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Penguin in Your Ear
Eliza Bent
September 13 - September 17
$20 – $35
The Brick presents
Penguin in Your Ear
written and performed by Eliza Bent
September 13-17
$20-35
Running in rep with Looming Dogs by David Perez, directed by William Burke.
Get tickets to both shows at a discount with our package deal.
Only the desperate turn to stand-up, and Bent is no exception. Watch this former downtown experimental New York theatre scene (RIP) mainstay— that Time Out New York once described as “immensely likeable”—step into and “stand up” inside a new medium. Bent, who now lives an anonymous life in an American province, knows first-hand that comedy is tragedy plus time.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS:
Eliza Bent (writer / performer)
Eliza Bent is a playwright, performer, and artistic director of Bentertainment. As the love
child between Lily Tomlin, Pee Wee Herman, and Mr. Peanut Bent’s Bentertainments
include solo-ish works (Karen, I Said, Toilet Fire and Aloha, Aloha, or When I Was
Queen), plays (Indeed, friend!, On a Clear Day I Can See to Elba, The Hotel Colors),
adaptations (The Beyonce, She of the Voice), and hybrid affairs (Bonnie’s Last Flight, Real
Talk / Kip Talk, Blue Wizard / Black Wizard, Pen Pals Meet). Bent’s shows have been
developed, workshopped, commissioned, and produced at Abrons Arts Center, the New
Ohio, the Atlantic Theatre, the Bushwick Starr, the Exponential Festival, and New York
Theatre Workshop’s Next Door Series. Residencies: MacDowell, LMCC’s Workspace,
SPACE on Ryder Farm, New Georges, Target Margin Institute Fellow, Casa Zia Lina,
Berkeley Repertory Theatre’s Ground Floor, Beach64, and Pilot Balloon. As an actor Bent
has performed in pint-sized New York theatres, regionally in Omaha and Louisville, and
internationally with the performance ensemble Half Straddle. BA in philosophy Boston
College, MFA in playwriting Brooklyn College. Bent is currently a lecturer in the Radio TV
& Film department at Northwestern University.
Bentertainment:
Bentertainment creates performance texts and media that tends toward narrative,
dramatic, and linguistic structures that are indeed “bent” “different from normal;
strongly inclined; changed from an originally straight condition.” Bentertainments take
many shapes: as plays, solo shows, adaptations, hybrid works, experiential immersions,
Zoom theatricals, and most recently stand-up. Bentertainments are seriously silly and
philosophically inclined, they explore the edges of appropriateness and are best
experienced in a state of ecstatic liveness.
Jess Barbagallo (director)
Jess Barbagallo is a theater artist, teacher, and writer. Some creations include: Sentence
Fetish (The Brick’s Trans Theater Festival, NYC); Not for Resale (in collaboration with
NYU Steinhardt’s Drama Therapy as Performance, Provincetown Playhouse); Beaches in
Winter (Experimental Theatre Wing at NYU); Room for Cream: A Live Lesbian Serial (with
the Dyke Division at LaMama ETC/The New Museum, NYC); The Puzzlers/The Puzzlers 2:
Black Box (with Accent Wall Productions at The Brick’s Exponential Festival); Weekend
at Barry’s/Lesbian Lighthouse (Abrons Arts Center, NYC); and Weekend at Barry’s:
Greatest Hits (The Brick). Currently, Jess is directing Snatch Adams & Tainty McCracken
Present It’s That Time of the Month to premiere at Soho Rep in October. He is a regular
contributor at Artforum.
***
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A Note on Accessibility: The Brick has trigger warnings posted in the space for each show for you to check if you so choose. If you would rather ask questions in advance of being in the space or would like to enter in advance of house opening due to our seating not being assigned, please reach out to theresa@bricktheater.com.
Mask Policy: The Brick strongly encourages but does not require masks for audience members. We are in ongoing conversation with our artists and audiences as we continue to adapt our covid policies and it is subject to change at any time. Thank you.