Thinking Theater NYC

axes, herbs & satchels: open the archive Devised by The Anthropologists Co-directed and co-written by Sandie Luna and Melissa Moschitto Presented at JACK (20 Putnam Ave, Brooklyn, NYC), April 16-19, 2025; Hebrew Tabernacle (551 Fort Washington Ave, Manhattan, NYC), May 1, 2025; and Tiffany Street Theatre @ Inspiration Point (710 Tiffany St, Bronx, NYC), May 9-11, 2025 axes, herbs and satchels . Photo by Jody Christopherson axes, herbs and satchels: open the archives , devised by The Anthropologists, is a time-traveling exploration of midwifery in America, spanning South Carolina in 1922, Florida in 1977, and “Here. Now.” Through a blend of archival research, movement, and direct audience engagement, the play examines how traditional midwifery knowledge, safeguarded by Black women, was systematically displaced by medical overregulation and the institutionalization of healthcare throughout the 20th century. This is a play about what has been lost, and how it might yet be recovere...

axes, herbs and satchels . Photo credit: Isha Patel. The Anthropologists, a NYC-based, female-led, investigative theater company, is launching the world premiere of their devised play axes, herbs and satchels . The tour begins in Jersey City at Art House on February 19th and 20th, followed by stops in Delray Beach at Arts Garage on February 23rd and Wabash College in Crawfordsville, Indiana on March 5th. The show will return to New York City in spring 2025 with performances in the Bronx, Manhattan, and Brooklyn. The Anthropologists’ Artistic Director Melissa Moschitto and co-director Sandie Luna helm the ensemble of Black women and non-binary artists who shine a light on the suppressed history of Black midwives, doulas, and birthing bodies. axes, herbs and satchels travels across generations with storytelling, movement, southern spirituals, and ritual. axes, herbs and satchels is an act of reparative history, offering audiences a space for communal learning, reckoning, and healing. ...

No Pants in Tucson Devised by The Anthropologists Director/Writer: Melissa Moschitto Lead Deviser: Mariah Freda Presented by The Anthropologists at A.R.T./New York Theatres 502 W 53rd Street, Manhattan, NYC November 5-14, 2021 Mariah Freda, Kian J. Johnson, April J. Barber, Marissa Joyce Stamps. Photo by Jody Christopherson A divided country replete with attempts to legislatively prescribe and regulate people's gender expression: the United States in the 1860s or the United States in 2021? The answer is both, as No Pants in Tucson makes resoundingly clear. Making its world premiere, this comedy from The Anthropologists, who are dedicated to research-based theater that inspires action, focuses primarily on "masquerade" laws, ordinances that, for example, prohibited the wearing of 'men's' clothes by whom the state considered women, and that underwent an explosive proliferation in 19th-century America. No Pants in Tucson takes a playful, kinetic, intersectional...