Larval masks are based on traditional masks used in Basel, Switzerland during the mid-winter festival. Larval (or Basel) masks are used to represent characters in “the state of becoming”. Like their namesake “larvae,” they represent humans that are not yet fully-formed. Larval Mask performers have a simple way of moving through the world and represent people at their most curious and most vulnerable. Larval Mask as a style of theatre is poetic, haunting, non-verbal, and accessible to audiences regardless of language or literacy.
The Collective is developing a 60-minute play about displacement and migration, performed in Larval masks, to be collaboratively developed in rehearsals with a writer.
BACKGROUND
According to the UN, in 2021 there were 89.3 million people worldwide who had been forcibly displaced as a result of persecution, conflict, violence, human rights violations, or events seriously disturbing public order. Moved by the urgency to humanize the faces of the displaced and understand the migrant experience, each member of the collective also comes to the project with a personal connection. Some are immigrants. Some work with migrants and displaced people. Some have family who were immigrants. All are seeking to create a piece of theater that transcends borders and language to find the shared humanity in the displacement and migration experience.
Larval Mask was a natural choice for this work. The otherworldly quality of the masks plunges the audience into the unsettling experience of being alone in a new land. The masks also allow the unfolding of an intimate, individual immigrant experience without ever settling on a specific person, time, or place, so the story can transcend nationality and culture. The nonverbal communication in Larval Mask ignites imagination and engages the audience in acts of interpretation, making the storytelling a collaborative experience.
THE COLLECTIVE
Megan Campisi (she/her) (writer) is a playwright, novelist, and teacher. Her plays have been performed in China, France, and the United States. From 2005 to 2015 she co-directed and performed with Gold No Trade, a physical theater company that devised original plays (last seen at NACL in 2013). In 2019 she received a Fulbright Specialist award to give master classes in Lecoq at Tatbikat Theatre in Ankara, Turkey. Her last play, Malus domestica, was long-listed for the Synecdoche Prize. Her first novel, Sin Eater, received the Debut Crown award from the Historical Writers’ Association in 2021. She attended Yale University (BA) and the École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq (MFA) and trained at RADA (Shakespeare) and with Antonio Fava (Commedia dell'Arte). She is current faculty in Physical Theater at the Neighborhood Playhouse conservatory in NYC and has taught at Yale University and the Shanghai Theatre Academy. Originally from the San Francisco Bay Area, Megan lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her family. www.megancampisi.com
Julia Cavagna (performer) is an Argentinean born, Brooklyn based, actress, director and dramaturge. She studied Sociology and Classical and Physical Theater. She has a BA in Drama from EMAD, Buenos Aires, and has trained with different mentors (Belisario and Movement Theater Studio). Her work is in the frontier of movement, site-specific, classical, and contemporary theater and film. She was selected to be part of Patrice Chéreau’s Elektra (2016) and Simon Mcburney’s Die Zauberflote (2023) both at the Metropolitan Opera. She is a proud performer and collaborator in Solitary (Habermann-Cooper) presented at the Fringe Festival, Edinburgh ’19. As a director, she has released: O.Y.A., Sentimiento González is da Bomb! (Undiscovered Countries, Boog City), MALALA (selected at NYC Indie Theatre Film Festival ‘21) and Prácticas Materiales (Undiscovered Countries Incubator ’20, recipient of JACK Artist Residency at Governors Island ’21, recipient of City Artist Corps Grants ’21). She is a new member of Broken Box Theater Company. International appearances include: Argentina, Puerto Rico, Brasil, Thailand, Japan, Scotland, South Australia, and Spain. She is co-founder of: Lampazo Group, Las Pibas Theater Company, and THEATER TO THE PEOPLE (awarded with the 2019 and 2021 BAC Grant and 2020 Town Stages Fellowship). www.juliacavagna.online www.theatertothepeople.com
Jay Dunn (performer) is an actor, director, and choreographer based in Brooklyn, NY. He has worked as an actor Off-Broadway, Off-Off-Broadway, regionally, and internationally with companies including the LA Philharmonic & Simon McBurney, Pig Iron Theatre Company, rainpan43, Geoff Sobelle & Charlotte Ford, PTP/NYC & Project Y, U.S. theaters including Atlantic Stage 2, Arena Stage, Folger Theatre, Woolly Mammoth Theatre, MCA Theatre and international venues such as The Barbican, Edinburgh Fringe and Paris’s Maison des Metallos. As a director/choreographer, selected credits include Music at the Close at Carnegie Hall, the world premiere of Spoolie Girl Off-Broadway, Village of Vale at Lincoln Center Education, and a developmental libretto reading of Rev 23 with White Snake Projects/Beth Morrison Projects. Jay’s on screen work can be seen in feature films The Harbinger, We Go On, Ex-Girlfriends, and as a motion capture performer in Red Dead Redemption 2. Jay is a graduate of L’Ecole Jacques Lecoq and currently teaches acting, movement, commedia and physical comedy in NYC at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts and SUNY Purchase BFA. www.jaydunn.co
Blake Habermann (performer) is a performer, director, and educator working in NYC. Recent projects include performing as Pierrot in Ariadne Auf Naxos at the Metropolitan Opera and composing, writing, and producing as part of the indie music duo Arga Reath. Blake attended NYU’s Experimental Theater Wing and completed L’Ecole Internationale de Theatre Jacques Lecoq.
