SPANKING MACHINE Will Be Performed at the Marsh in September and October

Award-winning writer/performer Marga Gomez returns to The Marsh San Francisco stage for live performances of Spanking Machine, her by turns funny, intense, and heart-rending memoir of growing up brown and queer in Washington Heights. Childhood pranks, Devil Dogs, sadistic nuns on poppers, assault, and suppressed memory play their parts in Gomez's shift across gender, latitudes, and generations.

The narrative is propelled by a fraught reunion with her childhood friend "Scotty."

As Gomez explains, "His real name was Agamemnon Perez Jr. but he shortened it to 'Scotty' because he thought Agamemnon sounded too Cuban." He was the first boy that she ever kissed, and it made them both gay forever.

Spanking Machine will be presented live on stage, September 17 -October 23, 2021 (press opening: September 24), with performances at 8:00pm Fridays & Saturdays at The Marsh San Francisco, 1062 Valencia Street, San Francisco. For tickets ($20-35 sliding scale, $55-$100 reserved) or more information, the public may visit themarsh.org or call (415) 282-3055 (Monday through Friday, 1:00pm-4:00pm).

To ensure a safe theater space for all, The Marsh will require all patrons to be fully vaccinated; all audience members will be asked to show proof of vaccination during check-in. The Marsh will also require patrons to wear a face covering over their mouth and nose while inside the building at all times in both the San Francisco and Berkeley theaters. Tickets to live productions must be pre-purchased through TheMarsh.org website before arriving at theatre; no tickets will be sold at the door.

Spanking Machine was first commissioned as a work in progress in 2019 for the Syracuse Stage "Cold Read" Festival in 2019, and developed (from 2019 through July 2020) with director Adrian Alea. While a March 2020 premiere of Spanking Machine at Brava Theater (San Francisco) was canceled due to the pandemic, a virtual adaption of the work was commissioned in July 2020 by Dixon Place (New York) and was presented via digital stream at Brava Theater and San Diego Repertory Theatre. Critics have applauded the work, with the San Francisco Chronicle cheering Gomez in this piece, noting "She's a ceramics-shattering, pleasure-seeking, curiosity-gratifying observer with quick wit and a sharper tongue. She's learned how to take herself out of a bad situation. She's learned how to ask for what she wants."

As the writer/performer of thirteen solo plays and a stand-up comedian, Marga Gomez has been described as "deliciously cheeky and incendiary" by The New York Times, and "astonishing" by Armistead Maupin, and "amazing... a lesbian Lenny Bruce" by Robin Williams. Her solo plays have been developed with and staged by renowned New York director David Schweizer, as well as Adrian Alea, Ellen Sebastian Chang, and David Ford. She is the winner of a GLAAD Award for Theater and a three-time winner of San Francisco Bay Guardian's "Best Of The Bay Comedian." Her acting credits include theatre roles: Campo Santos SF production of Translating Selena (January 2020), Off-Broadway Ars Nova production of Dr. Rides American Beach House (November 2019), and television: Sense8 (Netflix). She also teaches solo performance online via her website: margagomez.com. A beloved performer at The Marsh, Gomez's solo theatre career began at The Marsh San Francisco in 1991, where she has been seen in award-winning, long-running productions including Latin Standards, Love Birds, Memory Tricks, Not Getting Any Younger, among others.

The Marsh is known as "a breeding ground for new performance." It was launched in 1989 by Founder and Artistic Director Stephanie Weisman, and pre-COVID hosted more than 600 performances of 175 shows across the company's two venues in San Francisco and Berkeley. A leading outlet for solo performers, The Marsh's specialty has been hailed by the San Francisco Chronicle as "solo performances that celebrate the power of storytelling at its simplest and purest." The East Bay Times named The Marsh one of Bay Area's best intimate theaters, calling it "one of the most thriving solo theaters in the nation. The live theatrical energy is simply irresistible." Since its launch in April 2020, the theatre's digital platform MarshStream has garnered more than 100,000 viewers. Notable MarshStream moments include the debut of MarshStream International Solo Fest, The Marsh's first- ever digital festival, and the U.S. premiere of The Invisible Line, a new documentary about one of the world's most famous social experiments gone wrong. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic MarshStream has hosted over 500 LIVE streams, providing some 300 performers a platform to continue developing and producing art. The Marsh will continue to offer digital content on MarshStream, as well as in-person performances.