ANNEX By Maddox Pennington To Make World Premiere At Hollywood Fringe!

Fringe veteran (and award winner) Maddox Pennington has a profound interest in survivors, both the sturdy friend who gets their life together quickly and the "disaster" friend who takes a bit more time. Pennington (they/them) recognizes the loneliness that both can experience and how that loneliness can sometimes lead people to do something reckless...like conjuring a bowl of talking pink light without knowing what it wants in return.

Pennington and Producer Charity Sade present their new play Annex, making its world premiere at the Zephyr Theatre this June as part of the Hollywood Fringe Festival.

Annex is a dark comedy about queer family, mental illness and magical realism. Elliot is a single parent who's never had full custody of their trans teenage son due to ongoing mental health issues. While Elliot has the help of their queer chosen family, they are frustrated by the ongoing demands of balancing their job as a tarot-reading advice columnist with their aspirations as a parent. Elliot conjures a mysterious entity, a talking bowl of pink light known as Belinda Carlisle. At first Belinda seems like a miracle cure, providing Elliot with energy, focus, and stability for their relationships with their son and friends. But as Elliot becomes more and more dependent on her help, Belinda Carlisle becomes something more nefarious and threatening.

"I thought of a person who's done 'everything right' in terms of asking for support, building a community and absolutely doing the best thing for their child, but who still feels like they're up against something insurmountable," said Pennington, who wrote Annex and will also direct. "This was a chance to confront and explore those ideas with other artists in the ways that only theatre lets you do."

Annex was developed at the Bucharest Inside the Beltway "Radiance" residency in 2021. Premiering at Fringe made sense for Pennington, a nonbinary writer and teacher originally from the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma. Their play Love Chicken premiered at Fringe in 2022, where it was a Best Comedy nominee, and won a Producer's Encore Award and the Theater Theatre Podcast Playwright Award.

Pennington has put together a top-level team for this deeply personal work, including producer Sade, who is also a stand-up comedian, writer and the founder of Coping Through Comedy. They are working with an entirely queer cast, almost all of whom are nonbinary or trans.

"Many of us bring relevant experience with disability and mental illness to the table as well," Pennington said. "It's freeing to collaborate on a story that's fun and fantastical and heartbreaking and grounded and loving all at once, because that's how life feels for so many of us."

The team also has some events planned around performances, including a Happy Hour Talkback, Late Night Tarot After Party and a Trans Lifeline Fundraiser. Beyond just showcasing their new work and their incredibly talented cast, Pennington hopes the show will also develop support and love for the trans and nonbinary community...while also making patrons suspicious of talking bowls of light.

ANNEX

Written and Directed by Maddox Pennington

Produced by Charity Sade

A world premiere from acclaimed writer Maddox Pennington, Annex is a dark comedy about queer family, mental illness and magical realism. Elliot is a single parent who's never had full custody of their trans teenage son due to ongoing mental health issues. While Elliot has the help of their queer chosen family, they are frustrated by the ongoing demands of balancing their job as a tarot-reading advice columnist with their aspirations as a parent. Elliot conjures a mysterious entity, a talking bowl of pink light known as Belinda Carlisle. At first Belinda seems like a miracle cure, providing Elliot with energy, focus, and stability for their relationships with their son and friends. But as Elliot becomes more and more dependent on her help, Belinda Carlisle becomes something more nefarious and threatening.

DATES AND TIMES:

June 4 - 3 p.m. (*pay what you can preview)

June 8 - 8:45 p.m.

June 17 - 3:45 p.m.

June 23 - 7 p.m.

LOCATION:

The Zephyr Theatre

7456 Melrose Ave.

Los Angeles, CA 90046

TICKET PRICES:

$20

$5 discount code for supporters: LGBTQFam

$10 discount code for students: STUDENT