Highlights: Coil Festival at PS122 (NYC)

COIL Festival at PS 122
A winter festival of contemporary performance featuring work of the past, present, and future.

Richard Maxwell/NYC Players – Ads
Upstairs at Performance Space 122
WORLD PREMIERE | THEATRE, VIDEO
Co-presented with Under The Radar Festival

[singlepic id=251 w=590 h= float=center]

Ads marks a new departure in the work of celebrated downtown auteur Richard Maxwell. In collaboration with photographer/cinematographer Michael Schmelling and Wooster Group technical director Bozkurt Karasu, Maxwell asks whether theatre is possible without a human presence.

Wed, Jan 6 at 10pm | Fri, Jan 8 at 7pm | Sun, Jan 10 at 10pm | Tues, Jan 12 at 10pm Thu, Jan 14 at 10:30pm | Fri, Jan 15 at 8pm | Sat, 16 at 10:30pm | Sun, Jan at 17 5:30pm

EXTENDED at PS122 Wed, Jan 20 – Sun, Jan 31 (Wed – Sat 8pm, Sun 6pm)
ADDED LATE SHOWS: Sat, Jan 23 + Sat, Jan 30 at 10pm / NO SHOW: Thu, Jan 21

Gisèle Vienne/Jonathan Capdeville/Dennis Cooper – Jerk
Downstairs at Performance Space 122
NY PREMIERE | GLOVE-PUPPET THEATRE
Co-presented with Under The Radar Festival

[singlepic id=254 w=590 h= float=center]

Jerk” is an imaginary reconstruction – strange, poetic, funny and somber – of the crimes perpetrated by American serial killer Dean Corll who, with the help of teenagers David Brooks and Wayne Henley, killed more than twenty boys in the state of Texas during the mid-70s.

This show sees David Brooks serving his life sentence. In prison, he learns the art of puppets, which somehow enables him to face up to his responsibility as partner in the crimes. He has written a show that reconstructs the murders committed by Dean Corll, using puppets for all the roles. He performs his show in prison for a class of psychology students from a local university.

Due to the violence and humor of the text, there is an underlying fierceness to the performance. The glove puppet theater is in fact the traditional form used to enact violent illicit subjects. And “Jerk” unabashedly mingles sexuality and violence in the vein of gore aesthetics, thus harking back to the glove puppet repertory.

The text has been staged as a solo for puppeteer, who uses glove puppets and also acts the role of con artist.
The story, however realist it may be, seems to border on unrealism. The play’s apparent realism stems from its linear narration, as well as from its basic true story and from the trickster-puppeteer’s total identification with the fictive character of David Brooks.

“Jerk” merges three plays that were produced in collaboration with the American writer Dennis Cooper: “I Apologize” (2004), “Une belle enfant blonde” (2005) and “Kindertotenlieder” (2007). In these three plays, the links between fantasy and reality are being constantly probed, thereby altering our perception of reality. The more realist “Jerk” puts forth a consistent linear narrative, generating the credibility that undeniably stems from this form. And it is this undeniability that is reexamined by way of our different formal experiences.

Performed by and created in collaboration with Jonathan Capdevielle

FOR MATURE AUDIENCES ONLY
Thu, Jan 7 at 6:30pm | Sat, Jan 9 at 7pm | Sun, Jan 10 at 9:30pm | Mon, Jan 11 at 9:30pm | Thu, Jan 14 at 10pm | Fri, Jan 15 at 7:30pm | Sat, Jan 16 at 10pm | Sun, Jan at 17 6pm

Edgar Oliver – East 10th Street; Portrait with Empty House
50 Minutes
Downstairs at Performance Space 122
SOLO PERFORMANCE

[singlepic id=255 w=590 h= float=center]

Presented by Brian Barnhart, Axis Theatre and Richard Jordan Productions Ltd

Edgar Oliver weaves a fantastical and hilarious voyage through the dark and strange rooms of his East Village tenement building.

Wed, Jan 6 at 9:30pm | Thu, Jan 7 at 9:30pm | SPECIAL MIDNIGHT SHOW: Sat, Jan 9 | Sun, Jan 10 at 4:30pm |Mon, Jan 11 at 7pm | Tue, Jan 12 at 7pm | Thu, Jan 14 at 7:30pm | Fri, Jan 15 at 10pm | Sat, Jan 16 at 7:30pm | Sun, Jan 17 at 8:30pm

Reid Farrington – Gin & “It”
Offsite* at 3LD Art & Technology Center
THEATRE, CINEMA
Co-presented with Under The Radar Festival in association with 3LD Art & Technology Center

[singlepic id=253 w=590 h= float=center]

For his next work Gin & “It”, Reid Farrington’s principle source is a film from the Master of Suspense. Again Farrington collaborates with film historians and archivists to bring a classic film to the stage with his own boundary-pushing melding of projected imagery and live drama.

Thu, Jan 7- Sat, Jan 16 9pm
OFFICIAL NY PREMIERE: Performance Space 122 April 2010
*Tickets available through 3LD Art & Technology Center

The National Theater of the United States of America – CHAUTAUQUA!
Offsite* at The Public Theater
THEATRE
Co-presented with Under The Radar Festival

[singlepic id=252 w=590 h= float=center]

Winners of PS 122’s 2007 Spalding Gray Award, NTUSA returns to NYC to channel the form and style of the original Chautauqua Lectures through their own inimitable aesthetic and theatrical rhythm.

*Offsite – Tickets available through The Public Theater as part of the Under The Radar Festival
Thu, Jan 7 9:30pm | Sat, Jan 9 7pm | Tues, Jan 12 9:30pm | Thu, Jan 14 9:30pm | Fri, Jan 15 9:30pm | Sat, Jan 16 9:30pm | Sun, Jan 17 3pm

The full listings for COIL festival can be found at www.PS122.org