Spark Theatre Festival NYC Celebrates 20th Anniversary with Spring Edition at The 28th Street Theatre

Award-winning Emerging Artists Theatre (EAT) returns with their bi-annual Spark Theatre Festival NYC, running from April 6-26 at The 28th Street Theatre (TADA). The three-week festival will showcase over 60 new works, including musicals, plays, solo performances, storytelling, and dance. Theatre luminaries such as TV comedy legend Joyce Bulifant, Tony Award nominee Christopher Sieber, and Emmy winner Dorothy Lyman will take part in the Spring Spark Theatre Festival NYC.

This year marks the festival's 20th anniversary. Originally launched as the New Works Series, the event has grown significantly since its inception-doubling in size and expanding to include genres such as dance, music, cabaret, drag, sketch comedy, and other boundary-pushing performances. Today, the Spark Theatre Festival NYC presents Spring and Fall festivals, showcasing over 100 new shows each year and giving more than 400 artists the opportunity to perform new work on stage.

During the festival, performances run nightly, with multiple performances on the weekends. Most productions receive one performance, with shorter shows grouped together to form a full evening of entertainment. Short talkbacks with the artists will follow some of the performances.

Tickets range from $20 to $40. Tickets and the full lineup are available here. All performances take place at The 28th Street Theatre (TADA).

FESTIVAL HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE:

Twelve short and full-length plays will be presented, including The Jesus Hickey (written by Luke Yankee), in which an innocent Irish lass receives a hickey from the village bad boy in the shape of Jesus, featuring Joyce Bulifant and Christopher Sieber (Tony Award nominated); My Windows (written by Emmy winner Dorothy Lyman), where five longtime friends reunite to plan a fundraiser to save their church; Titanic, Jesus, and Coca-Cola (written by Gena Oppenheim), in which Lucy, a third-generation Titanic fanatic, discovers she may even be related to the man blamed for the tragedy; and Oscar's Razor (written by Brent Weaver), where, ten years after the infamous Ridgway Razor murders (Green River Killer), a fresh wave of killings unravels the lives of four queer men, with Oscar-the sole survivor of the original murders-at the center.

Nine musicals-both short and full-length-will be presented, including The Scarlet Letter Musical (written by Kenady Sean and Christine Hand Jones), which reimagines the story of Hester Prynne as she transforms her scarlet letter from a mark of shame into a symbol of survival and rebellion, and If I Could Go (written by Steve Engelbrecht) in which a gateway in Dublin leads to the mythical land of Tír na nÓg, launching an extraordinary journey into a magical realm.

Thirty dance works will take center stage, including Carmilla (choreographed by Danielle Davis and Claire Pennington), a queer love story between an isolated noblewoman and a vampiress disguised as her companion; Canzoni per Papa (choreographed by Taylor Gordon), a dance suite tracing inherited identity through kitsch and romance; and Human - Layers of Identity (choreographed by Charly Wenzel) featuring an international cast of women paying homage to the rich taperstry of human diversity.

Numerous solo shows will be presented, including A Gay Masseur's Guide to Happy Endings (written and performed by Austin Jennings Boykin), about a gay masseur navigating sex work, self-worth, and survival; Back Float: A Very Hard of Hearing, Deaf-ish, Bluegrass-Forward Solo Show (written and performed by Jo Brook), in which an actor and musician grapples with hearing loss, isolation, and belonging; and Miss Magnolia Beaumont Goes to Provincetown (written and performed by Joe Hutcheson), in which a debutante who chokes to death on a pork rib just before the Civil War suddenly finds herself inhabiting the body of a middle-aged gay man on his way to Provincetown.

This year's festival features two productions centered on bugs, including the dance piece Sniff My Undies (choreographed by Lulu Munteanu), in which three otherworldly insects explore each other-and themselves-through maximalist, alien movement; and Buzzkill (written by Jordan Knitzer), a darkly comic pop-rock musical anthology that zooms in on the creatures we often overlook-from disease-spreading mosquitoes to praying mantises at prom and even a cicada rock band.

To see the full lineup, please visit www.emergingartiststheatre.org.