Return Engagement of MAHINERATOR & GHETTO ALCHEMY Added to The Tank Spring 2024 Season

The Tank will present additional productions for the Winter/Spring 2024 Core Productions season.

Mahinerator by Jerry Lieblich, co-directed by Jerry Lieblich and Meghan Finn, and performed by Obie Winner Steve Mellor, will receive an encore run at The Tank (312 West 36th Street) due to popular demand. Mahinerator originally played an extended run at The Tank September 28-October 25, 2023.

 

Ghetto Alchemy: A Lunchroom Survival Guide, written and performed by Maleek Rae and directed by amani meliyah, will begin performances on May 2, 2024 with a limited run through May 19, 2024.

 

 

MAHINERATOR

Written and co-directed by Jerry Lieblich

Performed by Obie Winner Steve Mellor

Co-directed by Meghan Finn

Performances begin September 28, 2024

Limited run through October 22, 2024

The Tank’s 56 Seat Theater

 

Hrak! Tunely froth thine earliparts what for bespeaks Yours Trustly! In Mahinerator, an ambitious bureaucrat, two-time Obie winner Steve Mellor, speaking in a quasi-English pseudolect, tells his greatliest life story; a story of the banalation of the evilwise, of vacuumic compressulated ecocide.

 

In a review of the Fall 2023 run, Sara Holdren (New York Magazine) said, “Lieblich’s verbally virtuosic play is an eerily funny, deeply chilling demonstration not simply of the banality of evil, but of its absurdity.” Helen Shaw (New Yorker) praised both playwright and actor, “The gravel-voiced Mellor, super dry and super droll, is an Olympic-level outraged bristler, and ‘Mahinerator,’ Jerry Lieblich’s hilariously gruesome sci-fi monologue, fits him like a hair shirt.”

 

The performance schedule for Mahinerator is January 10-13 and January 17-21 at 7pm;  January 14 at 3pm; and January 15 at 4pm.

 

 

GHETTO ALCHEMY: A LUNCHROOM SURVIVAL GUIDE

Written and performed by Maleek Rae

Directed amani meliyah

Performances begin May 2, 2024

Limited run through May 19, 2024

The Tank’s 56 Seat Theater

 

Ghetto Alchemy: A Lunchroom Survival Guide is an afrofuturist coming-of-age story that transports us from the outers of space to the rhythmic tables of a middle school lunchroom. This hip-hop solo show uses rap, poetry, and movement as liberation tools to help the main character travel back in time to gain the assistance of their middle school self to overcome current-day blockades, exploring puberty, socioeconomic status, and queer awakening. This show is a Sankofa offering. It’s never too late to go back and get it. It’s never too late to give 11-year-old you a hug.

 

The performance schedule for Ghetto Alchemy: A Lunchroom Survival Guide is May 2-4, May 9-11, May 13, May16-18 at 7pm; May 5 and May 19 at 3pm.

 

For tickets and more information, visit www.thetanknyc.org/20th-anniversary-season

 

Previously announced for The Tank’s Spring 2024 season is Primordial, by Lillian Isabella and directed by Meghan Finn followed by Three Scenes in the Life of a Trotskyist, by Andy Boyd and directed by Jake Beckhard. In April The Tank will present The Human Dream Project, created and directed by Admiral Grey; The Lydian Gale Parr, composed by Alaina Ferris with a libretto by Karinne Keithley Syers and performed at Target Magrin Theater; and The Vicky Archives, co-created by The Brouhaha Theatre Project and performed in The Tank’s Attic space. The season will conclude with Midnight Coleslaw’s Tales From Beyond The Closet!!! by Joey Merlo to ring in The Tank’s Pride Month programming.

 

The Tank's Core Production series serves companies and artists as they create new works for performance. Core Productions are central to The Tank’s mission to give emerging artists resources to build their careers and artistic voices. These productions receive institutional support in the form of financial assistance, performance and rehearsal space, press, marketing, and more, culminating in a world premiere production run. The Core Production series offers a way for emerging artists to fully realize their artistic vision in partnership with The Tank.

