the week of january 10-16, 2025
sentient puppets, shape-shifting oracles, so many operas
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I donated a portion of this week’s subscription income to the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank, LAFD Wildfire Emergency Fund, Direct Relief, and this GoFundMe for a college friend who lost her home in the Eaton fires. The magnitude of loss is devastating and infuriating. Stay safe, friends.
icymi: bills, bills, bills
This month’s money diary is from a development worker on the West Coast with hefty private student loan payments:
As a reminder: The full archive of past Bills, Bills, Bills money diaries is available here and we accept diarist submissions on a rolling basis.
we all belong in the preamble
Heidi Schreck’s What the Constitution Means to Me starts performances at Round House Theatre in Bethesda, MD on January 15th. Morgan Gould directs “the profoundly personal look at our nation’s most debated document and its effects on four generations of women in [Schreck’s] family.” (And I’m the dramaturg, so it receives prime placement in this week’s round-up.)
world premieres
Ari Roth, A. Lorraine Robinson, and Vanessa Gilbert’s Who Cares: The Caregiver Interview Project is now running through February 2nd at Universalist National Memorial Church from DC’s Voices Festival Productions. The “story of evolving relationships within a multi-generational caregiver support group” is directed by Kathryn Chase Bryer.
Michael Hollinger’s Holy Grail of Memphis starts performances January 16th at Arden Theatre Company in Philadelphia. Terrence J. Nolen directs the profound comedy about a man who “unearths long-lost blues recordings and fights to restore his grandfather’s music studio and fractured family legacy.”
productions
Monica Bill Barnes and Robbie Saenz de Viteri’s Many Happy Returns is now running through January 18th Off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons. The “dance version of a memory play” centers on “a woman in the middle of her life who moves with total clarity but can’t stop revealing the doubt she’s desperate to dance over." (All tickets are free!)
The Wooster Group’s new production of Richard Foreman’s Symphony of Rats is now running through January 25th at The Performing Garage in NYC. Elizabeth LeCompte and Kate Valk direct the reimagining of Foreman’s 1988 work now “set in a spaceship-museum gallery” following “an American president receiving messages by unknown means — and he doesn't know whether to trust them.”
Sanaz Toossi’s English is now playing on Broadway through March 2nd. Knud Adams directs the “Pulitzer Prize-winning play about the universal foibles of language and miscommunication.”
Jordan E. Cooper’s Ain't No Mo' runs January 10 - February 8 at Boston’s SpeakEasy Stage in a co-pro with Front Porch Arts Collaborative. The “blisteringly funny series of sharp comic vignettes about Black American life, history, and identity” is directed by Dawn M. Simmons.
Jordan Harrison’s The Antiquities starts performances January 11th Off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons in a co-pro with the Vineyard Theatre and the Goodman Theatre. David Cromer and Caitlin Sullivan direct the new work set in a post-human world “as the curators at the Museum of Late Human Antiquities are fiercely committed to bringing a lost civilization to life again.”
Kentucky Shakespeare’s production of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest runs January 11-19 at Actors Theatre of Louisville. The “delightful comedy sparkling with vibrant characters, mistaken identities, and farcical antics” is directed by Amy Attaway.
James Ijames’ Fat Ham starts performances January 11th at The Goodman Theatre in Chicago. Tyrone Phillips directs the Pulitzer-winning “uproarious reimagining of Hamlet set at a boisterous Southern cookout.”
Sanaz Toossi’s Wish You Were Here runs January 12 - February 2 at South Coast Rep in Costa Mesa, CA. The “enlightened comedy” following “five close girlfriends planning weddings, trading dirty jokes and trying to live their young lives as protests break out across 1978 Iran” is directed by Mina Morita.
Christina Ham’s Nina Simone: Four Women starts performances January 14th at Geva Theatre in Rochester, NY. Charlotte Brathwaite directs the musical exploration of “the seismic shift Simone took from artist to activist and revolutionary, and her fight to reflect the times through her consciousness rising music.”
Steve Carter’s Eden runs January 16 - February 8 at Yale Rep in New Haven, CT. Brandon J. Dirden directs the “blistering saga set in 1927 in San Juan Hill, a six-block stretch of Manhattan where tensions run deep between its populations of Black Americans and Caribbean immigrants.”
workshops & readings
The Relentless Reading Series begins January 12th at Theatre Row. The staged reading series of Relentless Award-winning and finalist plays kicks off with Patrick Vermillion’s The Good Boy Game (January 12, directed by Miranda Haymon) and Dave Harris’ MANAKIN (January 15, directed by Taylor Reynolds).
nyc festivals
The Under the Radar Festival is now running through January 19th at various locations around New York City. Here are the productions opening this week:
Malcolm-x Betts and Nile Harris’ Temporary Boyfriend at The Chocolate Factory Theater (January 11-13) is an “improvisatory duet locating the relationship between two men within ephemeral histories of gay Black brotherhood.”
