NOW 2024: Week Two Featuring Sophia Cleary: Read the Room (in LA)

The 21st Annual New Original Works continues with a program of works by Ajani Brannum, Sophia Cleary, and Tijuana Dance Company. Committed to an investigation of history and contemporary norms, these works use humor, improvisation, and multidisciplinary collaboration to disrupt power dynamics, craft collective rituals of care, and build new modes of community abundance.

Sophia Cleary: Read The Room

Framed as a theatrical rehearsal between an Actor and her Director, Read The Room reconsiders these roles and their relationship to the audience in an unsettling, comedic, and outrageous experience. Interdisciplinary artist Sophia Cleary investigates the tension between script and improvisation in theater and the illusion of control in a performance that embraces liveness: you cannot fast forward or rewind–you can only move without knowing what comes next. This two-hander play manifests as a metaphor for the contemporary climate where fact and fiction are no longer discernible and investigates what laughter seemingly condones–ultimately calling attention to what contracts can be upended rather than being consumed as spectacle.

Starts 8:30PM PT