SEPTEMBER 28 TO OCTOBER 21
VARIOUS LOCATIONS IN AND AROUND NYACK, NY
SECOND ANNUAL PHOENIX LIVE ARTS FESTIVAL
Building on the success of its critically-acclaimed inaugural festival in 2022, Phoenix Theatre Ensemble, led by Artistic Director Elise Stone and Executive Director Craig Smith, will present its Second Annual Phoenix Live Arts Festival from September 28 to October 21, 2023 in and around Nyack, NY. The festival features world-class theater, music, dance, family shows and one-of-a-kind performances. There will be four indoor and outdoor productions, partnerships with Children’s Shakespeare Company and Emotions Physical Theatre, and special events all over downtown Nyack. Phoenix Theatre Ensemble is a prominent producer of classical theater which was founded in NYC in 2004 and now makes Rockland County its second artistic home.

The presenters aspire to create an arts festival to rival the national arts festivals, celebrating classical theater, classical music and the community of Nyack. Presented during the Hudson Valley Fall Foliage season, the festival features immersive theater and live performance programs, all in nontraditional spaces. These include a stage version of "Crime and Punishment" by Dostoevsky, four solo plays, one dance work, an improvised Regency Era production, two plays by and for kids, a staged reading, a musical concert, a poetry slam and a community theater "Dracula."

INFO: https://liveartsinnyack.com/ and www.jsnyc.com/season/nyack.htm
PHOTOS: https://photos.app.goo.gl/xSS7bBH19s7w4syx8

OCTOBER 1 TO 29
EARTHCHXRCH, 36 AVE. C
REV. BILLY & THE STOP SHOPPING CHOIR IN "WELCOME TO THE EARTHCHXRCH!"
As a follow-up to Climate Week, Reverend Billy and the Stop Shopping Choir will perform “Welcome to the Earthchxrch!” a protean hour of rousing song and moving political satire, each Sunday in October (10/1, 8, 15, 22, 29) at 3:00 PM in Earthchxrch, their Lower East Side performance space-- a converted bank located at 36 Avenue C (Loisaida Ave., at E. 3rd Street).  Each performance will be a one-of-a-kind show aimed at confronting climate grief, inspiring activism and building community.  The ensemble is winner of numerous awards.  The shows are directed by Savitri D.  

“Welcome to the Earthchxrch!” combines activism and highly responsive entertainment. The show includes songs, rituals, testimonials from the audience, and a 15-minute sermon by Bill Talen as the energetic, charismatic revivalist preacher Reverend Billy. Each show is different but all are motivated by a profound imperative - to strengthen individual connection to the Earth, develop pathways to social change and hold financial institutions and policy makers accountable for their role in the Climate Crisis. 

COMPLETE INFO: www.jsnyc.com/season/Chxrch.htm
PHOTOS: https://photos.app.goo.gl/UjcRVFcdiZ1nmh9j6

OCTOBER 2
EDISON BALLROOM, 240 W. 47TH STREET
NEW FEDERAL THEATRE GALA
Woodie King, Jr.'s New Federal Theatre (NFT), led by Artistic Director Elizabeth Van Dyke, will hold a 53rd Anniversary Celebration October 2, 2023 at Edison Ballroom, 240 West 47th Street. The event will honor Woodie King, Jr., Gabrielle Kurlander and Sade Lythcott and is chaired by director Kenny Leon and actor Lynn Whitfield. Its honorary benefit committee includes Dee Davis Enterprises, Frankie Faison, Heather Beal, Ron Himes, Ruben Santiago Hudson, Delroy Lindo, Jonathan McCrory, John Rankin, Norman A. Small, John E. Scutchins, Diane Stiles, Elizabeth Van Dyke and Claude Winfield.s

COMPLETE INFO: www.jsnyc.com/season/NFT_gala_2023.htm
PHOTOS: https://photos.app.goo.gl/CBj5jcNzmgKukkj6A

OCTOBER 7 TO 22
OVER 60 PRESENTATIONS IN 17 VENUES IN AND AROUND NYC
PRELUDE '23 FESTIVAL
The Martin E. Segal Theatre Center of CUNY Graduate Center will present its 20th annual PRELUDE Festival, titled "Re: Generation." The event brings together artists, thinkers, activists, and presenters from New York City and beyond in free performances and panels to explore the many ways in which new forms of theater and performance are taking place today. The festival will offer over 60 free presentations in 17 venues in and around New York City. This festival is the annual flagship event of the Segal Center. Traditionally, it is dedicated to artists at the forefront of contemporary NYC theater, dance, interdisciplinary and mediatized performance and offers an array of short performances, readings, and screenings -- a survey of the current New York moment and the work being prepared for the next season and beyond, plus new commissions and panel discussions with artists, scholars, and performers.

