'PHANTASMAGORIA' to Premiere at La MaMa This Fall

La MaMa presents the world premiere of Phantasmagoria; or, Let Us Seek Death!, conceived and directed by Obie Award winner Randolph Curtis Rand, written by Chana Porter and puppetry by Benjamin Stuber.

Phantasmagoria; or, Let Us Seek Death!, an Eric Borlaug production, runs as part of the 2016 La MaMa Puppet Series from October 20 - November 6 at the Ellen Stewart Theatre, located at 66 East 4th Street between 2nd Avenue and the Bowery in New York City. Previews begin October 20 for an October 23 opening.

Performances are Thursdays - Saturdays at 7pm and Sundays at 4pm. Tickets are $30 and $25 for students and seniors, and can be purchased online at LaMaMa.org or by calling 646-430-5374. A limited amount of $10 tickets are available for each show. For mature audiences ages 16+. Post-show panels will follow select performances. For more information visit LaMaMa.org/Phantasmagoria, Like on Facebook at www.Facebook.com/PhantasmagoriaPlay, and follow on Instagram (www.Instagram.com/PhantasmagoriaPlay) at @phantasmagoriaplay and on Twitter (Twitter.com/LetUsSeekDeath) at @letusseekdeath.

A rainy night in a Genevan castle. Debauched poetry and too much wine. A teenage girl writes a spooky story. On the 200th anniversary of Mary Shelley's creation, Frankenstein: or The Modern Prometheus, Phantasmagoria assembles a swirl of puppetry, biography and storytelling into a market of ghosts...the dead walk among us.

The cast includes Jane Bradley (I'm Bleeding All Over The Place, La MaMa; And That's How the Rent Gets Paid, The Kitchen), Equiano (The Parable Conference, BAM; In Fields Where They Lay, New Ohio), Andrew Lynch (Blue Man Group, NY/Chicago; Music Theatre Factory's The Disappearing Man), Katie Melby (Basil Twist's Sister's Follies; Mabou Mines' La Davina Caricatura; Basil Twist's Rite of Spring, Lincoln Center), Demetrius Stewart (People's Improv Theater), Josephine Stewart (He Who Gets Slapped: the Gentlewoman, Live Arts; A Midsummer Night's Dream, Tiltyard), Benjamin Stuber (Port Out, Starboard Home, La MaMa; Epona's Labyrinth, HERE) and Ashley Winkfield (Basil Twist's Sister's Follies, and Rite of Spring, Lincoln Center).

The creative team includes Jessica Greenberg (Lighting Design & Sound Design), Kima Baffour (Costume, Hair, Wig & Make-up Design), SNOW (Set Design), Micah Maxson (Co-Sound Design) and Misha Wulfe (Props Design). The production team includes Mimi Barcomi (Production Stage Manager) and PlayMachine (General Manager).

Watch a trailer for the production below!

---

Dedicated to the artist and all aspects of the theatre, La MaMa provides a supportive home for artists and takes risks on unknown work. An integral part of New York City's cultural landscape, La MaMa has a worldwide reputation for producing daring work in theatre, dance, performance art, and music that defies form and transcends boundaries of language, race, and culture. Founded in 1961 by theatre pioneer and legend Ellen Stewart, La MaMa is a global organization with creative partners and dedicated audiences around the world.

Randolph Curtis Rand (director) is an Obie Award winning theatre artist whose work encompasses directing, performing, dramaturgy, teaching and design. A member of two theatre companies in New York, Arden Party, which The Village Voice called, "An amazing company...with plasticine bodies and souls," and The Drama Dept., for whom he directed his own adaptation, Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Other past collaborators include Elevator Repair Service, Richard Foreman, The Foundry Theater, La MaMa ETC, Meredith Monk, The Public Theater, The Talking Band, Target-Margin, and the Wooster Group, among many others nationally.

Chana Porter (playwright) is a writer and teacher living in Brooklyn. Her plays and performance pieces have been developed and produced at Cloud City, 3-Legged Dog, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, Cherry Lane, The Invisible Dog, Primary Stages, Movement Research, PS122, Dixon Place, and The White Bear in London. She is currently writing a series of science fiction novels, POST HUMAN CLASSICS and is the co-founder of the Octavia Project, a free summer program for Brooklyn teenage girls. Up next: Leap And The Net Will Appear, directed by Tara Ahmadinejad at Playwrights Horizons New Works Lab, Dec. 2016.

Benjamin Stuber (puppetry) is a theatre artist, designer and teacher working across acting, dance, design, puppetry, direction, choreography and composition. Recent credits include Love in a Heat Death Universe by Angela Santillo (Dixon Place, Chain Theatre Festival, Chicago Fringe Festival), the world premiere of Sheila Callaghan's Port Out, Starboard Home with foolsFURY Theater (ZSpace SF & La MaMa), DaZain's butoh adaptation of Dostoevsky's Netochka Nezvanova (CPR), and a new adaptation of Uncle Vanya (Mabou Mines Suite). Stuber is a founding member of One Continuous Mistake, CDP/NYC, and Convergences Theatre Collective. (BenjaminStuber.com)

Eric Borlaug (production) is a co-host of the monthly radioplay podcast The Parsnip Ship (www.TheParsnipShip.org), a curator of the Williamsburg art and performance venue Cloud City (www.CloudCity.nyc), and the founder and Director-general of PlayMachine (www.PlayMachine.org), a non-profit theater startup dedicated to innovation in theatrical experiences which explore futures. Favorite past productions as producer or fundraiser include: You Will Make a Difference (AliveWire Theatrics); Old Fashioned Prostitutes: A True Romance (Richard Foreman/The Public Theater); The Tribute Artist (Charles Busch/59E59, Primary Stages/Daryl Roth Productions); The Call (Tanya Barfield/Playwrights Horizons, Primary Stages); All in the Timing (David Ives/59E59, Primary Stages). (EricBorlaug.com)

Need more Off-Off-Broadway Theatre News in your life?
Sign up for all the news on the Spring season, discounts & more...