years of teaching at a conservative high school, one teacher fears the oppressive curriculum they have been forced to regurgitate has left their students with no way to see themselves in the limited education they've received. Today, for their final class of the year (and possibly their career), this teacher has decided to change that. The teacher, by using the toys that have followed them their entire life, carves an academic path to their own Non-Binary identity, and, in so doing, advocacy for the beautiful uniqueness of all their students. Taught by Jonathan Alexandratos, this immersive, theatrical class uses toys, discussions, literature, projected images, and community to build a hopeful, Queer story. You are the student. The semester is almost over. Class is in session, one last time.

"he is exceptional, you tend to forget you're in an english class. don't think twice just REGISTER FOR THE CLASS :)" -Rate My Professor

"Greatt prof! homework really easy. read the books- really interesting. gives 2 , 5-7 page essays and a midterm! easy A if you come to class and do all the work!" -Rate My Professor

June 9 @ 7pm, June 22 @ 7pm

Runtime: 50min

 
JONATHAN ALEXANDRATOS is a New York City-based playwright and educator. Jonathan began work on their M.F.A. in Playwrighting at Queens College (CUNY), graduating in 2011. During their time in graduate school, they co-founded Playsmiths, (a playwrights' lab in which holds weekly readings of writers' work and provides them with feedback), and studied with playwrights Richard Schotter and Tina Howe. Howe nominated Jonathan's play *Molding Plastic* for the Rita and Burton Goldberg Award and the Irving Zarkower Award for best new play. In 2012, Jonathan's play *Chain Reaction*, a two-act comedy about the building of the atomic bomb, was produced in the NY International Fringe Festival. Jonathan has received commissions from the Abingdon Theatre Company and Truant Arts for the creation of new work. These commissions have resulted in two well-received plays: *Shepherd* (a piece about the bond between military dogs and their human partners) and *Teeth* (about a woman, born without a mouth, who finds her voice). Their play *Breaking/Orbit* was performed at the 2013 Pop Culture Association Conference in Washington, D.C. and the 2013 Last Frontier Theatre Conference in Valdez, Alaska. They are a member of Mission to (dit)Mars, a Queens-based writers' collective that commissions new plays from its members each season. Jonathan created *Duck*, a full-length animal allegory about the nature of abuse, culture, and individuality, which received a workshop production in Strasbourg, France. As a member of the Ingram New Works Lab at Nashville Repertory Theatre (2015-2016), Jonathan wrote WE SEE WHAT HAPPEN, a play about Jonathan's grandmother's immigration from Greece to the U.S. in 1951 as told by bootleg superhero action figures. They are a huge geek: a lover of action figures and comic books, and always finding ways of incorporating those things into their theatre.

 

WHISKEY FILCKS LIVE!: KING OF NEW YORK (World Premiere)
New York is f-ing dying. Capitalism is killing it. Let's go to the movies.

Performed & Co-Created by Michael Niederman

Directed Co-Created by Daniel McCoy

A live "reaction performance" (over a bottle of whiskey) in which film geek, motormouth, and native New Yorker Michael Niederman provides unscripted responses to a series of movie clips centered around New York City's past, present, and future, pondering the question: is New York dying, and if so, what can we do to save it?

Whiskey Flicks: Live! - The King of New York is the next step in an ongoing collaboration that began with the film-exploration cable access talk show Niederman Describes (watch on YouTube!) and continued with the midnight-movie-going-slash-whiskey-tasting podcast Whiskey Flicks (listen on iTunes!). This is a live attempt by McCoy to impose structure on the natural pandemonium inherent in Niederman. Just like New York itself, this piece is a marriage of order and chaos.
June 7th @ 7pm, June 8th @ 830pm, June 16th @ 2pm, June 22th @ 330pm

Runtime: 50 min

 

MICHAEL NIEDERMAN (Co-Creator, Performer) is a graduate of Columbia University's MFA Playwriting Program where he studied under such luminaries as Eduardo Machado and Theresa Rebeck. He is the author of the plays Freshman Fifteen (NYC Actors Studio), The Riverside Symphony (Planet Connections Theater Festivity), The Kuptferberg Family Tragedy (New York Stage and Film), To Barcelona! (Ignited States), Chelsea, Alaska (Lion Theater), and his newest work, Untitled First Draft. His play Every Man was the winner of the 2007 Samuel French Short Play Festival. Michael is also a screenwriter/filmmaker. Most recently he Co-Directed the film uniform, starring co-starring Laura Gomez, which for the past year has played for dozens of film festivals across the world. His script for the short film Proof of Birth won the Broadcast Educational Association Best Screenplay Award, and Faculty Selects at the Columbia University Film Festival. His feature-length screenplay, Saint Carlos of Gowanus also won Faculty Selects at Columbia University, was featured at the National Association of Independent Latino Producers Writer's Lab, and has been a finalist for the Sundance Film Festival Writers Lab.

DANIEL MCCOY (Co-Creator, Director) is a playwright and performer based in New York City whose plays include Dick Pix, Perfect Teeth, Nothing Beyond the Light Matters, Four and Twenty Draculas, Cleave, and Epimythium. His work has been produced and developed recently with Theaterlab, Primary Stages, Project Y Theatre, IATI Theatre, Dutch Kills Theatre, and Simple Machine Theatre. He is alumni member of the Project Y Playwrights Group and the Cimentos Play Development Program at IATI Theatre. As an ensemble member of the New York Neo-Futurists, Daniel has written and performed in The Great American Drama, Mute, (un)afraid, and the long-running late night show The Infinite Wrench. Daniel is a graduate of the MFA Playwriting Program at Hunter College, where he studied with playwrights Tina Howe and Arthur Kopit and dramaturg Mark Bly. He directs every spring for the Writopia Lab Worldwide Plays Festival, showcasing the work of young playwrights.

 

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