Frigid NY To Present THE SONG OF LIP AND TARANTULA: A TRANSSEXUAL CODEPENDENT CHOSEN FAMILY TRAGEDY
The new workshop production explores complex themes of chosen family and identity in the trans community.
Frigid NY, Big Beef Productions, and Kelley-Marie Van Dilla are thrilled to present a workshop production of The Song of Lip and Tarantula written by Aviva Pearl Ocean Creation, directed by Sasha Gheesling, and starring Aviva Pearl Ocean Creation and Airen Guevara.
The Song of Lip and Tarantula is a transsexual codependent chosen family tragedy about childbirth, murder, and Shabbat dinner.
The play follows two transgender women named Lip and Tarantula who raise 26 trans children until their family falls apart due to an act of violence between the children. Lip clings to the past and hopes to rebuild her chosen family and Tarantula marrying a man, procuring a high paying job, and undergoing surgery so that she can bear her own child. When the two women meet again, Tarantula reveals her pregnancy to Lip. Lip begs Tarantula to move back in with her so they can raise the child together but Tarantula refuses and in the ensuing fight ends up falling from the roof. Lip peels her friend's body from the pavement, steals her pregnancy, and takes her home where she begins to make a Shabbat dinner she believes will bring back Tarantula and her 26 children.
Aviva Pearl Ocean Creation wrote The Song of Lip and Tarantula after an upheaval in her own chosen family forced her to grapple with the cycle of violence prevalent in trans-feminine communities. This story speaks to the near-impossible choice trans women face of making their own families with under-resourced and traumatized peers or striving to fit into a world that wishes them gone. She believes that in light of the onslaught of legislation targeting trans women, that this play is more relevant than ever.
The Song of Lip and Tarantula was first seen by the public in a staged reading at Seventh Heaven Bar in December, directed by Kelley-Marie Van Dilla and starring Aviva Pearl Ocean Creation and Rosalina Michele. The Song of Lip and Tarantula will have its first ever workshop production at Under St. Marks Theater in early February, to be performed by Aviva Pearl Ocean Creation and Airen Guevara, with direction from Sasha Gheesling. It will go on to be featured at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival at CC Blooms this August.
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