as•sem•bly |ə-sěm'blē| (noun)
1. a group of people gathered in one place for a common purpose.
2. a public facility to meet for open discussion.
3. the action of fitting together component parts of a machine or
other object.
4. a collective of artists dedicated to realizing a new American theater.
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Harpo's Salon: A Night of Conversation
Monday, October 6 | 7pm Doors Open | 7:30pm Performance | 8:30pm Post-Show Hang!
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The Attic @ The Tank
312 West 36th Street, 6th Floor, New York, NY — see transportation options
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Welcome to The Assembly's performance and conversation salon! We've missed coming together as a community of art-makers and audience members, and so we're thirlled you've joined us in the Attic to drink, snack, see some exciting new works-in-progress by artists in our community!
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THE LINE-UP
Ivanov Workshop
by Toska New York with Bito Boucher, Mya Rosado-Tran, Max Fermin, Tom Mcgovern, Mia Fritz, Jacob Schrosch, Maya Partridge, Dominic Cárdenas,
Madeleine Fisette, Henry Alper, Taylor Goodwyn, and Kento Morita
Ivanov Workshop is an exploration of Chekhov’s Ivanov, approached through gesture, modern dance, physical score-making, and collective devising. The piece investigates Ivanov’s profound Toska—a Russian word Vladimir Nabokov described as “a sensation of great spiritual anguish, often without any specific cause… a dull ache of the soul.” As Ivanov’s debts mount, his marriage to the ailing Anna collapses, and her eventual death leaves him consumed by despair.
In Chekhov’s world, there is no shared narrative to hold a community together—only the lonely stories individuals tell in a desperate attempt at self-justification. Ivanov embodies this failure: his efforts to frame his life as meaningful collapse into delusion, alienation, and cruelty, leaving his wife Anna dead and all culminating in his suicide. Through gesture-based acting, modern dance, and ensemble tableaux, this work exposes both Ivanov’s failed attempt at self-justification and his Toska as mirrors of today’s America, where the erosion of the arts and the absence of shared cultural narratives deepen our collective sense of despair and longing.
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JANE THE QUENE, a one-girl beheading
by Vanessa Bellew
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A one-woman show in iambic pentameter: The (mostly) true story of Lady Jane Grey, a pious and learned 16-year-old girl who became England's first Queen. For nine days. It doesn't end well.
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Marinos or the Trans Saint Play
by Ania Upstill, Lynn Hodeib, Brooke Ferris and Becca Canziani
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St. Marinos and self-proclaimed saint Margery Kempe are in Saints’ Heaven. Joan of Arc arrives unannounced, direct from canonization. Newly sainted, Joan has some questions. Who gets to be a saint? Why is virginity so important? And how does cake taste so good?!
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Sound Play
by Rob Neill​
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a small collection of thoughts around hearing, sound, and memory, possibly activating the audience in various ways
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LEAD ARTIST BIOS
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VANESSA BELLEW (Jane the Quene) is a performer, a writer, a nerd, and a wayward daughter of the American South/Southwest. She now lives in Brooklyn, where she spends her time digging deep into stories of every kind to make or to discover those which are delicious to sing, say, and share.
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BROOKE FERRIS (she/her, Marinos or the Trans Saint Play) is an actress, singer, and clown. She has been seen by sold out audiences in her original solo show How to BDSM at PhysFest NYC 2024, directed and co-devised by Rachel Resnick. How to BDSM has also graced the stages of The Hot Festival at Dixon Place, the Brooklyn Art Haus, The Idiot’s Hour, and Pine Box Rock Shop. Brooke also co-produces Down To Clown, a monthly clown open mic and space for new works-in-progress the second Thursday of every month at the Pine Box Rock Shop. In addition to clowning, Brooke was delighted to be a part of Babel, a communal acrobatic theatrical dance piece off-Broadway at the 14th Street Y. She has performed solo cabaret at the Duplex in Brooke Ferris: On Fire, and with the 4-part harmony group Harmonic Proposal in Enjoy the Journey and I Can’t Even.
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LYNN HODEIB (she/her, Marinos or the Trans Saint Play) is a PhD candidate in the Theatre and Performance studies program at CUNY, theatre maker, musician and creative arts therapist from Beirut, now based in New York. Lynn has acted in, sound designed and managed theater productions between Beirut and New York. Her most recent work is the short play and work in progress, The Suicide, a multimedia performance staged at the Brick theatre. As a scholar, she explores the performance of transgenerational memory in Lebanon. She holds a BA in Psychology with a Minor in Theatre from the American University of Beirut, and a Masters in Drama Therapy from NYU.
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ROB NEIL (Sound Play) is a New York-based artist whose body of work includes avant-garde theatre, storytelling, Broadway, short film, and workshops in creativity. He is a founding member and current Artistic Director of the performance collective, the New York Neo-Futurists. His original pieces have been performed at such theaters as The Ontological, P.S., HERE, and The Public Theater. As an actor, he has performed in Broadway shows (“London Assurance,” “Peter and the Starcatcher” on tour), in London (“The Cherry Orchard”), and regionally (“You Never Can Tell"). He has taught a variety of performance and writing classes around the country, including at Brooklyn College, NYU, Hubbard Hall, Texas State, and URI. Rob studied at Grinnell College, LAMDA, and the Atlantic, and he has worked on a variety of commercials, TV shows, and independent films. Hopefully, you can find him online at robneill.com.
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ANIA UPSTILL (they/them, Marinos or the Trans Saint Play) is a queer and trans performer, educator, theatre maker and clown. They primarily create work under their company Butch Mermaid Productions, a transdisciplinary company whose mission is to make queer joy irresistible and contagious. With a keen interest in research and collaboration, they are a current PLAYA Arts and Science Resident Artist, a 2024 - 2025 Folger Shakespeare Library Artistic Fellow; part of The Orchard Project’s Greenhouse Lab 2023-24; and a Fellow with The Urban Field Station Collaborative Arts Residency 2022-23. Serious about joy, they have performed clown at Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center (RIP) and for Clowns Without Borders USA. Across all of their work, Ania strives to inspire curiosity, question dominant narratives, and incite meaningful change.
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TOSKA NEW YORK (Ivanov Workshop) @toskanewyork started as an artistic duo, Bito Boucher and Mya Rosado-Tran, creating new performance work at the intersection of theater and dance coming out of NYU Tisch. Together they have co-directed and devised The Seagullmachine (The Invitation Arts Collective) and The Rite of Spring (Green Oasis Community Garden), blending physical theater, modern dance working with others coming out of NYU.
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​THE ASSEMBLY is a multi-disciplinary collective of theater artists committed to realizing a visceral and intelligent theater through sustained collaboration. Founded in 2008, the company has created 11 original works, including IN CORPO (2023); SEAGULLMACHINE (2018); HOME/SICK, a NY Times and Backstage Critics' Pick ("a cutting edge young theater collective" -NY Times, 2011), revived in 2017 (JACK, Brooklyn); and I WILL LOOK FORWARD TO THIS LATER (2016), praised for its "boldly unhip sincerity" (NY Times). The Assembly has performed in such New York venues as Theatre Row, La MaMa ETC, The New Ohio, The Ontological Incubator, The Prelude Festival, HERE Arts Center, toured to the Edinburgh and Philadelphia Fringe Festivals and The Odyssey Theater in LA. From workshops to productions to post-performance discussions, The Assembly is dedicated to rooting its artists, audiences, and peers in a profound sense of community.
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Harpo's Salon is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.
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