Directing
(Full list available upon request)
Psychic Self Defense (Opens Sept 12th at HERE Arts Center)
Psychic Self Defense is a show that invites you into the guts of the theater. Audiences enter the show through a corridor draped with fabrics and dimly lit by chandeliers. Are they entering into a séance? No... after piercing these veils, they arrive at what is apparently a tiny, haunted proscenium theater. A curtain opens with great fanfare... and then another... and then curtains keep opening and closing, revealing and concealing for the next hour. Strange creatures emerge from the shadows, protagonists are absorbed into set dressing and scenic ornaments run rampant. Psychic Self Defense is a journey into abstraction, allowing audiences to experience mystery and mental spaciousness by way of that most basic of theatrical machineries– the curtain reveal.
Psychic Self Defense has been commissioned and is being developed as part of the HERE Artist Residency Program. Additionally, Psychic Self Defense has been supported by Millay Arts and has been funded by the New York State Council on the Arts’ Individual Theater Commission, the Mental Insight Foundation, ART-NY’s Nancy Quinn/ DIME Fund and Creative Opportunity Fund, and Materials For the Arts.
The Story Box (HERE Arts Center / Bethany Arts Community)
Written and performed by Suzi Takahashi and directed by Kristin Marting, The Story Box explores the importance of safeguarding our civil rights through the lens of Japanese-American identity, using traditional Japanese storytelling elements, like kamishibai, along with Takahashi’s own family history. Representing the relocation of Japanese Americans during WWII, the audience will receive a suitcase and a tag, inside of which is a wireless headset and a family photo album. Each unique family photo album documents an account of the problematic history of Asian people in the U.S., and more recently, the rise in anti-Asian violence during the pandemic. Inspired by the events of writer/performer Suzi Takahashi’s own life and delivered through her own words performed live & transmitted via the headset, The Story Box asks audience members to reflect together on the stories in each suitcase, and they are invited to leave a story of their own behind for future audiences.
The Story Box is produced by HERE and has been developed with support from Alfred University, Bethany Arts Community, Bristol Valley Theatre and National Park of Women’s Rights. It is co-presented with Japan Society, Bronx Academy of Art and Dance, and NYC Economic Development Corporation and through partnerships with Asian American Arts Alliance, Chocolate Factory, Flushing Town Hall, National Lighthouse Museum, Snug Harbor Cultural Center, Staten Island Arts, and Target Margin Theater. Additional support provided by The Venturous Theatre Fund of theTides Foundation; and GREEN / ARTS LIVE NYC. GREEN / ARTS LIVE NYC is made possible with support from New York Community Trust and Con Edison’s Arts Al Fresco Series, administered by City Parks Foundation in collaboration with the Horticultural Society of New York, New Yorkers for Culture & Arts, NYC Department of Transportation, OpenCultureWORKS, and Street Lab.
Written, Created, and Performed by Suzi Takahashi
Developed with and Directed by Kristin Marting
Assistant Director Elyse Durand
Composed by Michaela Gomez
Production Manager Ayumu “Poe” Saegusa
Set and Costume Design by Jian Jung
Sound Design by Drew Weinstein
Stage Manager Sarah Grant
Lorca in a Green Dress (California State University, Northridge)
Lorca in A Green Dress, by Pulitzer Prize winning Cuban-American playwright, Nilo Cruz, is an exploration of the life and alluring circumstances surrounding Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca's 1936 death. Streamed online, for a covid-conscious presentation
Directed by Christine Menzies
Assistant Direction, Dramaturgy, + Sound Design by Elyse Durand
Stage Management by Shiku Thuo
Costume Coordination by Amanda Cleveland + Elizabeth Cox
Scenic Coordination by Brian Hashimoto
Lighting Coordination by Michael Ziegler
Gay and Afraid (The Tank)
Gay and Afraid is a comedic two-hander celebrating and reminiscing on queerness. Premiered at The Tank in New York City.
Written + Directed by Elyse Durand and Aline Dufflocq Williams
Sound Design by Elyse Durand
Stage Management by Shiku Thuo