Experience the Magic of Physical Theater: Broken Box Mime Theater Presents PhysFestNYC

Broken Box Mime Theater is proud to announce PhysFestNYC, a new, 10-day physical theater festival premiering in January 2024 at Stella Adler Center for the Arts, and supported by Clown Gym. PhysFestNYC is a community-focused festival that celebrates, enriches, and envisions the field of physical theater. As an annual gathering, it provides space for practitioners, audiences, and the physical-theater-curious to share in presented works, diverse workshop offerings, and community-building events. PhysFestNYC takes place at Stella Adler Center for the Arts (65 Broadway floor 2, New York, NY) from January 5th - 14th, 2024, and presents performances, workshops, panels, scratch nights, and community events from practitioners, makers, and companies from all genres of physical theater across two theaters, two studios, and a community-gathering space.

 

Physical theater has a varied and often disjointed story in the United States. As a field, it includes various genres such as mime, clown, performance art, puppetry, cultural movement traditions, and dance theater, yet it also exists in the space between and around these genres, combining and redefining them in real time. What it has in common is a centering of the body as storyteller, a tendency toward experimentation, and an openness to (re)considering the definition of theater and/or theater processes. To reference this expansiveness, the PhysFestNYC defines itself as a physical theaters festival, pluralising the word to encompass its multiplicity.

 

Due to many factors, physical theater practitioners in NYC (and often country-wide) are somewhat siloed in their practice. PhysFestNYC seeks to create a festival that opens pathways of communication and opportunities for shared resources, supporting artists in their work and deepening their impact.

 

Becky Baumwoll, Artistic Director of Broken Box Mime Theater and Co-Executive Producer of PhysFestNYC, remarked, “The performing arts create spaces for connection, and physical theater has a unique lens on this process by centering what we all have in common: the body. We believe our field should be an extension of this ethos of connection, and PhysFestNYC is a response to that need.”

 

PhysFestNYC leadership is horizontal; instead of being led by a singular party, the leadership team of the festival will consist of various cohorts so as to best reflect the varying desires and perspectives of the physical theater community. This horizontal leadership is made up of circles of teams who work in tandem to organize, curate, and produce the festival.

 

The Producing Team for PhysFestNYC is led by Becky Baumwoll, B.J. Evans, and Julia Proctor. This team is tasked with the logistical production and planning of the festival, as well as its financial stewardship. The Artistic Leadership Circle includes Margarita Blush, Bill Bowers, Akil Apollo Davis, Lou Sydel, Selma Trevino, and Ran Xia. This team is designing the curatorial model and criteria for submissions, creating the programming schedule, and curating up to half of the Festival. The leadership structure also consists of an Advisory Council, Honored Curators, an Event Team, an Outreach Team, and a Hosting Committee.

 

PhysFestNYC is a grassroots effort that hopes to grow over time and has launched a crowdfunding campaign to help raise money for this inaugural year. You can find the fundraising campaign at this link: https://givebutter.com/physfest2024

 

PhysFestNYC will soon be releasing an Open Call for submissions for companies, artists, and practitioners of all physical theaters to submit their pieces, workshops, and ideas to be considered for festival programming. The deadline for submissions will be mid to late August, approximately one month after applications go live.

 

For more information and to stay up-to-date on future PhysFestNYC announcements, sign up for the festival’s mailing list at: PhysFestNYC.org

 

About Broken Box Mime Theater

 

Broken Box Mime Theater (BKBX) is a collaborative theater company that performs original work entirely through movement. Our mission is to activate the imaginations of our audiences, contemporize the art of mime, and remind us all of the power of simple storytelling. Based in NYC and founded in 2011, our version of “mime, redefined” blends techniques of French pantomime, cinema, performance art, and contemporary theater. The 19 artists who call BKBX their artistic home believe in making innovative, provocative theater that erases the spoken language barrier and champions the power of simplicity in performance. More at www.brokenboxmime.com

 

About Clown Gym
 

Clown Gym started in 2014 as a collaborative member-sourced experiment in play and under the direction of Julia Proctor has grown into NYC’s home for clown and physical comedy. Clown Gym’s mission is to build community, spread joy and support artists as they embrace their humor, beauty, vulnerability, skill, intelligence, and passion. We do this through affordable high-quality training, teacher mentorship programming, new work development, performances, and community events focusing on clown and physical comedy. We aim to create a welcoming space for folks to train, connect, and perform so that more people get to play and decide the rules of the game. www.clowngym.com
 

About Stella Adler Center for the Arts
 

Established in 1949, the studio was founded upon Stella’s belief in the supreme seriousness of art, both its cultural significance and its power to affect social change. For 70 years, the studio has enriched every part of American culture, training many brilliant artists including actors Marlon Brando, Robert DeNiro, Elaine Stritch, Benicio Del Toro, Warren Beatty, choreographers Alvin Ailey and Jerome Robbins, playwright Horton Foote and director Peter Bogdanovich.

 

Today the Stella Adler Studio extends the tradition rooted in Stella’s ideals. The Studio uses the power of theater to contribute to positive social transformation, employs craft and art in service to communities and trains highly skilled actors who understand their role as the voice of the people. The studio’s mission is to create an environment that nurtures theater artists and audiences who value humanity, their own and others, as their first priority while providing art and education to the greater community.

 

About the Producers

 

Becky Baumwoll is an NYC-based artist and founding Artistic Director of Broken Box. Becky has directed projects small and large, from a US premiere of a Georgian play with Red Lab Productions to a Samsung Commercial all about hands. Onstage, Becky has worked regionally and Off-Broadway as an actor with words. She currently works as a consultant with Arts Action Research, supporting arts leaders to strengthen their organizations by grounding their administration in the artistic process. Becky is a teaching artist with BKBX, Arts Ignite, and the International Rescue Committee. She is a 2020 BRIClab artist, 2021 International Teaching Artist Collective Innovator, and 2021 NYC Women’s Fund grantee.