COMPLETE INFO: www.jsnyc.com/season/PRELUDE.htm
PHOTOS: https://photos.app.goo.gl/mdMSbqwZXx6WFVKJ7

OCTOBER 11 TO 29
GENE FRANKEL THEATRE, 24 BOND STREET
"SCRAMBLED EGGS" BY REGINALD L. WILSON
In honor of Domestic Violence Awareness Month, Faithsteps Productions and 24 Bond Arts Center present "Scrambled Eggs," a new six-character fictional work by Reginald L. Wilson, directed by Fulton C. Hodges, that reveals the underpinnings and dynamics of domestic violence. It's a compelling story that can incite conversation on this difficult issue, build understanding and inspire advocacy. Audience members are encouraged to wear purple to demonstrate support and show survivors they are not alone. (Across the country, people will “Go Purple” on October 20 to spread awareness.)

COMPLETE INFO: www.jsnyc.com/season/scrambled_eggs.htm
PHOTOS: https://photos.app.goo.gl/wVG4TAZHjvoe8kSj7

OCTOBER 18 TO NOVEMBER 12
NEW FEDERAL THEATRE AT ASP/CASTILLO THEATRE, 543 W. 42ND STREET
"TELLING TALES OUT OF SCHOOL"
Following an enthusiastically received work-in-progress of the play last May, New Federal Theatre (NFT) will present the world premiere of "Telling Tales Out of School," a new play by Wesley Brown. The piece offers a unique perspective on the Harlem Renaissance by providing a character study of four of its most-noted female prime movers--Zora Neale Hurston, Nella Larsen, Jessie Fauset and Nancy Cunard--revealing their ambitions, longings and resentments and illuminating the feminine energy they brought to the movement. Director is Woodie King, Jr., founder and Producing Director Emeritus of NFT and an iconic figure of Black Theater. King and NFT received a 2020 Tony Honor for Excellence in the Theatre and the Off-Broadway Alliance named him a "Legend of Off-Broadway."

It's June, 1954 and a memorial service for Alain Locke, architect of the Harlem Renaissance, is being held at Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem. Among the attendees are the four writers. Not having seen one another in over twenty years, they gather at the Hotel Theresa after the funeral. Over tea, an afternoon of boundless praise of Locke unravels into disturbing revelations about the great man and the four women who have come to honor him. With Richarda Abrams as Jessie Fauset, June Ballinger as Nancy Cunard, Petronia Paley as Nella Larsen and Elizabeth Van Dyke as Zora Neale Hurston.

COMPLETE INFO: www.jsnyc.com/season/tales.htm
PHOTOS: https://photos.app.goo.gl/Lk6C7F1WbpGUfxek9

OCTOBER 24 TO 30
MORNINGSIDE PLAYERS, 100 LASALLE STREET, MANHATTAN
"HEDY: THE LIFE & INVENTIONS OF HEDY LAMARR"
Heather Massie will perform her solo play, "HEDY! The Life & Inventions of Hedy Lamarr," at Morningside Players, 100 La Salle Street, Manhattan, for general audiences October 25 to 29 and for special school groups October 24 and 30. The award-winning play celebrates the unexpected scientific genius of Hedy Lamarr, the Viennese-born Hollywood film star of the 1930s-1950s. Leslie Burby directs.

Known as 'the most beautiful woman in the world,' Hedy Lamarr spent her spare time in Hollywood inventing new technology. She had stored away knowledge of munitions while married to an Austrian arms dealer in the thirties, and employed this knowledge to support the US Navy’s war effort during WWII by inventing (with composer George Antheil) Frequency-Hopping Spread Spectrum Technology. At the time, it was to be used as a secret communication system for making torpedoes more accurate. Today it is used in cell phones, WiFi, CDMA, GPS and Bluetooth.

