I Don’t Wanna See That?!!?!
Project: The Mannequin Play
April 8–14
“The Mannequin Play is a folk-rap musical devised by NYC drag performers and members of the performance art collective “I Don’t Wanna See That?!!?!” The play follows three mannequins, Sale, Glossy, and Liver, working at a Rainbow Shops in Bushwick. Much like every family, they have their conflicts, but are united in their goal of one day escaping Rainbow and visiting the beach painted as a mural in their store. Golden Gardens Beach. These plans are interrupted by the abrupt closure of their store, which starts the biggest fight the family of mannequins have ever had. Ultimately the stores closure separates them. Glossy is sent to a sex shop in Michigan where she falls in love with the shop’s clerk, Delilah. Liver is sent to the garbage dump where they meet another mannequin who is just a head, HairKitt. The two form an unlikely friendship and fight through roaches and crows to escape the dump. Meanwhile, Sale is forgotten at the Rainbow; left alone to ponder the immortality of a mannequin who is made of plastic, and thus, will never decompose into the earth again. The play travels through decades until the mannequins are finally reunited at the beach.
David Lee Huynh
Project: mẹ mình là ai
June 10–16
mẹ mình là ai is part stand-up comedy, part TED Talk, David Lee Huynh shares how the effects of French colonialism shaped Vietnam and tore his maternal family apart. Trying to understand why his mother has such a #%@#ing hard time saying “I love you”, the story is told with whimsy, sardonic humor, and heart.
Reynaldo Piniella
Project: Son of an Unknown Father
June 17–23
Son of an Unknown Father remixes the story of the first Black saint of the Americas, Martin de Porres, bringing the world of 17th-century Lima, Peru into present-day East New York, where I grew up in Brooklyn. Canonized during the Civil Rights movement as the patron saint of mixed-race people, Martin was born into slavery. Even through exceptional piety and devotion, he could not escape bondage and the violent racism of his time until one day, he discovered he had a miraculous power to cure people simply by touching them with his bare hands. Suddenly viewed as the second son of God, people come from far and wide to meet the man with the magic hands. Martin’s burden becomes too much to bear and he is forced to make a decision – self-preservation or self-sacrifice?
Kaili Y. Turner
Project: Sheen the Musical
July 6–12
Sheen the Musical is a musical play based in the 1960’s, where a group of teens sing, dance and fight to try to find their way. Stuck between color lines, the greasers and what it means to be American, they experience friendship, romances and adventures. Sheen, the musical named after hair sheen, a product used by African Americans for decades is the answer to Grease you never knew you needed, but are damn sure glad you have!
Joey Massa & Katharine Lorraine
Project: Workshop (working title)
July 22–28
Workshop follows YURI, a late-twenties digital artist, and JAMES, a progressive late-twenties New Yorker, as they navigate a complicated history of intimacy and harm. The play is heated and tense and, at other times, nostalgic and intimate. It’s an exploration into consent, boundaries, accountability and an examination of the question: how do we move forward from harm?
2024 Residency Panelists: Daniel Carlon, Alejandro de la Guerra, David Deblinger, Craig MacArthur Dolezel, Maria Fontanals, Kate Fuglei, Pat Golden, Deirdre MacNamara, Achiro Olwoch, Jaime Sunwoo, Ashley Teague, Rhys Samuel Washington
