Press Info: Peg-Ass-Us

FOR IMMEDIATE RELASE - July 30th, 2008

Contact: Sophie Nimmannit, sophie [at] packofothers [dot] org, 718-610-9447
Press Photos at end of page

Sexuality Out of the Box: Fringe At the Center for Sex & Culture

(Brooklyn, NY) The Center for Sex and Culture plays host this year to two fringe shows that bring friendly faces to two much-feared and oft-ignored sexual phenomenons: bisexuals and assholes.

FLUID is a one-woman show created and performed by Brooklyn theater artist Erika Kate MacDonald that gently dissolves the restrictions of binary thinking about gender and attraction, and presents a grounded, nuanced look at “bi”sexuality. Peg–Ass–Us is a theatrical burlesque all about pegging, the sexual act where a woman wearing a strap-on dildo penetrates a man’s anus. This awkward topic is given glitter and heart by real-life couple John Leo and Sophie Nimmannit, also from Brooklyn. The three artists collaborate as part of the theater company Pack of Others, which did not win a regular fringe spot this year for Peg-Ass-Us and so courted a wondrously appropriate “non-traditional” host for the show in the Center for Sex and Culture. The center, which won Best of the Bay "Best Sex Education Resource" in 2008, is a community-based sex education non-profit offering lectures, classes, workshops, salons and discussion groups, plus readings, book parties, theater and other cultural events pertaining to sexuality. CSC is directed Dr. Carol Queen, a writer and cultural sexologist with a doctorate of education in human sexuality, and a staff sexologist at Good Vibrations. This is the first time CSC will host a fringe show, and as arrangements were made for Peg-Ass-Us, the artists decided that the shared themes of their shows – desires that play outside “straight-or-gay” lines – would make an exciting pair. FLUID and Peg-Ass-Us will appear on alternating nights at the Center for Sex and Culture during this year's festival, with two nights that include both shows in a sexy double-header. Fringe audiences will enjoy conversational theater - accessible to self-identified straight and queer audiences - designed to entertain, inform, and encourage honest discussion. Both are recommended as excellent date shows.

“Smart, funny, emotionally honest,” “entertaining and challenging,” FLUID is, at its heart, a ever-spiraling coming-out story by “charming, playful, and, yes, sexy” star Erika Kate MacDonald, told through a mixture of adept personal storytelling, shockingly entertaining mathematical and linguistic lectures, rousing original rap songs, and sassy multi-character confrontations. The show challenges biphobia – fear or mistrust of any sexual orientation which is not either strictly heterosexual or strictly homosexual – standing in contrast to the world of TV, film, songs, and everyday conversations where fluid sexualities are regularly fetishized, demonized or, worst of all, ignored or dismissed. Last summer's Boulder and Minnesota Fringe audiences hailed it as "Raw and exposed … and hilarious all at once. If you’ve ever questioned, or even unknowingly questioned, Erika will strike a chord." "I felt like I was there with Erika on her journey through what it means to be a person in this world. Definitely a conversation piece. Hilarious and touching." FLUID has toured to the Minnesota and Boulder Fringe Festivals, Portland, OR, New York City, Wheaton College, and BECAUSE '08, the Midwest Conference on Bisexuality in Minneapolis, MN. In October, it will have its Canadian premiere at Harvest V, the Montreal LGBT International Theatre Festival.

In Peg–Ass–Us, the charming duo, Sophie and John, set out to spread the word about the pleasures of prostate stimulation and strap-on sex, or “pegging,” the term which, in 2001, won a reader-based sex-act-naming competition held by Dan Savage of the popular sex advice column “Savage Love.” As they explore this “fetish,” the two butt heads over whether to present pegging as good, clean, straight fun, or as a revolutionary act that could destroy either-or binary thinking of gender and sexuality. They wrangle over issues of identity and desire, trying to celebrate the silly and the serious, kink with dignity, and manage to build their own honest-to-goodness sweet love story while teaching anal sex. Armed with original songs (accompanied by banjo-uke and glockenspiel), dance, puppetry, physical comedy and audience participation, the two lovers turn their bedroom and hearts inside out for the world to see. And take off their clothes.

