Final vlog: Cara gives FREE STONING at Union Square

Last few performances of (un)afraid

Tonight and tomorrow night are you LAST CHANCES to check out (un)afraid. See the show critics call

"a bold stab at all that scares."-nytheatre.com

"stimulating and dynamic performance art and theatre."-Happiest Medium

before it passes you like a midnight ghost train on a ghost bridge over a ghost lake in spirit country.

Here is a star-studded list of the remaining spirits we will be calling each show:

11/05 early-Mary Shelley
11/05 late-Alfred Hitchcock
11/06 early-Edgar Allen Poe
11/06 late-John the Baptist (author of the Book of Revelations!)

Get your tickets!:

https://www.ovationtix.com/trs/pr/777585

Sounds of Fear

Christopher Loar, Sound Designer for (un)afraid and Ensemble Member of NYNF

So today I have been sitting in my cozy little chair with my headphones on, testing an re-editing sounds, drinking coffee, eating, and enjoying the fact that I have no cell phone reception down here.

For once, I am offstage, in the land of the sitting down and the watching and the taking notes. And it's enjoyable! I don't have to wear no costume! I don't have to learn no lines!

But I do have to make and tweak and tinker with sound. Which means my ears have been in headphones more than they usually are, which is a lot.

The Living Theater is a beautiful space. One feels so removed when descending into the space. I could live down here. People do, in fact.

Other than Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind, I've never designed sound for theater before. I love sound and I love making it. And Ableton Live is a dream of a program to work with.

The sounds I make for my plays in TML are indeed often strange, but never I have been called upon to compose such strange things, such as:

"I need a cat going into a grinder . . . a machine . . . a machine grinder . . . going into nuns"

or

"Sex into death. Porno sex into total murder."

or


"white noise. And Blue noise. Lots of white and blue noise."

What can I say about this show? This was the first "run thru" of the show I've seen, and true to the Neo aesthetic of Chance, Change and Chaos, the order of pieces is random (like tml) only it's determined by a ouija board, or more accurately, a ouija board possessed by a different spirit every night.

I must admit I was skeptical. But I think it works! It leaves me wanting more.

And for a show looking at fear, there is much comedy. Much funny. Much fun.

Gets me thinking about the nature of fear and the thin line between all our feelings.

HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM.


Well, it's time for pizza.

A long day at the theater

(un)afraid has descended into the Living Theater!
Life is beautiful and challenging
as we build the insanity of the (un)show.
So we open in just a few days and are putting the finishing touches on things and initial touches on other things as well.
We are rolling out the carpet and turning down the lights, join us, join us if you dare...

From (un)afraid's "minion" Nicole: A four letter word that starts with "F"

In the last few weeks, the word 'fear' has taken a front & center seat in my life. The reason for this is because I'm in this wonderfully amazing show called (un)afraid with the New York Neo-Futurists. The show is about fear but I will reference the amazing creators of this show as they have explained it a bit more elegantly than I: "(un)afraid is an exploration of the concept, causes and consequences of our greatest fears, individually and as a society." Each show Jill, Dan, Cara & Ricky will explain, embrace & confront many different types of fear. I applaud them for what they are doing. Fear, especially personal fear, is not an easy thing to grasp or wrangle with or even talk about.

Fear is a pretty powerful word and emotion. At some point (or at several hundred) in our lives, we have felt it, possibly faced it or dealt with it, ran away from it and maybe even just laughed in its face.

I don't easily get scared, save for the occasional startle or random unknown occurrence, but I consider that nothing more than being scared. Fear is much more powerful. When someone fears something, that person has a much deeper emotional attachment to whatever it is they fear. Fears are based on belief. You can not tell a person their fears are unwarranted, much like you can not tell a person that there is no Santa Claus or Heaven or Loch Ness monster...if they believe it exists. There are common and shared fears in our nation and throughout the world, but fears are always personal, almost private in a way. Because of this, I don't believe fears are easily overcome because most stem from an experience/setting/person that triggers a part of your soul. That moment, that trigger, is what stays with you and keeps you believing in that fear - that harm or ill-will or death or whatever will come your way from whatever it is you fear. Because of this, people don't ever want to face or challenge their fears because, to a fearful person, THAT is worse than death. And that is why fears will always be with us. That's is what keeps fear alive.

I don't fear many things - just the usual fears of failure, embarrassment & humiliation, a slight fear of drowning, a much stronger fear of reality television and a fear of anything that the ghostbusters can't kill. But these ''fears'', except for the ghostbusters one, I consider to be more like obstacles and self-improvement type things that I could maybe work on and overcome. Maybe. They aren't things I fear...well the drowning one I sort of do... I just get frightened, scared, or find them completely intolerable.

