IASNY Presents An Evening Of Immigrant Women's Monologues at Nuyorican Poets Café

Immigrant/International Artists and Scholars in New York invites YOU to LIBERTY's DAUGHTERS: An Evening Of Immigrant Women's Monologues presented by artists across generations, ethnicities, and gender identities at the storied (virtual) Nuyorican Poets Café.

Featuring Alisar Awwad, Maria Alexandria Beech, x, Mariana Carreño King, Cecilia Copeland, Daniela Dakich, Michal Gamily, Antoinette Lavecchia, Vernice Miller, Saviana Stanescu, Pia Wilson.

Talkback with the artists moderated by Associate Producer, x (pronouns: they/themme), hosted/produced by Saviana (pronouns: she/her).

Monologues written/presented by 11 fabulous artists:

ALISAR AWWAD is a recent graduate from Ithaca College's MBA in Media Management and Entertainment program. Born in New Delhi, India, but is of Middle Eastern descent. She is currently managing artist, Jagwar Twin. As a Theatre and Communications Studies major at Ithaca College, she directed the first ever site-specific production of Little Shop of Horrors. She also worked with Civic Ensemble as the Assistant Director for Trump Card.

MARÍA ALEXANDRIA BEECH is an award-winning, Venezuelan-American playwright, artist, journalist and former Wall Street analyst. Her plays and musicals have been presented around the world and featured on Steppenwolf's The Mix List and 50PP's Best Unproduced Latin@ Plays, among others. Her comedy series "Telemamas" is in development in Los Angeles.

x (pronouns: they/themme) is a Taíno, Afro + Chinese-Jamaican, first generation USian. x is a proud multi-hyphenate who has shown work in NY state and internationally. x curated the January 2020 web gallery for Visual AIDS and is a 2020 Disability. Dance. Artistry. Dance and Social Justice Fellow.

MARIANA CARREÑO KING's plays include Truckers, The Red Gene, Miss 744890, Patience, Fortitude and Other Antidepressants, Dance for a Dollar, Ofelia's Lovers, Rare Encounters, Darkroom, The Wake and Fool's Journey among others. Mariana is also a stage director, translator, part of the Advisory Committee for The Lark Play Development Center US/Mexico Playwrights Exchange and member of LAByrinth Theatre Company.

Cecilia Copeland Member writer NYWIFT, Indie Theatre Hall of Fame, Best Drama Screenplay Female Eye Film Festival, Best TV Pilot NYWIFT New Works Lab and LA Femme Int. Film Festival, Kilroy's List Nominee, Special FX Grant Recipient MetroScreen Australia, Lennis J. Holm Scholarship Writer's Workshop, Anarchist Theatre Festival Montreal. www.ceciliacopeland.com

DANIELA DAKICH is an Emmy award winning collaborator and one of the co-creators of the show "HitRECord on TV" directed by Joseph Gordon Levitt. A New York based actress, she appeared in 20 feature films, 4 TV shows, and over 2000 theatre performances. Daniela was born in Tuzla, former Yugoslavia, and spent her teenage years as a Serb refugee from Bosnia in Serbia and Greece. Much love to Savi and the team.

MICHAL GAMILY is an Israeli actress, producer and director. She has worked as an actress for film, TV and stage both in Israel and the US. She has been associated with La MaMa Theatre for the last 25 years. Series Director of the Coffeehouse Chronicles at La MaMa. Founder of No Visa Production. ~~~ Michal will be reading a monologue adapted from the novel "Wadi Mileh" by Orna Akad (Israeli author, playwright, theatre director, and publicist, who is married to a Palestinian and divides her personal and professional life among the two societies, Arab-Palestinian and Hebrew-Jewish.)

Antoinette Lavecchia (Award-winning Actress/Playwright/Director/Master Games teacher) - Actress: Broadway, off-Broadway, regionally, film&tv (currently "Lucia Francavella" Mad About You.) Playwright: Two one-woman plays performed at Urban Stages, Cherry Lane Studio, Culture Project Women's Festival, Ars Nova, Parity Productions @TheaterLab. Fox Fellowship, Drama League Director Fellowship, Anna Sosenko Trust Grant. www.antoinettelavecchia.com

Vernice Miller Educator/Director/Producer/Performer. For Civic Ensemble; worked with incarcerated youth and directed Saviana Stanescu's Bee Trapped Inside the Window. Recipient of London New Play Festival's Best Actress Award. Co-founder A Laboratory for Actor Training Experimental Theatre Company. (www.ALATetc.org)

SAVIANA STĂNESCU is a playwright, poet, teacher, and ARTivist, author of Aliens with Extraordinary Skills (off-Broadway, Women's Project) and many other plays about the immigrant experience. Winner of New York Innovative Theatre Award for Outstanding Play (Waxing West). Founder of IASNY. www.saviana.com

PIA WILSON has received awards and residencies from several organizations, including Sundance and The Public Theater. Her plays have been produced domestically and internationally. Her work as a playwright was part of the curriculum at Franklin & Marshall College in 2019. www.piawilson.com Twitter & Instagram: @pwilson720

Founded by writer Saviana Stănescu in 2010, IASNY is an alliance of outstanding people working in the arts and academia who are committed to support, nurture and advocate for immigrant and international voices as a vital and vibrant part of the New York state community.

Since 1973, the Nuyorican Poets Café has served as a home for groundbreaking works of poetry, spoken word, music, theater and visual arts.

A multicultural, multi-arts institution, the Cafe champions the use of spoken word and poetry to empower artists of color, immigrant artists and LGBTQIA+ artists. Allen Ginsberg called the Cafe "the most integrated place on the planet", the Wall Street Journal wrote that the Cafe is "an antidote to gentrification" that has grown "from a small, volunteer-led venue best known for weekly poetry events to a thriving arts center with partnerships across the city"; and NPR called the Cafe a "wildly diverse venue with socially conscious programming" that "speaks to the marginalized."

The Cafe presents a robust series of weekly open mics, spoken word showcases, theater and music performances and educational events. All our events are free, but we rely on the generosity of audiences and supporters. If you'd like to help keep our programs going, please consider donating to nuyorican.org/contribute.

The Nuyorican Poets Café would like to thank the National Endowment for the Arts, the New York State Council on the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the Amazon Literary Partnership, the Academy of American Poets, and the New York Community Trust's COVID-19 Response Fund for helping us to provide free online programming. Please help support our efforts with a tax-deductible donation, by visiting www.nuyorican.org/contribute, or via CashApp to $NuyoricanPoetsCafe.

Livestream on Zoom, Wednesday, August 19, at 8 pm. Reserve FREE tickets for the event HERE: https://ci.ovationtix.com/35133/production/1030485?performanceId=10556012.