B.J. Evans is a producer and curator of time-based art and is currently producing and curating for theaters and festivals across North America and Europe. She has developed work across a spectrum of disciplines; from theater and dance, to poetry, installation art, ritual-making, and film and tv. Her creative producing career includes time at The Dallas Theater Center, Blue Man Group, Working Theater, The Public Theater, BRIC, Our Town (off-Broadway), and Sleep No More. B.J. is also a freelance dramaturg specializing in participatory, experimental, and devised performance, and holds an M.A. in Applied Theatre, focusing on theater as a tool for community building and social action. She is currently an MFA Candidate in Pedagogy and Dramaturgy at the University of Idaho and is based in Barcelona, Spain.

Julia Proctor (she/her) is an educator, collaborator, and community builder. She is the founding Director of Clown Gym, NYC's hub for physical comedy and clown. She loves devising and performing smart, funny, and innovative theatre. Her training includes a BA from Middlebury College, an MFA from the Academy for Classical Acting, Ecole Philippe Gaulier, The PIT, and she completed a pedagogical apprenticeship with Christopher Bayes. In addition to running Clown Gym and helping produce PhysFestNYC, Julia teaches Physical Acting at NYU’s New Studio on Broadway and was Beanie Feldstein’s personal Clown Coach for the Broadway revival of Funny Girl.

 

About the Artistic Leaderhip Circle Team

Margarita Blush (she/her) is a Bulgarian American theatre artist. She works in the field of devised physical and visual theatre as a creator, director, performer, and educator. Margarita is the Producing Artistic Director of Margarita Blush Productions, an ensemble-based company which performs nationally and internationally. Margarita’s work has been supported by The Jim Henson Foundation, NET, TCG, USArtists International, and many others. She has also received an Asian Cultural Council and a Grant Wood Fellowship.Margarita is passionate about meaningful collaborations with artists and organizations from around the world. She has performed, taught, directed, and studied in Bulgaria, Macedonia, Turkey, Germany, France, U.K., Japan, Indonesia, and USA. www.MargaritaBlush.com

Bill Bowers’ (he/him) Broadway credits include Zazu in The Lion King, and Leggett in The Scarlet Pimpernel. A student of the legendary Marcel Marceau, Bill is hailed by critics as one of the great mimes of our generation. An award-winning performer and playwright, Bill has created numerous solo plays that have garnered top honors in festivals throughout the world.  He is featured in the film Two Weeks Notice, on television in Out of the Box, Remember WENN, and the PBS documentary series, Brief But Spectacular. Bill serves on the faculties of Stella Adler Center for the Arts, NYU Tisch, Esper Studio. www.Bill-Bowers.com

Akil Apollo Davis (him/them) is a full-time Theatre Professor of Mask & Art Aesthetic, and a Performing Artist whose disciplines include Mask work, Dance, Acting, Music, MCing, and Poetry. He is the Founder of the transdisciplinary performance company, LoudSol, the founding MC of one NYC’s “Top Dance Parties”- The Get Down, a resident performer at the sober morning party, DayBreaker, and a regular collaborative performer at The House of Yes and other  artistic events around the city and the world.

 

Lou Sydel (he/they) is a choreographer whose work draws from the study of gesture as well as experiences of transness, imagining movement as a living journal for a body moving towards new directions. He is a graduate of Bowdoin College with a degree in performance and anthropology, and has studied physical theater at LaGuardia Arts HS and Accademia Dell’Arte. Past work has been shown at New York Live Arts with Ellen Robbins, as well as the Celebration Barn, Westbeth, PortFringe, Norte Maar Dance at Socrates, Sokolow Theater / Dance Ensemble, Rascal Arts at Theater Row, and the International Society for Gesture Studies. Lousydel.com

Selma Trevino (she/her) is a Brazilian performing artist based in New York City who specializes in Corporeal Mime. She co-founded Corporeal Arts Incorporated, a physical theatre company which devises original shows, offers professional training workshops, and promotes intercultural exchanges. Her choreography has appeared at Baryshnikov Arts Center, Lincoln Center, Dixon Place, and Green Space as well as in California, Paris, Finland, and throughout Brazil. Informed by Alexander Technique, Flamenco, and Grotowski’s Plastiques, her physical research seeks to employ Corporeal Mime to develop the personal movement of performers. She holds an MA in Performance Studies from NYU and full certification in Pilates.

Ran Xia (she/her) is a Shanghai-born, Brooklyn-based Playwright/Director/Audiogremlin. Member of WP Lab (2022 - 2024); Member of Soho Rep's Writer/Director Lab (2022-2023); Beatrice Terry Resident at the Drama League (2021/22); Chava the Giant and the Oldest Bird at Rattlestick Global Form Festival. Resident Director at the Tank where she directed and composed for the film adaptation of Prometheus Bound (inaugural Artist of the Year 2019, In Blue, Tallest Man in the World, etc.); Guest director ar Barnard (Orlando, fall 2021), Montclair State (Randi & Roxanne), Commissioned playwright at Vanderbilt University (To Stab a Butterfly Through the Heart); Usual suspect at Exquisite Corpse Co (Sound Design for the NYT critics' pick Zoetrope, audio installation for Memory House, and many more); audio producer at Black Revolutionary Media. Playwright/Director for the theatrical portion of Risa Puno's The Privilege of Escape with Creative Time. Assistant/Associate credit include: Grey House on Broadway, The Atlantic, Long Wharf, The Flea, etc. She's also designed sound for productions at LIU Brooklyn, John Jay College, Theater Lab, and more. ranxia.info | thearcticgroup.org/echo

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