 

 

ABOUT THE TANK

 

Founded in 2003, The Tank is an Obie Award-winning, multi-disciplinary non-profit arts presenter and producer, which provides a home to emerging artists working across all disciplines, including theater, comedy, dance, film, music, puppetry, and storytelling. Led by Artistic Director Meghan Finn, Managing Producer Molly FitzMaurice, and Director of Artistic Development Johnny G. Lloyd, The Tank champions emerging artists engaged in the pursuit of new ideas and forms of expression. In doing so the company removes the economic barriers from the creation of new work for artists launching their careers and experimenting within their art form. From the company’s home with two theaters on 36th Street, The Tank serves over 2,500 artists every year, presents over 1,000 performances, and welcomes 36,000 audience members annually. The company fully produces a curated season of 8-12 theatrical World or New York premieres each season.

 

Recent Tank-produced work includes The New York Times Critics' Picks Taxilandia by Flako Jimenez (2021), OPEN by Crystal Skillman, directed by Jessi D. Hill (2019); Red Emma & The Mad Monk by Alexis Roblan, directed by Katie Lindsay (2018); and The Offending Gesture by Mac Wellman, directed by Meghan Finn (2016), as well as Drama Desk Award-nominated productions The Hunger Artist (2018), The Paper Hat Game (2017), the ephemera trilogy(2017), Ada/Ava (2016) and youarenowhere (2016).

 

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

www.TheTankNYC.org

 

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BIOS

 

Steve Mellor (he/him, Performer) has appeared on Broadway (Big River), Off-Broadway (Nixon's Nixon) and regionally at Arena Stage, Long Wharf Theater, La Jolla Playhouse, Portland Stage and Yale Rep. A longtime collaborator with Mac Wellman, Steve has appeared in Wellman's Harm’s Way, Energumen, Dracula, Cellophane, Terminal Hip (OBIE Award), Sincerity Forever, A Murder of Crows, The Hyacinth Macaw, 7 Blowjobs (Bessie Award), Strange Feet, Bad Penny, Fnu Lnu, Bitter Bierce (OBIE Award), and Muazzez. He also directed Mr. Wellman's 1965 UU. In New York City, he has appeared at The Public Theater, La Mama, Soho Rep, Primary Stages, PS 122, MCC Theater, The Chocolate Factory and The Flea. His film and television credits include Sleepless in Seattle, Mickey Blue Eyes, Celebrity, “NYPD Blue,” “Law and Order,” “NY Undercover” and “Mozart in the Jungle.”

JERRY LIEBLICH (they/them, Writer, Co-Director) plays in the borderlands of theater, poetry, and music. Their work experiments with language as a way to explore and expand textures of consciousness and attention. Plays include D Deb Debbie Deborah (Clubbed Thumb – Critic’s Pick: NY Times), Undying in Yidderland (Kulturhaus Mousontorum, Frankfurt), Everything for Dawn (Experiments in Opera), Tongue Depressor (The Public Theatre), Ghost Stories (Cloud City — Critic’s Pick: TimeOut NY), The Barbarians (Dixon Place), and Your Hair Looked Great (Abrons Arts Center). Their poetry has appeared in Foglifter, Grist, SOLAR, Pomona Valley Review, Cold Mountain Review, and Works and Days.

