Dark Comedy Premiere of FUNERAL SHOW at Hollywood Fringe Festival
Performances take place in June.
Making its debut at the 2025 Hollywood Fringe Festival is Funeral Show - Elena Martinez’s one-woman dark comedy pokes around in the well-known wound of when your parental relationship becomes terminal. You're all invited to a musical, drag, clown spectacle that seeks closure when your parent(s) is neither gone, forgotten...nor in your life. Opening June 8th - 29th (5-performances), at The Broadwater Studio.
A compelling comedy with dark humor about family and grief. Celebrate the bygone good times in memory of a life still being lived. Bring your tissues and dress in black, the mourning has begun.
About Elena Martinez – Playwright and Performer
Elena Martinez is a storyteller and theater maker who explores the dark comedy of what it means to be alive. She brings over a decade of experience in improv and sketch comedy to the stage underlined by a childhood of classical piano training. Her first solo show, “One Night in Aurora”, debuted at Sketchfest Seattle in 2017 – a musical and stream of consciousness retrospective about love, dreams, and misunderstandings. Elena’s ensemble sketch comedy group, Getting Naked with Friends, performed headlining sets at Seattle Sketchfest in 2016 and 2017. Her duo, Sober Virgin, with Anthony Householder explored the altered perspectives of codependency and addiction in their 2018 show “Short Stories”. Before relocating to Los Angeles, Elena toured her holiday musical parody duo show with Rachel Walls and joined the illustrious cast of beloved Seattle improv show Uncle Mike Ruins Christmas. You can now catch her performing with her house team Cynthia on Friday Night Fridays at World’s Greatest Improv School helmed by Will Hines, producing Not Too Shabby weekly at UCB, and monthly with hit indie improv team Dough Dough.
About NATASHA MERCADO – Director
Natasha Mercado is a director, performer, and visionary of the “Soft Clown”—a performance style she pioneered that combines unapologetic vulnerability, absurdism, and emotional depth. Her innovative approach has made her a sought-after teacher, with sold-out workshops across the country. In 2024, The Comedy Bureau named her work one of the “Best Things in Comedy,” and Cirque du Soleil’s David Shiner praised her as “fearless and completely out of [her] mind.”
As a director, Natasha has helmed critically acclaimed Fringe productions including Thank You So Much For Coming, Medicine Woman, and The Great Shamé. These works have garnered dozens of award nominations and widespread recognition across the Edinburgh and North American Fringe circuits. In 2025, she is directing three new original works debuting at the Hollywood Fringe Festival, continuing her commitment to developing emotionally transformative, genre-defying performances in collaboration with rising artists.
Her solo shows, Tree and #1 Son, have toured internationally and received critical acclaim, with Tree being named one of Stage Raw’s Top 10 Shows in Los Angeles. Natasha’s directorial work centers creative impulse within heightened, often surreal worlds, creating transformative experiences that engage audiences both intellectually and emotionally.
In addition to her performing and directing career, Natasha works with The Unusual Suspects Theatre Company, mentoring youth in under-resourced communities to develop original work that reflects their personal stories. She draws inspiration from immersive theatre, physical comedy, and the transformative power of intentionally shifting the energy in a room.
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Good Night, Oscar North Coast Repertory (9/16-10/11) |
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Much Ado About Nothing McCadden Place Theatre (8/07-8/16) |
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6 Out of 10 Theatre 68 (8/20-8/20) |
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After the Blast The Broadwater Second Stage (8/05-8/13) |
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Catch Me If You Can Colony Theatre (9/17-10/18) |
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Emily Skinner: In Concert Feinstein's at the Nikko (8/14-8/15) |
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Gershwin and the Golden Age Younes and Soraya Nazarian Center for the Performing Arts (The Soraya) (10/11-10/11) |
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John Lloyd Young Feinstein's at the Nikko (8/21-8/22) |
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Love, Loss and What I Wore Sawyer's Playhouse (8/08-8/30) |
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Our Man in Santiago by Mark Wilding Odyssey Theatre Ensemble (9/10-9/20) |