Samantha Herrera (she/her) (performer) is a Filipina actor, director, and filmmaker from Queens, NY. She last directed a one-woman show, Woman/Mujer, at The Brick Aux and El Nogalar by Tanya Saracho at The Broom Tree Theater. Her last performance was a successful run of Native Gardens by Mexican playwright Karen Zacarias at The Hampton Theater Company. While attending Hunter College, she helped spearhead the MFA playwriting festival with playwrights-in-residence, Annie Baker and Branden Jacobs-Jenkins. Currently she is on the faculty of The Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theater as a Stage Combat Assistant and Admissions Representative. She is also yoga certified and presently teaches to the joyful elders in her hometown in NYC.
Joanie Hofmeyr (composer/performer) South African-born Joanie received a Bachelor of Music in Voice from The Juilliard School. Highlights from her classical, contemporary classical, and experimental music career include performing at London's Holland Park and the Royal Opera of Versailles with Juilliard's 2019 production of Purcell's Dido and Aeneas, portraying Flora and Puck respectively in two beloved Britten operas that same year, and the world premiere of the devised piece, Solitary, at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival which featured original live vocals by Joanie. Most recently she scored Broken Box Mime Theater's original performance at BRIC Brooklyn. Since 2018 she has been co-writing and co-producing original ethereal pop music as Arga Reath. Her experience as an immigrant in the U.S. provides a deep well of material from which she draws inspiration for her songwriting. While her next album is in development, she sings with the Lehman College and Community Chorus in the Bronx as an alto singer, and has a section leader position at the Presbyterian Church of Tenafly.
Brendan McMahon (performer) is a theatre artist, actor, director, and teacher. He is an Assistant Professor of Theatre Performance, specializing in Movement and Theatre Devising at the Oregon Center for the Arts at Southern Oregon University in Ashland. As a performer he has worked at theaters such as Lincoln Center, The Shakespeare Theatre in Washington DC, The Kennedy Center, The Public Theatre, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Asolo Rep, and with companies such as Mabou Mines, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Basil Twist’s Dream Music Puppetry, and many others. As a director, movement director, mask director, and fight choreographer, he has worked on Off-Broadway, academic, touring, and film productions, and at New York City theatres including the Brooklyn Academy of Music, The Culture Project, and Theatre Row. Most recently he directed The Servant of Two Masters at the Oregon Center for the Arts. Upcoming projects include Movement Directing for New York Classical Theatre’s upcoming production of Richard III, and directing Patrick Barlow’s A Christmas Carol at Collaborative Theatre Project in Medford, OR. www.brendanmcmahon.org
Malcolm Opoku (performer) is a 2016 graduate of the Neighborhood Playhouse School of The Theatre (NY), was born and raised in Accra, Ghana, and holds a BA from Queens University of Charlotte in International Studies and African Politics. Malcolm is passionate about work that challenges biases, illuminates identity, confronts power structures and holds a mirror up to nature. Recent credits include: Marat/Sade (The Theatre at Shapiro), As You Like It (Lenfest Center for The Arts), Black Hollow (Alchemical Studios), A Stitch Here Or There (The Playwright’s Loft), Ruined (Heights Players), Solitary (Edinburgh Fringe Festival).