COMPLETE INFO: www.jsnyc.com/season/hedy.htm
PHOTOS: https://photos.app.goo.gl/wj6sNCFJoTXUUi8L7

OCTOBER 31
THEATER FOR THE NEW CITY
VILLAGE HALLOWEEN COSTUME BALL
On October 31, Theater for the New City will present its 47th annual Village Halloween Costume Ball, a celebration that is mounted annually to delight its community, young and old, and celebrate the creativity that comes with the season. For the second year, it will be a mixed indoor/outdoor affair. A large outdoor frolic will be held from 3:15 PM to 8:00 PM on East Tenth Street between First and Second Avenues (or if it rains, in a big tent), featuring performances, a costume competition and dancing to swing and Latin bands. This will be followed by indoor performances from 8:00 PM to midnight in TNC's large Johnson Theater, and from 9:00 PM to 1:30 PM in the adjacent Community Space Theater. Admission is free for the outdoor program and $20 for the indoor festivities.

COMPLETE INFO: www.jsnyc.com/season/halwn2023.htm
PHOTOS: https://goo.gl/photos/RaQKK8C5mjqE3wsx5

NOVEMBER 9 TO 26
THEATER FOR THE NEW CITY
"SPIES FOR THE POPE"
Playwright Douglas Lackey takes us back to the 17th century and introduces a forgotten hero: the philosopher and biologist Giulio Caesare Vanini, who was garroted on a false charge of atheism in Toulouse in 1619. In the lead up to the Thirty Year's War, Vanini and a young companion zig-zagged across Europe, emerging at religious flashpoints in unsuccessful attempts to maintain the peace. Lackey's play takes on culture and politics and the great war that produced the modern structure of Europe. Alexander Harrington directs.

JANUARY 9 TO 21, 2024
THEATER FOR THE NEW CITY
THUNDERBIRD AMERICAN INDIAN DANCERS POW-WOW AND DANCE CONCERT
Theater for the New City, 155 First Avenue, presents its 49th annual Thunderbird American Dancers Pow Wow and Dance Concert. There will be dances, stories and traditional music from Native Peoples of the Northeast, Southwest and Great Plains regions. The event has become a treasured New York tradition for celebrating our diversity by honoring the culture of our first Americans. TNC donates all proceeds from the event to college scholarship funds for Native American students.

VIDEO ON DEMAND

"USED AND BORROWED TIME" BY SOPHIA ROMMA
"Used and Borrowed Time," written and directed by Sophia Romma, is now available on Amazon Prime, Apple TV, Roku and the Vyre Network. This experimental avant-garde film, a psychological drama phantasma, has amassed over 45 festival awards and 26 festival film selections. An interracial couple's idyllic love rises above the hatred of a vengeful white supremacist family in segregationist Alabama during the 1960s. The film pays homage to the French New Wave films of Goddard, Truffaut and Agnès Varda. It has been translated from its original English into Greek, Spanish and Italian.

COMPLETE INFO: www.usedandborrowedtime.com

THEATER FOR THE NEW CITY & NEW YIDDISH REP PRODUCTION OF "THE DYBBUK"
"The Dybbuk" is arguably the most well-known play in the Yiddish theater lexicon. It was premiered on December 9, 1920 by the Vilna Troupe at the Eizeum theater in Warsaw. Its success catapulted that company onto the International stage. It has since been translated into 27 languages and performed worldwide. From December 9-13, New Yiddish Rep celebrated the play's 100th birthday with a live performance streamed from Theater For The New City. A recording of the production has now been released for the general public to view on Vimeo.

MORE INFO: www.jsnyc.com/season/Dybbuk.htm

"Feathers of Fire" is the most elaborate shadow theater experience ever created, and this recording, captured on an actual theater stage, transforms it into a video-on-demand production for all ages. The story is adapted from Shahnameh (the Persian Book of Kings) and tells the action-packed tale of two star-crossed lovers of old Persia. Zaul, an outcast albino boy, is brought up by a bird-goddess and grows up into a wise ruler. He enters into a forbidden love with Rudabeh, a princess who is the granddaughter of the dreaded Serpent King. Their young, impetuous romance survives many precarious adventures before they finally receive blessings for their union. When they ultimately have a child, it is Rostam, "the Hercules of Iran." Aspects of the story are reminiscent of "Romeo and Juliet," "Rapunzel," "The Firebird" and "Jungle Book."

The piece is created and directed by Hamid Rahmanian, a 2014 Guggenheim fellowship-winning filmmaker/visual artist living in Brooklyn. It is endorsed by Francis Ford Coppola, who called the production "Fantastic! One of the greatest epics of all time and my favorite Shahnameh brought to life in a spectacular fashion by Hamid Rahmanian with shadow puppets design and cinematic wizardry."

COMPLETE INFO: www.jsnyc.com/season/feathers.htm