news No Comments

Performance Picks: Tarot Card Donner Party, New Play Readings, and More

December 9, 2015 By Cassidy Dawn Graves

Would you rather spend a short evening watching stuff in a bar or dedicate your whole day to the wildest and most visceral of performance art? This week, you can do both.

WEDNESDAY

Where The Wild Things Are 8
At Bizarre Bushwick, 12 Jefferson Street, Bushwick. 9pm; $7-20 suggested donation. More info here.
Party moguls Brooklyn Wildlife present the eighth edition of their evening variety show at Bizarre Bar, home to all shapes and sizes of variety show. At any given moment, you can catch “aggro” raps by Stonehenge Parnhashnakovsky, beats by Star Falcon and Rob Interface, performance art poetry by Terminal Intrusion (Nyssa Frank, owner of The Living Gallery), burlesque, and more. The event asks attendees to wear a costume from a childhood story, a mascot outfit, or just to come half naked. So, suit up. Or down.
More →

Tags: Beyond, Bizarre Bushwick, Brooklyn Wildlife, Bushwick, Cloud City, foxwolf productions, fresh ground pepper, gowanus, gowanus ballroom, here arts center, macbeth, non grata, performance art, plays, shakespeare, the tower, theater, tribeca, Wild Torus, Williamsburg

news No Comments

Hanukkah Haps: Take a Tipsy Tour of a Synagogue or Warp Back to Yiddish Theater

December 7, 2015 By Daniel Maurer

Museum at Eldridge Street. (Photo: Peter Aaron/OTTO)

The Festival of Lights is as good a time as any to get in touch with your Jewish heritage — or at the very least your city’s Jewish heritage. Take advantage of these two fine opportunities.

More →

Tags: and Beyond, Deborah Gans, Eldridge Street Synagogue, Events, Financial District, Hanukkah, holiday events, holidays, Kiki Smith, Lower East Side, Museum at Eldridge Street, Museum of Jewish Heritage, museums, National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene, plays, The Golden Bride, Theatre, tours

news No Comments

‘Post-Op’ Stitches a Tale of ‘Gender Confirmation’ Surgery Into Musical Theater

October 19, 2015 By Cassidy Dawn Graves

Shakina at Joe’s Pub last month. (Photo: Michael Kushner)

A little past 8pm, the band atop the Wild Project’s bare stage begins to play an opening jaunt by Zoe Sarnak, part of a genre-bending new generation of musical theater writers, and Shakina Nayfack steps onstage to sing about her Brand New Pussy. “She’s made for lovin’ and breakin’ hearts,” Shakina proclaims fiercely.

More →

Tags: musical theater factory, plays, shakina nayfack, the wild project

news No Comments

Five Years After Interpol, Carlos D Tells Us Where He’s Been Hiding

August 17, 2015 By Nicole DeMarco

Carlos D, former bassist of Interpol is now Carlos Dengler, actor (Photo: Craig Johnson)

Carlos D, former bassist of Interpol is now Carlos Dengler, actor – here in his one-man show, “Homo Sapiens Interruptus” (Photo: Craig Johnston)

Carlos D, former bass player of Interpol, was an integral part of the band — and was once described as its “most infamous” member. As a founder of the heavily bass-driven post-punk outfit that dominated the indie rock scene of the early aughts, his seemingly sudden departure in 2010 after issuing four solid albums, and realizing fame and success beyond what he could have ever imagined, was shocking for many fans. Not only did Carlos D quit the band, he disappeared from the downtown scene he inhabited altogether.

More →

Tags: acting, Art + Culture, bands, Carlos D, Carlos Dengler, interpol, music, plays, Theatre

news No Comments

New Play Brings Together Slasher Films and Beckett For Some ‘Blissful Confusion’

May 12, 2015 By Nicole Disser

“Biter (Every Time I Turn Around)” at Silent Barn (Photo: Walter Wlodarczyk)

It’s hard to imagine how Title: Point productions crams not only an audience of up to 40 people into a tiny room (now known as Vital Joint, a black box theater) adjacent to the more familiar space at Silent Barn but also an entire cast, multiple sets, lighting, and crew. Well, things get a little creative. “They stuck me in a hole,” Spencer Thomas Campbell, co-writer of the current production, explained. “I spend the entire show in a hole.” But the challenges of a small space also contribute to keeping things interesting around here. I mean, at what other (serious) play is there a distinct possibility that the audience could get splattered with blood or maybe even puked on?