I think the one thing I truly fear is people. Just like fear, people are unpredictable and unknowing. You never know what they will do or say or not do or not say. People can hurt you, physically, mentally & emotionally. Most people can't be trusted. Look at the state of our world. Yes, there are good people and good things being done & said but I can't help but dwell on the recent horrific events resulting in all the suicides & bullying all because of people's sexual orientation. Or the fact that 2 guys starting fighting over their dogs and one stabbed the other to death. Or that people abuse animals and the elderly & throw babies in trash cans. Those are people I fear. Because they are the people I have to share the planet with.

Fear. It's just like people. You never know what will be just around that corner...a baby in a trash can?

(un)afraid vlog #2

"Be afraid. Be very afraid… of your sweet Mexican grandmother’s house," by Ricardo Gamboa

An exploration of fear a la Neo-Futurists, “(un)afraid” required I explore the sources of my own fears. Some of them recent and irrational and others, understandably deeply rooted. Some fears of my early years surprisingly led me to my grandmother, my father’s mom.

The notion of the benevolent matriarch in Latin American culture is widely known and documented in some of the culture’s seminal literary works such as Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s “One Hundred Years of Solitude.” Latin American matriarchs are symbols of compassion, perseverance, and wisdom. My grandmother, Clementina Gonzalez Gamboa, is no exception.
She is an amazing woman who has survived the hardships most immigrants endure, raised ten children on Chicago’s gritty Southside, and has been a figure of warmth for me and my over thirty cousins. She hasn’t lost any skill with the nostalgic practices of our family: Making pozole for birthdays, tamales at Christmas, and feeding you the minute you walk into her home. She is small, rotund, and adorable—like a brown hobbit. If I could, I would love to just pick her up and put her in the man-bag I wear to work and feed her Jell-O. I mean, c’mon…

Don’chu jus’ wanna put her in your murse and feed her Jell-O?

Me and my cousins loved going to her house and hated leaving. We would pretend to be asleep and when that failed we would throw ridiculous temper tantrums. Mine were among the worst: I would cry, scream and tell my parents how much I hate them until one of them said, “C’mon kid, get up or I’m gonna kick your ass.” An ultimatum which usually resulted in me getting my brown ass kicked and dragged to the car back home.

What’s funny is although my grandmother’s house was an urban sanctuary no doubt, when I think about some of the first times I’ve felt afraid, it was there in that house…. I blame her—I mean it’s not her fault. It’s cultural. I have talked to a lot of other Mexican kids with the same cuddly Hobbit-like Mexican grandmother’s and all of them agree—Mexican abuelas have some freaky ass taste! F’real…. During the nights my temper tantrums were successful and I was able to sleep over, when it was time to go to bed, I would start regretting that shit all crazy because that house… That house became freakier than a mutha’fucka. Like if her house at night was walking down the same side of the street as me, I would cross as fast as I can to the other side of the street away from that bitch like it was a two headed rapist. You see, my grandmother, like many Mexican grandmother’s never question the freaky factor of their decorative choices. So populating her home were things like this:

Crucifixes all up in the bedrooms:

Religious paintings in bathrooms looming over the toilet making you pee all over the seat after midnight:

And throughout the 80’s, a handful of porcelain cats staring at you, staring at them lit only by the moonlight:

And other irrelevant porcelain figurines:

                        

And, something I could never understand, random Happy Meal toys on furniture:

Imagine any of these things staring down a four year old you past midnight. I know my grandmother never meant any harm with any of this. It wasn't until I was 16 that she renovated her house and all figurines became porcelain cows--cow canister, cow salt and pepper shakers, etc. She misses the ranch she grew up on. However, the crucifixes and cautionary paintings are still there, everywhere. They still freak me out. And if I were working in the Marketing Department for the Catholic Church I would suggest they revisit those bloody depictions if they want to increase their waning attendance. Seriously, if I have a choice to spend my Sunday having brunch with an alcohol of my choosing or staring at The Savior pinned up all crazy to the cross in agonizing pain and all bloody, guess what I'm gonna pick... Guess...

If my grandmother were to read this she would tell me, "Dios te va a castigar!" Translated: "God is going to punish you!" Every kid with a brown cuddly Hobbit-like Mexican grandmother knows that line too. I don't know about them, but that doesn't scare me anymore.