French Institute Alliance Française and Abrons Arts Center present US Premiere of DICKIE BEAU: BLACKOUTS

As part of the 2016 edition of Crossing the Line, the French Institute Alliance Française (FIAF)'s celebrated contemporary arts festival, FIAF and Abrons Arts Center are thrilled to present award-winning, UK-based drag fabulist, Dickie Beau in the US Premiere of his solo show Blackouts, Thursday through Saturday, October 6-8and 13-15 at Abrons Arts Center.

Dickie Beau has revitalized the tradition of lip-synching through distinctive playback performances in which he embodies counter-cultural figures and movie stars alike. Innovatively reimagining traditional lip-syncing, Beau mimes to spoken word in uncanny invocations with the showmanship of a drag artist and the dark melancholy of a clown. Beau's postmodern art is far more surreal and provocative than the comedic drag we're used to seeing on our screens. Merging reality with illusion, he blends his identity with the ghosts of stars as he breathes electrifying life into Hollywood's audio artifacts.

In Blackouts, Beau conjures the spirits of his childhood idols, including Marilyn Monroe and Judy Garland, to create a uniquely personal theatrical experience. The resulting "digital script" incorporates found source material, visual invention and gorgeous stagecraft resulting in a portrait of icons in exile, not only from society, but from themselves.

The process of building Blackouts began with the Judy Speaks tapes, recordings of Garland sitting alone with a Dictaphone making notes for a memoir never to be written. Feeling there were parallels to be drawn with similarly iconic figures, Beau followed the siren call of Marilyn Monroe and ended up in the New York apartment of journalist Richard Meryman, who gave him access to the unpublished tapes of Monroe's final interview conducted just before her death in 1962. Using this encounter as the genesis for Blackouts, the show includes unique material from this iconic interview and also includes Beau's own recordings with the late Meryman, creatively appropriated to form the backbone of the show.

Blackouts sees Beau shape-shift through a shadowy soundscape of lost souls in a sensational trip to the subconscious underworld of his future self. Going beyond homage, Beau breaths vital new life into an age-old art form. A reflection on the tragic loss of icons whose voices felt unheard in the spotlight, Blackouts is also a reflection on the haunting impressions they've left behind.

Blackouts premiered at the Unity Theatre, Liverpool, as part of the Homotopia festival. It has gone on to sell-out runs at Contact Manchester, Chelsea Theatre, and London's Soho Theatre and has toured extensively within the UK.

"This is lip-syncing to spoken word. It's about channeling the voices, imagining the voices going through my body, but at the same time the body becomes a conduit for other things, like glitches in machines."-Dickie Beau

About Dickie Beau

A versatile performer and artist, Dickie Beau is mainly recognized for rejuvenating the drag tradition of lip-synching through his distinctive playback performances. He is widely celebrated for the virtuosic skill, innovation and diversity of his work in which he realizes an exquisite interplay of digital content and live performance. He has received multiple awards, including the prestigious Oxford Samuel Beckett Theatre Trust Award and the London Cabaret Award for Best Alternative Performer.

Beau's work is increasingly studied in Contemporary Theatre and performance courses in the UK and he is regularly in demand as a workshop leader, teacher and visiting speaker, influencing the practice of a whole new generation of performance-makers. He is an Artist Research Fellow at Queen Mary University of London and the Birkbeck Centre for Contemporary Theatre at the University of London.

About Abrons Arts Center

The Abrons Arts Center is the Obie award-winning performing and visual arts program of Henry Street Settlement. The Abrons supports the creation and presentation of innovative, multi-disciplinary work; cultivates artists in all stages of their practice with educational programs, mentorships, residencies and commissions; and serves as an intersection of engagement for local, national and international audiences and arts-workers.

Each year the Abrons offers over 250 performances, 12 gallery exhibitions and 30 residencies for performing and studio artists, and 100 different classes in dance, music, theater, and visual art. The Abrons also provides New York City public schools with teaching artists, introducing more than 3,000 students to the arts. www.abronsartscenter.org

About Crossing the Line 2016

Crossing the Line, now in its tenth year, is an annual citywide festival that engages International Artists and New York City audiences in discovery and dialogue to re-imagine the world around us. The festival is produced by the French Institute Alliance Française (FIAF) in partnership with leading cultural institutions. This year's edition of the festival takes place from September 22-November 3, 2016.

France has a long history of supporting national and international cultural practices, welcoming and nurturing new ideas and influential perspectives from around the world. FIAF, as the leading French cultural institution in the US, critically maintains that tradition through the Crossing the Line Festival, presenting leading-edge artists from France and the US alongside their peers from around the world.

Since its inauguration in 2007, Crossing the Line has cultivated an increasingly large and diverse following, and received numerous accolades in the press. The festival has been voted "Best of 2009," "Best of 2010," "Best of 2012," "Best of 2013," and "Best of 2014" by The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Time Out New York, Artforum, and Frieze, with performances earning an Obie and several Bessie awards. The New York Times states, "For terrifically unusual, unpredictable, unnameable performance, we've come to expect a lot from ... the curators of the French Institute Alliance Française's interdisciplinary festival," and The New Yorkersays, "This interdisciplinary festival...goes from strength to strength." For more information, visit www.crossingtheline.org

About FIAF

FIAF's mission is to create and offer New Yorkers innovative and unique programs in education and the arts that explore the evolving diversity and richness of French cultures. FIAF seeks to generate new ideas and promote cross cultural dialogue through partnerships and new platforms of expression. fiaf.org