More →

Tags: avant-garde, Biter (Every Time I Turn Around), indie theater, plays, production companies, Ryan William Downey, silent barn, Spencer Thomas Campbell, Theatre, Theresa Buchheister, Title: Point

news No Comments

Nirbhaya Takes On Rape: ‘The Gift of This Play Is That It’s Not Fucking Palatable’

April 17, 2015 By Elizabeth Flock

(Photo: Sinbad Phugra)

On its face, Nirbhaya, which had its American premier at the Lynn Redgrave Theater in the East Village last night, is about the 2012 gang rape of a 23-year-old student in New Delhi. Jyoti Singh Pandey, who was coming home with a friend from the movies, was brutally raped and beaten with an iron rod by six men aboard a bus, then left naked, for dead, by the side of the road. She died days later from internal injuries. The incident spurred angry protests across India, and a documentary about Jyoti’s assault, India’s Daughter, was released earlier this year, banned by an Indian court, and then watched by thousands.

More →

Tags: 2012 New Delhi gang rape, East Village, India's Daughter, Jyoti Singh Pandey, Lynn Redgrave Theater, Nirbhaya, plays, Theatre, Yael Farber

No Comments

At the Inkwell: Playwright Night

July 3, 2014 By Kirsten O'Regan

At the Inkwell, an NYC organisation dedicated to promoting authors and their work, brings you Playwright Night at KGB Bar. The writers appearing on Wednesday are Ross Klavan (known for the novel Schmuck and a slew of film, stage and TV projects), Bonnie Culver, Gregory Fletcher, Jan Quackenbush and Sam Viverito. Sip vodka among the Soviet-inspired furnishings, and listen up.

Tags: bonnie culver, gregory fletcher, jan quackenbush, KGB Bar, plays, ross klavan, sam viverito, writing

news No Comments

3 Comic-Book-Inspired Dramatists Name Their Favorite Comics and Plays

June 3, 2014 By Kate Beaudoin

Mining the Moon

Just in time for the opening night of the Comic Book Theater Festival tonight at The Brick in Williamsburg, we asked three writers to tell us about their three very different plays, and to name their favorite comic books and theatrical productions.

MATTHEW THURBER, “Mining the Moon”
June 8, 10, 21 and 26
The play: “It’s fantasy-based story about the president, who is a werewolf, and who has halted the spinning of the moon, so the moon’s always full and he can stay in power. He’s deposed, and with the help of his friend, who’s a talking horse, he tries to find his way back to the moon and to the source of his werewolf people. It’s very much a satire and a fantasy in a humorous way, about power and corruption and environmental themes. It’s a weird blend of puppet theater and kabuki theater.”
More →

Tags: Arts + Culture, comic book theater festival, comic books, FRED VAN LENTE, KELLY JEAN FITZSIMMONS No, King Kirby, MATTHEW THURBER, Mining the Moon, plays, the brick, Williamsburg, YOU Tell It!

news No Comments

Is This Lena Dunham Send-Up Enough to Cure You of ‘Girls’ Withdrawl?

June 25, 2013 By Jazmine Hughes

Did you miss “Too Many Lenas,” the loving spoof of Lena Dunham and her characters that we told you about last week? Well, then you missed two Lenas playing Chubby Bunny, a monologue rife with breakfast-themed double entendres, a human-sized cake, topless doubles ping-pong, masturbation to a Woody Allen film, and zingers like “Does curly hair make me ethnic?” But don’t worry: Bedford + Bowery has secured this clip of Sam Corbin as Self-Depicted Lena. Just a little something to tide you over until the real Lena returns to HBO.

Tags: Arts + Culture, dixon place, hbo, lena dunham, Lower East Side, plays, sam corbin, theater, too many lenas

news

Can’t Get Enough Lena Dunham? Boy, Do We Have the Play For You

June 17, 2013 By Jazmine Hughes

Left to right: Tessa Skara (Apologetic Lena), Haley Traub (Perfect Lena), Stephanie Hsu (Urban Lena), Sam Corbin (Self-Depicted Lena), Jaime Wright (Naked Lena)

She’s won a Golden Globe. She’s sold a book for over $3.5 million. She’s one of the most influential people in the world. Now imagine if there were six of her.

This is the premise of “Too Many Lenas,” a play based on — you guessed it — the creator of HBO’s “Girls” premiering at Dixon Place later this month.
More →

Tags: carroll dunham, david bernstein, dixon place, girls, golden globes, hbo, jaime wright, laurie simmons, lena dunham, Lower East Side, nyu, plays, theater, too many lenas