Zoe Geltman's THE LONELIEST WHALE IN THE WORLD to Premiere at Dream Up Festival, Begin. 8/28

The Loneliest Whale in the World, written by Zoë Geltman and directed by Julia May Jonas, will be performed at the Community Space Theater at Theater for the New City as part of the 2013 Dream Up Festival, from August 28 - September 7. The Loneliest Whale...is a play about a sad whale who has decided to end its own life, and two self-destructive loners who risk allowing their hideous kinks to swallow themselves up. As all three alternately fight and give into the shameful morbid pleasure of obsession and complacency, this performance invites the question: can we ever really fix our broken parts?

Writer Zoë Geltman was inspired to write this play by the story of the real loneliest whale in the world--the baleen whale that the Navy discovered in 1989 who sings at a different frequency than all other baleen whales. Because of her curious song, she has been unable to find other whales, and they cannot find her either as they cannot hear her. It is unknown whether she is a hybrid of two different types of whale, a genetically mutated whale, or the last of an entirely unknown species. Geltman draws on this poignant story, as well as cult '80s movies like Robocop, old news reports, and her own experience of growing up in New York City and visiting the depressed towns of upstate New York. Thanks to Julia May Jonas' smart and whimsical direction, The Loneliest Whale in the World exists somewhere between cautionary tale and fanciful spoof of modern day consumption, entitlement, and the media that reports on it all.

Zoë Geltman is a native New Yorker and an actor and playwright. As an actor, she has worked with playwright Julia May Jonas and Jonas' theater company, Nellie Tinder, on numerous projects, including most recently Evelyn in Concert (Incubator Arts Project, Other Forces Festival | APAP). Other Nellie Tinder projects she has worked on include Evelyn (The Bushwick Starr), Raise Your Voice in Medieval Counterpoint (Prelude 12, Martin E. Segal Theatre at CUNY), and No One is Excused from the Trouble of Living (Columbia Stages). She has also appeared at Dixon Place, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, Jimmy's No. 43, 59E59 Theatre, and the Living Theatre. Zoë also wrote for and performed in Pussyfest, curated by Mariah McCarthy. Zoë performed an excerpt of her play, The Loneliest Whale in the World, at the Invisible Dog Art Space as part of Catch!, the monthly performance series curated by Andrew Dinwiddie, Caleb Hammons and Jeff Larson.

Julia May Jonas, with her company Nellie Tinder, has created and directed multi-disciplinary plays since 2005 at venues including The Incubator Arts Center, University Settlement, Dixon Place, The Bushwick Starr, HERE Arts Center, Tonic, La Mama E.T.C. and PS 122 (with Terra Nova). The work of NT is currently supported by a grant from the The Mental Insight Foundation. She has created performance frequently for the Catch! Series, curated by Andrew Dinwiddie, Jeff Larson and Caleb Hammons, as well as at the Little Theater Series at Dixon Place, and her writing has been published by The Brooklyn Review. She received her MFA in playwriting from Columbia University in 2012.

For tickets, click HERE. And for more information, visit www.dreamupfestival.org/loneliestwhale.html.