A group of criminals are stuck in an uncanny, purgatory-like hospital complete with tiny boxes of apple juice, unlabeled vibrant bags of liquid, and slightly Mephistophelian Nurses, reminiscent of The Three Sisters and Fates. Our story focuses on Nancy, a woman plunging into the depths and boundaries of the feminine propensity for violence. Though her boyfriend introduces her to the cathartic ways of destruction, she’ll go even further with a feminine lens of brutality. Join Nancy in her discovery of evils, self-love, and broken bones. A splendid nightmare that evokes both the body horror of David Cronenberg and the mysticism of the Twilight Zone, the piece asks the audience to empathize with the lowest of society and find humor and beauty in the impermanence of the body and physical pain. Drawing from Artaud’s principles in The Theater of Cruelty, the piece utilizes intense physicality and movement and expects the audience to dwell in discomfort.

After a sold-out staged reading and many months of workshopping, we are working towards a fully produced staging of the play with our original company of actors. We are aiming to raise 6k to cover production costs and provide stipends for our actors, designers, and production team. 

Budget Breakdown
~$3,000 for all stipends ($300 for an ensemble of 10 emerging artists) 

~$1,000 for rehearsal  and performance space rentals

~$2,000 for productions costs (costumes, set, props, etc)

Nurse- Donate $25 and receive a special shoutout on our social media.

Physicians Assistant- Donate $50 and receive a special shoutout on our social media as well as a thank you video from our cast and production team.

Doctor- Donate $100 and receive a special shoutout on our social media, a personalized thank you video from our cast and production team, and a handwritten thank you note from our team (limited availability).

Surgeon- Donate $200 or more and receive a shoutout on social media, a personalized thank you video, a handwritten thank you note from our team, AND special reserved seats at the production (limited availability). 

Craig Perkins (Playwright and Artistic Director)
Craig moved to New York City ages ago because of the lack of jazz and opera in Omaha. He studied Creative Writing at the University of Nebraska, and has written and directed for HB Studio. Craig studied acting as well, with Sandy Dennis and Bill Hickey. He loves actors and finds it exciting to write blueprints for their creative work.  He founded Engage Playwrights Lab last year and really cemented it April of 2021 with membership at A.R.T-New York. He also writes poetry on occasion, and is heavily influenced by the writing of Brecht, Beckett, Chaikin, and Maria Irene Fornes.

Lauren Komer (Director)
Lauren is a director and theater artist based in New York. A majority of Komer’s work explores the convergence of theater, film, and interactive media. Komer is obsessed with deviancy, disgust, and the dark urges that lay in wait within the psyche. She rejects linear, naturalistic storytelling and embraces highly visual, fragmented, and referential narratives. Her work is steeped in pop culture, eroticism, mysticism, and postmodernism. Komer insists the best kind of theater is like eating a raw steak: it should be chewy, bloody, animalistic, and oddly addictive. Above all, Komer strives to dissect internalized misogyny and the inherited trauma of the modern woman. Her work has appeared in NYC, Boston, and internationally in Europe and the U.K. She is a Theater Arts Fellow of Brandeis University (B.A. Theater Arts with Highest Honors). Komer also studied playwriting, theater theory, and film studies at St. Catherine’s College, Oxford University.  

Amy Ollove (Production Manager)
Amy is an actress and stage manager recently based in NYC.  Some of Amy’s favorite roles include Narrator (Every Brilliant Thing), Grandma (American Dream), and various fool characters in her award-winning thesis Foolish Sanity, including Fleabag and King Lear’s Fool. In addition to taking the stage, Amy is working behind the scenes as Production Manager. Amy has stage managed numerous musicals and plays throughout the east coast, most recently in Gallery Player’s production of Fences, and has worked as a production manager, most notably at her alma mater’s theater, Brandeis University.