“It’s noir-shaped, but like all good noirs, there is more here than meets the eye—or ear. In Joey’s floridly contempo-queeny stylings, cliches meet cliches with cannibalistic ferocity, as the play’s quartet of queers—all played by the virtuosic actor-playwright David Greenspan—become exponentially queerer in their pursuits for one another.” – Jess Barbagallo for The Brooklyn Rail
“…in the tiny yet mighty Williamsburg venue The Brick, there is a solo performance occurring around a table on an otherwise empty stage… On Set With Theda Bara—written by Joey Merlo and performed by off-kilter-theater royalty David Greenspan—embodies exactly the kind of gutsy weirdness and rich, invigorating audience connection that can arise from the challenge of a limited set of tools.”
– Sara Holdren, Vulture
“…Those Moveable Pieces manages to leave a surprisingly delicate impression. In the center of it all is an attempt to redress, via two bodies sweating and connecting in space, three grave contemporary emergencies: ‘(1) A neglect of embodiment,’ says the voice-over, ‘(2) An abuse of narrative … (3) A crisis of imagination.'”
Sara Holdren for New York Magazine
“What will we preserve? What can we save from the wreckage? Going outside into the cold, I was almost surprised to find the world still there.”
And more!
Nicole Serratore for American Theater Magazine
Elisabeth Vincentelli for The New York Times
Joey Sims for Transitions
“Joey Merlo’s On Set with Theda Bara, an eerie seance-play performed by David Greenspan, who channels multitudes.” – Helen Shaw
“Dyer is intent on a kind of holy failure: he runs technical cues from a cell phone, which he hands to the audience, encouraging them to whack away at the controls, and he tries to invoke a supernatural power by painting a pentacle, an effort that collapses mid-ritual. Is he talking metaphorically about success here? Is the Devil not taking his calls? Yes and yes.”
Read Helen Shaw’s full review of Faust (The Broken Show) in The New Yorker
“Room, Room, Room, in the many Mansions of eternal glory for Thee and for everyone is part concert, part queer church service, part rave, and all big, tender, welcoming energy.”
“On Set with Theda Bara uses the mythology of the silent film star and anti-hero Theda Bara as a metaphor for queerness,” says playwright Merlo. “I’m a lyrical playwright who loves the campy, surreal, and melodramatic. My plays explore the cracks between the boundaries of what’s ‘real’ and what isn’t—by fusing the two, I attempt to locate my own existence within the realm of the fantastic. Theda Bara was written in a fever-dream state, literally, as I was very sick at the time and mostly bedridden. From that state, I used a cinematically imagistic narrative to create a play that transcends the traditional theatrical experience and invites a collaboration between audience, performer, and text.”
“Bent Duo unsettles traditional notions of music making; nothing is taken at face (or ear) value. They shift the sonic field through what they call their “radical faerie dance,” communicating queer bodies in motion. What was under the surface becomes legible, and the more audible these queer sonics become.”
Read John P. Hastings full feature on Bent Duo on Brooklyn Rail.
“Anthony Braxton’s music is difficult to program even among forward-thinking institutions. Leave it to the scrappy companies to get the work done.”
“Room, Room, Room delves into the end of the world, expanding definitions of gender identity and what it means to create a utopian society. It also contemplates, death. “
“Our existence is an elaborate joke: a stroke of dumb luck, a glint in the universe’s eye. What better way to acknowledge that fact than through a psychedelic cabaret, guided by the blind prophet of the Underworld themself? Part musical and part otherworldly burlesque, Hyperfantasia served the wild, the wonderful, and everything in between.”
“Experimental company Object Collection has transformed The Brick into a madhouse of assorted knickknacks, like six different living rooms all happening at once.”
“At its core, Automatic Writing is a kind of ritual magic rendered on magnetic tape. Imbued with a sense of occult-like mysticism, it transforms sound and language into a surrealist psychological space.”
“Bailey Williams’s comedy is a sharp-toothed, sometimes bewildering satire of all-consuming workplace culture.”
Read Lauren Collins-Hughes full review on the New York Times.
“The show is going to be zippy, moving, and a lot of fun,” McEntee says. “Cam is such a beguiling presence, so audiences can expect a magnetic performance as he takes us on the road but also on a journey of self-discovery — a path that’s anything but straight, which is to say it’s going to be a gay ole time.”
