Coney Island Ritual Cabaret - Credit-NormanBlake4Opening the 2023 season at Coney Island USA!

Brooklyn, NY –– The 5th annual Coney Island Ritual Cabaret opens Coney Island USA's spectacular 2023 season! After cancelling in 2020 due to COVID, this festival finally marks International Culture Lab’s (ICL) 5th year of probing the fantastical blending of ritual and entertainment on Coney Island USA’s (CIUSA) Sideshows by the Seashore stage. Once again, ICL has assembled an array of performance artists, musicians, puppeteers, sideshow performers and (butoh) dancers, all of whom have been tasked with presenting original works that define “ritual cabaret” through the lens of their own particular aesthetic, discipline and lineage.

The history of the Coney Island Ritual Cabaret Festival is informed by dancer/ choreographer Tatsumi Hijikata who in the 1950’s originated a dance form he called "butoh" with his ensemble of burlesque dancers in an effort to defy and subvert authority, including conventional notions of dance, thereby seeking transformation – on the personal, societal and political level.

Inspired by this historical reference, in its call for proposals, ICL challenged artists to deconstruct and reinvent their particular art form, whatever it might be. We asked: If the goal is TRANSFORMATION – of the self, of society, of politics – what will it take to bring this about? Is it possible to invent a new genre? What is Ritual Cabaret to you?

Cabaret, burlesque, vaudeville, and circus sideshow have a long and storied history in Coney Island, and Coney’s rich legacy of amusement, community, and innovation make CIUSA the perfect venue to explore the intersection of ritual & entertainment.

Poster and set design by Si Golraine

PERFORMER LINEUP: 

FRIDAY, March 31
Omer Gal of Cookie Tongue
Jonathan Kopp
Jacquelyn Marie Shannon
SisterDada
Suidae 
PNK VLVT WTCH
Durational performance by Dimitri Saari

SATURDAY, APRIL 1
Wharton Tract
Sprankles
Amazing Amy
Mistral Hay
Ama Diver
Aida Miro & Ken Arii
Durational performance by Dimitri Saari

SUNDAY, APRIL 2
Si Golraine Ensemble
Erika Hassan & Bob Lyness
Celeste Hastings "The Butoh Rockettes"
Obsidian Absurd
Alter Kacker Rocker Amos
John D'Aquino
Durational performance by Dimitri Saari

FULL PERFORMER BIOS HERE

WHEN:
March 31 & April 1 ::  8pm
April 2 ::  2pm 

WHERE:
Coney Island USA,
1208 Surf Avenue, Brooklyn

TICKETS:
$20 per night

To purchase tickets, CLICK HERE

FOR HIGH RES PHOTOS, CLICK HERE

PROMOTIONAL YOUTUBE VIDEO, CLICK HERE

( Appropriate for 18+ )


ABOUT:

International Culture Lab (Nick Fracaro and Gabriele Schafer, Artistic Directors) is a 42-year-old performing arts company renowned for its earlier history as Thieves Theatre. ICL interrogated the role of the Other in contemporary society with a series of controversial landmark productions: 1982 -- Marat/Sade, together with On Our Own, a group of anti-psychiatry former mental patients; 1987 -- the world-premiere of Fassbinder's highly controversial and "unproduceable" Trash, the City, and Death; and 1990-93 -The Hill (see book published by Autonomedia) for which the company’s directors erected a full-sized replica of a Lakota tipi and lived/worked for three years in the Manhattan's oldest shantytown. Follow the podcast being produced by Untamed River Media & Productions. For ICL's international collaborations in Turkey, Germany, Republic of Georgia, etc., visit intlculturelab.org.

See ICL's YouTube channel for a playlist of 2019's [4th annual festival] stellar acts, including a documentary about the 2018 Festival (teaser here).

Coney Island USA exists to defend the honor of American popular culture through innovative exhibitions and performances. Presenting and producing exciting new works, the organization’s approach is rooted in mass culture and the traditions of P.T. Barnum, dime museums, burlesque, circus sideshows, vaudeville, and Coney Island itself. Serving both New York City and an international community that includes visitors to Coney Island and enthusiasts of various cultural forms, Coney Island USA's signature activities include the Mermaid Parade, the Coney Island Circus Sideshow, the Coney Island Museum, and new theatrical work. coneyisland.com

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Contact:
Gabriele Schafer
917-202-6060 / festival@intlculturelab.org