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Showing posts from September, 2020

News: Outdoor, Socially-Distanced Pop-Up Solo Performances Coming This October

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  Photo courtesy Spin Cycle PR A handful of intrepid solo performers are presenting live, outdoor pop-up performances of their acclaimed solo shows this fall. These intimate storytelling events are presented using the LiveTours app and performed for an audience of 14 or less. Ticket buyers must have a smartphone and headphones or earbuds. By downloading the app in advance, patrons will be able to clearly hear the performer while being able to maintain a safe social distance. The exact meetup location (as well as instructions and safety protocols) will be emailed to ticket buyers in advance of the performance. It is suggested that patrons bring their own pillow/blanket/portable chair for seating and wear comfortable shoes. Face masks must be worn at all times -- no eating or drinking during the course of the event. In case of rain, refunds will be issued. Tickets are $20 each, available at SpinCycleNYC.com . Currently scheduled performances include: BETTE DAVIS AIN’T FOR SISSIES Written

Review: "Zero Cost House (for Zoom)" Offers Thoreau-ly Entertaining Deconstruction

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Zero Cost House (for Zoom) Written by Toshiki Okada Translated by Aya Ogawa Adapted and directed by Dan Rothenberg Presented by Pig Iron Theatre Company via Zoom September 18-25, 2020 Dito van Reigersberg, Alex Torra, and puppets by Maiko Matsushima. Photo by Mary McCool. The extra-diegetic echo that Pig Iron Theatre Company's first digital presentation, Zero Cost House (for Zoom) , includes a natural disaster interrupting development of a play represents precisely the kind of layered resonances that suffuse the play itself. Written by Japanese playwright Toshiki Okada and elegantly staged by Pig Iron, Zero Cost House , reimagined for virtual presentation after a live debut in 2012, playfully and thoughtfully troubles the boundaries of identity as well as the lines between artist and character, autobiography and fiction, and self-presentation and performance. Divided into three chapters, with a short intermission, Zero Cost House ostensibly tells the story of Okada's attempt

News: "Ghost Hunt: The Hall-Mills Double Homicide," an Asynchronous Multi-City Theatrical Adventure, Has Begun

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Image courtesy Kampfire PR Thinkery and Verse (Karen Alvarado and J.M. Meyer, co-artistic directors) and Butch Mermaid (Ania Upstill, artistic director) have annoucned their collaboration in the world premiere experiential production of Ghost Hunt: The Hall-Mills Double Homicide , based on their more traditional Hall-Mills stage-play, Thou Shalt Not , which was set to premiere this spring in New York City. Part podcast, part gaming (think Pokemon Go ), part theatrical production, this unique experience is entirely Covid-19 safe (set in a NJ community which has lost over 1400 people to the illness) and uses a free gaming app called ‘GeoCaching,’ in which audiences will track, hunt, and discover hidden caches at locations tied to Hall-Mills murders. Ghost Hunt  is a geo-cached audio adventure that invites participants to experience the story of a tragic double homicide at the sites where the murders occurred and justice was lost. “This is an innovative, experimental, and experiential aud

Review: "#txtshow (on the internet)" Virtually Makes Us All Playwrights

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#txtshow (on the internet) Created and performed by Brian Feldman Presented by the 2020 Philadelphia Fringe Festival (September 10-October 4, 2020) and Rochester Fringe Festival  (September 17-26, 2020) via Zoom Tickets available at: Philadelphia Fringe ; Rochester Fringe Brian Feldman as txt. Image courtesy Brian Feldman Watching Brian Feldman's experimental, immersive, interactive #txtshow (on the internet) brought to mind the plot thread in Umberto Eco's novel Foucault's Pendulum in which the protagonists use a computer to generate randomized assemblages of texts to help them to create a fabricated history, which is then received as real. Here, the character txt (Feldman) speaks assemblages of spontaneously generated text(s) from the audience in order to create the reality of the show, which, strictly speaking, is also made up of everything else going on the viewer's screen at the same time. It's all very postmodern. It's all very fun. Feldman's shows

News: Socially Distanced Performance "Static Apnea (2020)" Begins Sept. 12

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  Image courtesy Spin Cycle PR the american vicarious in collaboration with The Invisible Dog Art Center will present the New York Premiere of Static Apnea (2020) a socially distanced performative installation beginning performances on September 12, 2020. Conceived and directed by Founding Artistic Director, Christopher McElroen,  Static Apnea (2020)  features text by Julia Watt and is performed by Isabella Pinheiro and Jenny Tibbels. The design team includes Troy Hourie (Installation Designer), Zach Weeks (Lighting Designer) and Andy Evan Cohen (Sound Designer). The discipline of holding one’s breath underwater, motionless - static apnea. Breath has been taken away. By a virus. By a knee. By the uncertainty. The struggle to restore it has rendered us motionless, collectively holding our breath. Do you know how long you can hold your breath? Would it be long enough to save yourself? Would it be long enough to save someone you love? One audience member, surrounded by a tunnel of blue l

News: Artistic Stamp Launches Inaugural Season of Interactive Plays-By-Mail

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Image courtesy Kampfire PR  Presenting original work from six award-winning playwrights--Ben Bonnema ( The Apple Boys ) , November Christine, Matt Schatz ( UNTITLED a New Musical Comedy about Serious Drama , The Burdens ), Jahn Sood ( The Disappearing Man , We Were an Island ), Elyne Quan, and Natalie Ann Valentine-- Artistic Stamp will produce a season of interactive experiences that take audience members on unique journeys via handwritten correspondence. The audience becomes a character in the story, reacting and replying to the letters received and playing a role in deciding the outcome. All of this takes place during a seven-letter narrative arc that plays out over the course of September to December. In a time when theatergoers can’t venture out, Artistic Stamp brings the plays home. “Almost overnight we experienced the disappearance of live theater; the art form to which we’ve devoted our entire professional lives,” said West Hyler ( Cirque Du Soleil Paramour , Big Apple Circus)