Aakash Odedra Company and Lewis Major Projects’ Little Murmur at New Victory Theater (January 10-19) is a “biographical piece of solo dance theater [depicting a] triumphant and heartfelt portrait of neurodiversity.”
Palestinian artist Khawla Ibraheem’s A Knock at the Roof at New York Theater Workshop (January 10-19) is an “unforgettable new play about obsession, survival and everyday life in Gaza directed by Oliver Butler.”
Project NYX’s Duke Bluebeard’s Castle at Japan Society (January 15-18) is “a wild burlesque-like subversion of the French gothic horror legend directed by illustrious Korean-Japanese experimental theater director Kim Sujin.”
The Dan Daw Show at Performance Space New York (January 12-17) is a “peep into the shiny and sweaty push pull of living with shame while bursting with pride” directed by Mark Maughan.
South Korean artist Jaha Koo’s Cuckoo at PAC NYC (January 16-18) “takes you on a journey through the past two decades of Korean history, combining Jaha’s personal experiences with political events and reflections on happiness, economic crises, and mortality.”
The Protoype Festival is now playing through January 19th at various locations around New York City. Co-curated by Kristin Marting and Beth Morrison, this year’s line-up “tells stories of our shared experience, tracing the threads that connect us across eras, cultures, dreams, and memories.”
The world premiere of John Glover, Kelley Rourke and Kristin Marting’s alternative opera Eat the Document (January 9-13, 15-17 at HERE Mainstage)
David T. Little and Anne Waldman’s Black Lodge is a “part film screening and part industrial rock opera concert drawing on the complicated mythologies of the surrealist writer William S. Burroughs.” (January 11-15 at BRIC Arts Media; the production is also available to stream on demand)
Christopher Cerrone and Stephanie Fleischmann's chamber opera IN A GROVE is “a perspective-shifting musical adaptation of Rynosuke Akutagawa's short story.” (January 16-19 at La MaMa)
Sol Ruiz’s rock guaguanco opera Positive Vibration Nation is “a time-traveling exploration of Miami’s cultural singularity.” (January 11-14 at HERE)
Catapult Opera’s TELEKINETIK is available to stream on demand through January 19. Khary Laurent’s ‘hip-hopera’ follows “a would-be vigilante, tortured by a telepathic shaman, learning a difficult lesson about justice versus bloodlust.”
The Exponential Festival is now running through February 2nd at various locations around New York City. The annual showcase for emerging experimental performance artists continues this week:
Matthew Antoci & Meaghan Robichaud’s MEOW! at Loading Dock (January 10-12, 14-17) is “a revisiting of the documentary classic Grey Gardens through the eyes of Little Edie’s mysterious city life of the 80s, hosted by a pair of shape-shifting oracles in 50-inch wigs.”
Ella Lee Davidson’s “surreal afro-futurist satire” Sapphire at The Brick (January 15-18, Directed by Jordan Powell)
Ring Yuqi Yang & Casey Woodall’s ORACLE at Brick Aux (January 12 at 2:22pm) will also livestream on YouTube.
CAROL’s To Bridge Ten Millennia at We Are Here Brooklyn Studios (January 16-18) is created and performed by Skye Fort, Charlie Manion, and Mike Steele.
Vape Kid Jr., Sir Cum Sized & Excess Materials’ Cool Zone: The Lost Episode at Brick Aux (January 16-18) depicts “a Fascist brainwashing program disguised as a public access children’s television show, [hosted by] a 5-foot sentient puppet named Courtney as he learns what it means to serve his country.”
PhysFestNYC is now running through January 19th at the Stella Adler Center for the Arts. This week’s line-up for the “community-led festival that celebrates, enriches, and envisions the field of physical theater" includes:
Jacinta Yelland’s KOAL (January 10 & 11) is a “part climate-catastrophe, part clown show for the end of the world” performed by Yelland and directed by Trey Lyford.
The Fluxus Brothers Present: Good Art Bad Art (January 14) is “a performance art lecture demonstration featuring scores from the historic Fluxus art movement of the 1960s alongside Fluxus-inspired originals by The Fluxus Brothers and their Dada.”
the regional theatre game of thrones
Marya Sea Kaminski is stepping down as artistic director of Pittsburgh Public Theater in July 2025. She has led the company for seven years. In an interview with Onstage Pittsburgh, Kaminski said she was leaving because she wants “to have a more expansive and personal response artistically to the world, and cast a vision that is outside the parameters of the Public’s mission.”
2025 season updates
Invictus Theatre Company announces its 2025 season. The company-in-residence at Windy City Playhouse in Chicago, IL will produce Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale (directed by Charles Askenaizer), Tony Kushner’s Angels in America (directed by Askenaizer), and Marcus Gardley’s The House That Will Not Stand (directed by Aaron Reese Boseman).
in memoriam
Richard Foreman passed away on January 4th at age 87. The legendary avant-garde playwright, director, and experimental theater theorist founded the Ontological-Hysteric Theater in 1968, which produced over fifty of his plays.