Dixon Place is thrilled to announce our 2020 season, featuring nine commissioned original productions and four puppetry productions, including Concrete Temple Theatre, Sara Juli, Eszter Balint & Stew, Shayna Strype, Rachel Klein, Nora Burns, Marga Gomez, Maria Camia, Andy Manjuck, Dorothy James and Arif Silverman.
Additionally, Dixon Place is proud to co-produce and present the Criminal Queerness Festival with National Queer Theater in June. Following the success of last year’s inaugural Criminal Queerness Festival—featured on “Best of Pride” lists in The New York Times, The Advocate, and Thrillist—the 2020 Festival will feature original works by four renowned queer playwrights from around the world. Dixon Place is located at 161A Chrystie Street in Manhattan, for tickets and further information please visit www.dixonplace.org
THEATER, PUPPETRY
January 31 – February 14, 2020
Concrete Temple Theatre
Packrat
Created by Carlo Adinolfi & Renee Philippi
Set deep in the Sagebrush Desert, this visually stunning puppet-forward play contemplates humanity’s relationship with the natural world. Puppetry, projections and an original score elegantly come together to create many layers of meaning and emotion, presented simply and elegantly with engaging and captivating puppets ranging from Bunraku to Pageant styles.
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DANCE, COMEDY, THEATER
February 21 – 28, 2020
New York City Premiere
Burnt-Out Wife
Created & performed by Sara Juli
With her comically idiosyncratic text-driven dance style, Juli takes on monogamy, intimacy, loneliness, sex deprivation, and other impossibilities of marriage. In a pepto-bismol pink bathroom, this dance-theater-comedy tackles the taboo and urgent social topic of the detritus of committed partnerships, sparking intimate conversations while blowing up the marital institution with humor, controversy, and explicit personal musing and disclosure. For mature audiences only.
MUSIC, THEATER
March 20 – 28, 2020
I Hate Memory
Written by Eszter Balint
Songs by Eszter Balint & StewFeaturing: The Musicians
Directed by Lucy Sexton
Media Design: Tal Yarden
Musical director: David Nagler
An anti-cabaret co-starring the Streets of New York and the Late 20th Century, the show features appearances by family, film, fame, immigration, joy, theater, shame, dance floors, open doors, papaya ice cream, and the Shah of Iran’s wife. This reluctant memoir is served on a bed of song and dirt, with a punk aperitif and Jimmy Carter for dessert.
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THEATER, PUPPETRY
April 10 – 25, 2020
MINE
Created & performed by Shayna Strype
Live Feed Camera/Dramaturgy by Desiree Mitton
MINE uses a variety of puppetry styles, live-feed projections, stop-motion animation, wearable sculptures, and humor to weave together themes of nostalgia, excess, and the destructive human urge to colonize land, bodies, and minds.
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DANCE,THEATER
May 1 – 16, 2020
Breaking Glass
Conceived & Directed by Rachel Klein
Choreography by Rachel Klein, Danielle Marie Fusco, & the ensemble
Aerial Choreography by Summer Lacy and Chloe Goolsby
Featuring: Danielle Marie Fusco, Summer Lacy, Chloe Goolsby, Federico Garcia, Shoko Fujita, Joey Kipp, Manuela Agudelo, Connor Dealy, Stephanie Nobel, Amy Mack, Ricardo Barrett, & Andrea Dusel-Foil
Breaking Glass follows the plight of the Furies, three tenacious heroines who enter a land of Kings, confronted with outrage from the ruling class as they fight to earn their place as respected leaders. Through an allegorical dreamscape, this deeply personal piece inspired by true events serves to break down the barriers of intolerance through profoundly inspiring performances.
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THEATER, DANCE, QUEER INTEREST
May 20 – 30, 2020
The Village, or A Fag*, A Hag*, a Drag*, a Hustler*, a John*, a Junkie* and a Jew* Walk into a Bar (*sorry, *I know, *wrong, *dated, *what, *stop, *really?!)
Written by Nora Burns
Directed by Mike Albo
Choreographed by Robin Carrigan
1979, New York City. Trade, a hustler living in “Old George’s” apartment, brings home his latest trick, Steve, an earnest NYU student, as friends, neighbors and addicts come by to drink, drug, flirt, dream and dish about love, life, death and taxis. A Village, or… is a dance-filled disco comedy with an ensemble cast of eight (plus gorgeous go-go boys!), a meta musical with high jinks, low kinks, softcore porn and rock hard abs very loosely based on Our Town, with apologies to Thornton Wilder.