Peg–Ass–Us premiered at the Montreal Fringe in June 2008, where the Fringe Buzz said: “Kind of like the sex ed you wish you'd had in high school!” “Hilarious, totally shameless in a good way.” “An awesome exploration of how it feels to prefer sexual activities that are perceived to be outside of the norm.” In July, it was part of the HOT! Festival of Queer Culture hosted by Dixon Place in New York City. Peg-Ass-Us is particularly excited to be at the Center for Sex and Culture, as director Dr. Carol Queen was featured as an instructor and star of the Bend Over Boyfriend video series about female-to-male anal sex. Bend Over Boyfriend has been one of the best-selling videos at Good Vibrations. (**Peg-Ass-Us contains nudity and sexually explicit content.)

PERFORMER BIOS:
Erika Kate MacDonald earned her B.A. in Theater at Yale University, and is a New York- and New Hampshire-based theater artist, professional yoga teacher, and budding rap star. FLUID is her second full-length solo show, after Voting Rites: An Exploration of NH Women’s Attitudes Towards Voting (2004), and she is in the beginning stages of developing her third show, an interview-based piece exploring the ways her generation thinks about sexually transmitted infections.

John Leo studied dance at Bard College and is a graduate of the Dell ‘Arte School of Physical Theatre. For seven years (2001-2007) he lived in Juneau, Alaska performing/creating with Perseverance Theatre, Kitschy Yum-Yum Burlesque and Wild Rumpus Clown Theatre (Best of San Francisco Fringe 2003). Mr. Leo has toured his solo clown work throughout Mexico, Canada and the ‘Lower 48’ and has received funding from the Alaska State Council on the Arts and the Rasmuson Foundation. Mr. Leo is currently a member of the Big Apple Circus Clown Care Unit, as a Pediatric Clown in NYC area hospitals. He is also performing in the San Francisco Fringe Festival with his solo clown show Number's Up!”

Sophie Nimmannit received her B.A. in Theater at Yale, and has trained in mask, clown, Suzuki and other forms of physical theater. She has toured with the International Theatre Collective (St. Louis), the LIDA Project (Denver). She directed FLUID and currently appears as campaign manager for VOTE DEBS in '08, a theatrical presidential campaign alternative. She performs in NYC as a member of the South Wing and East Third Ensemble.

The Center for Sex & Culture, incorporated in 2000 and born of a conversation between masturbation advocate Betty Dodson and CSC founders Carol Queen and Robert Lawrence in 1994, is a community-based sex education non-profit offering lectures, classes, workshops, salons and discussion groups, plus readings, book parties, theater and other cultural events pertaining to sexuality. These are aimed at adults of all genders, orientations, and sex-and-relationship preferences. It maintains a sex library and archive, hosting interns and utilizing the energies of community volunteers. Other groups with a sex-and-culture focus utilize CSC’s space and add to its educational offerings. CSC maintains an events calendar and a twice-monthly email list, both of which are accessible at its website, http://www.sexandculture.org. CSC is a two-time Best of the Bay winner, "Best Emerging Sex Non-Profit" in 2005 and "Best Sex Education Resource" in 2008. SF Weekly named CSC the "Best Place to Watch Porn and Still Feel Like an Intellectual."

PHOTOS: Right-click to download hi-resolution versions.

FLUID photo features Erika Kate MacDonald. Photo Credit: Sarah E. Mayer.

Peg-Ass-Us photo features (l to r) John Leo & Sophie Nimmannit. Photo Credit: Louis Longpré.

PDF Press Release: Press Release, San Francisco.

San Francisco Fringe Festival Press Release, 5/10/08: "San Francisco Fringe Festival Adds 15 More Shows, Creating Largest Offering in Years"

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