Segal Center Film Festival on Theatre and Performance (FTP) 2022 is pleased to present individual submissions created under the digital initiative…
Theater in Quarantine
by Joshua William Gelb and Katie Rose McLaughlin
Country: United States | Language: English | Year Of Inception: 2020
About Theater in Quarantine
Theater in Quarantine is a Drama League Award-winning performance laboratory dedicated to the exploration of the live theatrical experience in the digital space. Established in response to the pandemic by Founder/Co-Creative Director Joshua William Gelb and Co-Creative Director Katie Rose McLaughlin, TiQ has live-streamed dozens of visually distinctive, original works to its YouTube channel, working out of a closet in the East Village that measures only 8 sq feet.
TiQ’s digital and hybrid programming spans genres and styles, including world premieres of new plays, new musicals, adaptations of classic texts, dance, and site-specific art installations. The accessibility of the digital form made it possible for Theater in Quarantine to reach audiences around the globe, with their viewership growing from just a handful to thousands. TiQ has been presented by The Invisible Dog, New Georges, Theater Mitu, CulturalDC, Ann Arbor Summer Festival, The New York Public Library, and was a 2021 artist in residence at LaMama and CultureHub’s Experiments in Digital Storytelling. Theater in Quarantine has been featured on NPR’s All Things Considered, Japan’s NHK Television, and has been profiled in The New Yorker and The New York Times. Within a single year Theater in Quarantine has been a four-time New York Times Critic’s Pick as well as one of Vulture’s “Top 10 Best Theater Moments of 2020” and the New York Times’ “Best Theater of 2021.”
“Our performance space is a closet. It measures four feet wide by eight feet tall, and is only two feet deep; eight square feet in total. It’s effectively the same aspect ratio as an iphone (9:16) and, like any of the digital conferencing boxes we’ve found ourselves navigating in this new age of remote work, this digital proscenium entraps our performer in an echo of the larger crisis of confinement that emerged in the early days of the COVID shutdown. Those formative weeks in lockdown, characterized by isolation and loneliness, spurred our first experiments in digital performance, and by continuing to hit our heads against the walls of what is possible, we have developed a practice that both embraces and aestheticizes the challenges presented by these creative, technical, and indeed literal limitations. We ask how this utilitarian container, so uncomfortably small, can become a stage for the imagination, harnessing technology to introduce new tools that expand our very concept of what’s theatrically possible.
Embracing 21st century solutions to the question of “what is “theatrical?” Theater in Quarantine integrates creative technology with the body in motion, finding tactility and dynamic physicality even in remote performance. We ask how it’s possible for a digital encounter to feel both intimate and immediate.
Our process was borne out of the desire to keep creating at a time when the theater industry was shut down and technology became not only a vital lifeline for this remote collaboration but an essential storytelling tool, whether it was using video processing to defy gravity or building a remote synchronous system to composite an entirely separate closet and performer from across town. Each new tool that was discovered became a jumping off point for a new story, a new point of view and a new way of connecting with our audiences.” – Joshua William Gelb & Katie Rose McLaughlin
Explore projects under Theater in Quarantine:
I AM SENDING YOU THE SACRED FACE
One Brief Musical Act with Mother Teresa by Heather Christian. An Expressionist Drag Performance in Triptych.
Presented by Theater In Quarantine and Theater Mitu’s Expansion Works
Written, Composed, and Recorded by Heather Christian
Directed and performed by Joshua William Gelb
Choreography and associate direction by Katie Rose McLaughlin
Drag Dramaturgy: Dito van Reigersberg
Scenography: Kristen Robinson
Video design: Stivo Arnoczy
Sound Design and Mixing: Ada Westfall
Make up by Jean Lu
Production Manager: Justin Nestor
Stage Manager: Ada Zhang
Social Media: Brian Bose
PR: Everyman Agency
Archived from the December 18, 2020 live performance
THE 7TH VOYAGE OF EGON TICHY
When space traveler Egon Tichy’s ship gets hit by a chunk of interstellar detritus, sending him careening into a minefield of time vortexes, a series of increasingly absurd events makes his chances of fixing things ever less likely.
