An Evening with Melba Phelps Belk
| Open: 12/18/09 Close: 12/20/09
James D’Entremont’s An Evening with Melba Phelps Belk is a 90-minute evisceration of the Christian Right, with musical respites by Barry Oremland. The play targets Christian celebrity culture, religious merchandising, the role of Endtime prophecy in American politics, and -- as sales of Sarah Palin's Going Rogue surge heavenward -- the entire Palin clan. Christine Donnelly, Richard Sheinmel and Nomi Tichman perform this new work under David Vining's direction at the East Village art space A Gathering of the Tribes for three nights in December.An Evening with Melba Phelps Belk is the perfect counterpoint to the antics of Glenn Beck and the exploding popularity of reactionary movements like the Tea Party Patriots. Melba Belk (Christine Donnelly), is a televangelist, a best-selling Christian author, and one of Alaska’s former governor's closest friends. The play depicts a lecture she delivers in a church basement a week before Christmas. Hilarious though she is, Melba lays out in chilling detail the twisted dogma of the Endtimers, whose God is, you had better believe it, a vengeful, punishing God.
Little Girls Have Heart Attacks
| Open: 07/17/08 Close: 07/19/08
What traumas of childhood are carried into adulthood? In this multi-character piece, a woman of varying ages looks at the mental and physical prison of her life. Little Girls Have Heart Attacks tells the story of a little girl, who at various ages has been neglected and mistreated. Playing over a dozen characters, the little girl tries to realize why she is the way she is, why she is stuck in a prison she can't get out of, and why her heart can't breathe. Little Girls Have Heart Attacks invites audiences to return to their childhood. In this piece, the audience will not play the traditional role of sitting back and watching. Set in an intimate space, the piece will need the audience's participation for the little girl to tell her story. The audience is encouraged to move around the space and play with the child and her toys. Little Girls Have Heart Attacks is an audience interactive piece in which the little girl cannot tell her story without the audience's help. With every audience, the piece can change