The Cohen New Works Festival presented by the University Co-op features many exciting projects this season, four of which directly engage ability. Please see the Festival schedule for the times and venues of the events listed below:
Colossal
“Colossal” is an epic theatrical event. Featuring a twenty-person ensemble, dancing, and a drum corps, its plot centers on a University of Texas football player, struggling to move forward in the wake of a catastrophic spinal injury. A play about love, ability, and extraordinary feats of strength, Colossal is both a celebration and critical examination of our nation’s most popular form of theater.
The Lavender and the Letter
Meet LETTER who speaks for SARAH, a student with a disability, at the University of Blah Blah Blah. Follow LETTER and SARAH to engage in a conversation surrounding how the ADA (Americans with Disabilities) Act, 39 years after its creation, still affects many in the world today.
The Only Living Boy in New York
A play about a hermitic synesthete named Henry who is dealing with the recent loss of his mother by closing himself off from his father and the city until a mysterious girl named Peter enters his cramped Brooklyn apartment and scrambles his perceptions of the world.
The Way You Move Your Body
This dance/theatre piece exposes and dissolves disability prejudices. Abled and disabled dancers guide the audience from the world of outcasts to a world where difference is celebrated. It is an unsettling but eye-opening journey, leaving the audience cringing, laughing, crying, smiling, and questioning the way we conventionally perceive differently-abled people.
“Ability in Performance” [Facebook event]
The goal of the Plug-Ins – crafted by the Engaging Research Subcommittee of the Cohen New Works Festival presented by the University Co-Op – are to craft accessible spaces within the NWF for critical inquiry, collaborations across degrees, disciplines, the campus, and the wider Austin community, and reflection around the themes, practices, and projects of the Festival.
This Plug-In, in particular, will feature collaborators and mentors from projects within the Festival which directly engage representations of disabilities:
>”Colossal”
**playwright Andrew Hinderaker
**performer Michael Patrick Thronton (also a NWF Guest Artist)
>”The Lavender and the Letter”
**playwright and director Rebecca Goldstein
**dramaturg James McMaster
**mentor/advisor Emily Shryock (Disabilities Services Coordinator at UT)
>”The Only Living Boy in New York”
**playwright and director Haley Anderson
**dramaturg Selina Rosales
>”The Way You Move Your Body”
**choreographer and project lead Lucy Kerr
**performers and community members Susie Angel, Juan Munoz, Jamie Schanbaum, and Tanya Winters
It will take place on Tuesday, March 26 from 11:30a-1p and be facilitated by Stephanie Rosen, a doctoral student in English at The University of Texas at Austin.
All of these events are free, but ticketed; while the online ticket reservation period is over, there will be tickets available at the door. We recommend arriving 30-60 minutes before the event if you do not have a reserved seat. If you do have a reserved seat, be sure to arrive more than 15 minutes before the event, as that is when reserved seats may be released. For more information visit:
The Cohen New Works Festival