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THEATER, QUEER INTREST
June 2020
Criminal Queerness Festival
Curated by National Queer Theater
Bringing together renowned queer playwrights from around the world, National Queer Theater and Dixon Place are providing a platform for artists facing censorship, shining a light on critical stories from across the globe. In order to build a truly global queer community, these writers are inspiring activism and shaping our culture towards the equitable treatment of LGBTQ people around the world. A Mayor’s Grant for Cultural Impact awardee, the festival is proud to partner with the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs for community engagement and outreach. Don’t miss The New York Times and The Advocate recommended theatrical event of the Pride season!
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THEATER, QUEER INTREST
July 16 – 25, 2020
Spanking Machine
Written & Performed by Marga Gomez
Directed by Adrian Alexander Alea
In Spanking Machine, GLAAD Award-winning writer/performer Marga Gomez shifts across gender, latitudes and generations in a darkly comic memoir about the first boy she ever sloppy-kissed and how it made them gay forever.
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THEATER, PUPPETRY
September 18 – 26, 2020
New Mony
Created by Maria Camia
Puppeteers: Leonie Bell, Maria Camia, Connie Fu, Marcella Murray, Leah Ogawa
Step into the colorful, comical, spiritual, sci-fi world of Aricama where we explore duality and ancestry with puppets, Toy Theater, body costumes, original live music, and projections in this full-length workshop production.
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THEATER, PUPPETRY
October 2020, dates to be announced
Bill’s 44th
Created & performed by Andy Manjuck & Dorothy James
Drawing from Bunraku and character driven object theatre, Bill’s 44th examines the loneliness of one man puppeteered by two people. He throws himself a party which isn’t well attended, and attempts to cheer himself up by creating some friends out of crudité and party balloons. Against all odds he succeeds and finds himself having a grand old time, but when a “real” guest arrives a wave of shame comes over him and he quickly destroys his newly created friends.
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THEATER,PLAY
November 6 – 21, 2020
World Premiere
Dream of Rays
Written by Arif Silverman
Directed by Lillian White
Featuring visuals by Julia Melfi
Not all is as it seems aboard Commander Viola Nightfire’s ship The Mad Wraith. Nightfire and her crew have been tasked by the Queen of the Silvercliffs to sail west and capture a school of singing Manta Rays, in hopes their ethereal, transcendent voices will restore the dying waters of their seaside kingdom. Grudges and deceptions run rampant, exacerbated by the presence of the Queen’s mysterious ambassador. With a cast of ten, Dream of Rays is a wild new play that explores the different ways humankind can react to the prospect of a crumbling world.
Dixon Place
An artistic incubator since 1986, Dixon Place is a Bessie and Obie Award-winning non-profit institution committed to supporting the creative process by presenting original works of theater, dance, music, puppetry, circus arts, literature and visual art at all stages of development. Presenting over 1000 creators a year, this local haven inspires and encourages diverse artists of all stripes and callings to take risks, generate new ideas and consummate new practices. Many artists, such as Blue Man Group, John Leguizamo, Lisa Kron, David Cale, David Drake, Deb Margolin and Reno, began their careers at DP. In addition to emerging artists, Dixon Place has been privileged to present established artists such as Mac Wellman, Holly Hughes, Justin Bond, Karen Finley, Kate Clinton and Martha Wainwright. After spawning a salon in her Paris apartment in 1985, founding Artistic Director Ellie Covan pioneered the institution in her NYC living room for 23 years. Covan was a recipient of a Bessie, a New York Dance and Performance Award and a Bax10 Award for her service to the community. Dixon Place received two Obie Awards, and an Edwin Booth Award for Excellence in Theater. Dixon Place has organically developed and expanded into a leading professional, state-of-the-art facility for artistic expression. www.dixonplace.org
Dixon Place’s 2020 season is made possible with public funds from the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs with support from the City Council/Councilmember Margaret Chin/ Manhattan Borough President/NYC Dept for the Aging/Materials for the Arts with support from the NYC Depts of Sanitation & Education; NY State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo & the NY State Legislature; NY State Assemblymember Deborah Glick with funds from NYS Office of Children & Family Services; and the National Endowment for the Arts; and with private support from Axe-Houghton Foundation, Dramatists Guild Fund, Gerald J. & Dorothy R. Friedman Foundation, The Howard Gilman Foundation, The Greater New Orleans Foundation, The Harkness Foundation for Dance, The Jane Henson Foundation, The Jim Henson Foundation, The Jerome Foundation, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Mertz Gilmore Foundation, Poets & Writers, The Jerome Robbins Foundation, The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation and The Shubert Foundation. New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project, with lead funding from Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