Presented by Theater in Quarantine & Sinking Ship Productions
Based on The Star Diaries by Stanislaw Lem
Created by:
Director Jonathan Levin
Playwright Josh Luxenberg
Performer Joshua William Gelb
Music & Sound by Florian Staab
Scenic Design by Peiyi Wong
Video Design by Jesse Garrison
PR: Everyman Agency
Archived from the July 31, 2020 live performance
FOOTNOTE FOR THE END OF TIME
Time stops for a Jewish playwright sentenced to death during the Nazi occupation of Prague in this brand new retelling of Jorge Luis Borges’ classic short story The Secret Miracle, created for spoken word and chamber orchestra.
Presented by Theater in Quarantine
Created by Alex Weston, Jonathan Levin, and Joshua William Gelb
Music by Alex Weston
Text by Joshua William Gelb
Directed by Jonathan Levin
Movement by Katie Rose McLaughlin
Illustrations by Jesse Gelaznik
Clarinet – Rob Walker
Violin – Alex Weill
Cello – Susan Mandel
Piano – Alex Weston
Archived from the August 27, 2020 live performance
About Joshua William Gelb & Katie Rose McLaughlin
Joshua William Gelb (Founder/Co-Creative Director) is an East Village-based director, performer, and librettist. Prior to the pandemic, Gelb created both Jazz Singer and The Black Crook in residence at Abrons Arts Center, while his Drama Desk-nominated adaptation of A Hunger Artist, created with Sinking Ship, continues to tour. Gelb participated in the Lincoln Center Directors Lab, is an associate artist with Sinking Ship, teaches Theater Collaboration at Cooper Union, and is the associate director of Pig Pen’s Phantom Folktales on Virgin Voyages. www.joshuawilliamgelb.com
Katie Rose McLaughlin (Co-Creative Director) is an NYC-based choreographer and director for theater, opera, film, music videos and viral TikToks. She has the great pleasure of being the Associate Choreographer for the Tony Award- winning show HADESTOWN on Broadway, NYTW, Edmonton, South Korea, and the First National Tour. Her work has been presented by Ars Nova, Under the Radar, HERE Arts Center, Joe’s Pub, St. Anne’s Warehouse, Target Margin, BRIC, and Ensemble Studio Theatre among others. katierosemclaughlin.com
About The Festival
The Segal Center Film Festival on Theatre and Performance (FTP) is an annual event showcasing films drawn from the world of theatre and performance. The festival presents experimental, emerging, and established theatre artists and filmmakers from around the world to audiences and industry professionals. The 7th annual festival will focus on work for the screen created by theatre artists during the Time of Corona. The festival will be held digitally from March 1st – 15th 2022.
Explore projects created under Theater in Quarantine from March 1st to March 15th 2022 on the Segal Center Film Festival on Theatre and Performance (FTP) website.
Support this project by Joshua William Gelb & Katie Rose McLaughlin by making a direct donation to them at the following details: https://fundraising.fracturedatlas.org/jv-squad
Read more about Joshua William Gelb & Katie Rose McLaughlin and Theater in Quarantine at (https://www.theaterinquarantine.com) or get in touch at joshuawilliamgelb2@gmail.com / Instagram/Facebook/TiKTok/YouTube @theaterinquarantine / Twitter @joshua_w_gelb
For more visit:
NPR’S ALL THINGS CONSIDERED, February 18th, 2021
Theater In Quarantine: All The World’s A Stage, Including This Closet
https://www.npr.org/2021/02/18/969151120/theater-in-quarantine-all-the-worlds-a-stage-including-this-closet
THE NEW YORK TIMES, August 19th, 2021
He Invited Us Into His Closet for Theater. And It Was Astonishing. By Jesse Green
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/18/theater/joshua-william-gelb-theater-in-quarantine.html
THE NEW YORKER, December 28th, 2020
A One-Man Musical About Mother Teresa By Alexandra Schwartz
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/12/28/a-one-man-musical-about-mother-teresa
THE NEW YORK TIMES – Critic’s Pick, December 16th, 2020
Mother Teresa Sings, in Drag and with Doubts By Jesse Green
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/16/theater/heather-christian-joshua-william-gelb-review.html
THE NEW YORK TIMES – Critic’s Pick, July 31st, 2020
A Sci-Fi Classic Featuring a Multiverse of Stooges By Jesse Green
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/31/theater/the-7th-voyage-of-egon-tichy-review.html