Jerry has held residencies at MacDowell, MassMoCA, Millay Arts, Blue Mountain Center, NACL, SPACE on Ryder Farm, UCROSS, and the Edward F. Albee Foundation. They have received an EST/Sloan Commission, the Himan Brown Creative Writing Award (twice), and a Martha Boschen Porter Fund grant from the Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation. They are a 2023-4 Wallis Annenberg Helix Fellow with Yiddishkayt, an alum of the Soho Rep Writer/Director Lab, Page 73's I-73 Writer's Group, and Pipeline Theater’s Playlab group. MFA: Brooklyn College (Mac Wellman and Erin Courtney, chief instigators). www.thirdear.nyc

Meghan Finn (she/her, Co-Director) is the Artistic Director of The Tank. She previously served as the Associate Artistic Director at 3LD Art & Technology Center. Her directorial work has been seen at the Tank, the V&A, Serpentine Galleries, The Wexner Center, SCAD, The Logan Center for the Arts in Chicago, Museo Jumex Mexico City, The Power Plant, Canadian Stage, Carnegie Mellon, Brooklyn College, MIT, NYU, the Great Plains Theater Conference and others. She has directed three world premieres by playwright Mac Wellman, including most recently The Invention of Tragedy (2019). Other recent credits include I Am Nobody a new musical by Greg Kotis (Urinetown) at The Tank; as well as The Nine Dreams: Blake & the Apocalypse by writer Nick Flynn (film). She directed a short film by playwright Peggy Stafford called 16 Words or Less which has been screened at indie film festivals nationally and in Europe. She is a frequent collaborator of conceptual artist and sculptor Pedro Reyes and directed Doomocracy for Creative Time. Finn collaborated with photographer Mitch Epstein on a live performance with cellist Erik Friedlander as well as celebrated premieres by Erin Courtney, Peggy Stafford, Gary Winter, Ben Gassman, Alexandra Collier, Carl Holder, Eliza Bent and Cori Copp. When We Went Electronic by Caitlyn Saylor Stephens which premiered at The Tank in 2018 toured in 2021 to The Roes Theater in Athens Greece and OnStage! Festival Rome and Milan. She holds a BA in Theater from The University of Southern California and an MFA in Directing from Brooklyn College.

MALEEK RAE (They/Them), the child of Joyce Gilbert and great grandchild of Joseph Gilbert,  is a gender queer writer/actor/rapper hailing from the eastside of Detroit,MI. Maleek is based in Brooklyn, NY where they create black/ghetto/multidisciplinary offerings that live at the intersections of genealogy, inner child healing, and shadow work. 

 

Maleek is a graduate of the SUNY Purchase BFA acting conservatory. Their work as an actor can be seen on networks such as NBC (“Law & Order: SVU” & “Organized Crime”), CBS (“East New York”), HBO (“Random Acts of Flyness” S2), Peacock (“The Best Man: The Final Chapters”), national commercial spots, video games, museum exhibitions, and a plethora of films. In addition to their on-camera work they’ve also worked on productions at theaters such as La Mama Experimental Theatre (Messiah), Classical Theatre of Harlem (The Bacchae), Premiere Stages (Mud Row), and The Detroit Public Theatre (Detroit 67’). 

 

In April of 2023 Maleek workshopped and presented a work in progress showing at The Tank of their play Community: A Guttah Ritual, which was shortly followed by the release of their debut mixtape Ghetto Alchemy Vol. 1. Maleek is currently a fellow with the Target Margin Theatre company and a member of LIT Council, a developmental playwriting intensive in partnership with The Tank. 

 

amani meliyah is a multidisciplinary artist based in Brooklyn, NY. They create socio-political portraits of identity, faith, and community through live performance, movement, poetry, and video. Directing credits include a recent theatrical production of new play Nyad's Dream, a queer magical realism play by Julliann Lavallee; In the Blood by Suzan-Lori Parks and original short films they wrote and directed Parkside and Daughters. amani is a Theatre of the Oppressed practitioner with Theatre of the Oppressed NYC and facilitates residencies at several local communities organizations including Ali Forney Center, Housing Works, and Fortune Society. amani is a co-founder of Blue Lilith Productions and is currently in production for the filmRooftop Jesus (writer/director). They are a member of the 2023-2024 Leon Levy Roundabout Directing Cohort. In NYC amani has collaborated with Soho Rep, Experimental Bitch, Vainglory Theatre, Brunch Theatre, and The Tank.

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