This Emancipation Thing
“‘This Emancipation Thing’ by Sara Lyons […] was everything I could’ve imagined and more. It created a safe space for conversations about gender and opened you up to new connections with the talent and fellow audience members.”
“There is so much here. Heartfelt moments of honesty from the performers, the audience, the history -– the room is rich in experience, sharing. There is more to appreciate here than possible in our short time together…”
“A truly remarkable artistic research experiment crafted for the stage.”
One & Only
“A good first date.”
-Jess Barbagallo for Movement Research Performance Journal [Full article]
“These intangible sparks of connection reveal how One & Only is designed to guide the audience member through their own journey of emotional self-discovery…One & Only is a reprieve from the outside world. You get to build a relationship without the emotional consequences of everyday life and perform for an audience without fear of public failure. The secret things you do alone—dancing in the mirror, imagining a stand-up set about your life, rehashing your personal insecurities—Sophia invites you to perform them all for her.”
-Noa Weiss for Culturebot.org [Full article]
She lets you in, but in the context of this performance, also requires that you acknowledge the ways in which vulnerability is constructed and consider how or what of yourself you can give over to her in return. Sophia’s brilliance is that she illustrates the boundaries necessary to maintain healthy connection to others while she jabs at them. She pushes right up to the line.”
“BigBlackOctoberSurprise is a story told from a certain interior, the interior of the body. It is told from deep inside the gristly, scarred entrails of the American body politic.”
“…How better to watch a play about isolation and separation than from our own cells? I thought about witnessing the life squeezed from George Floyd on video—about the positions of onlookers in front of Cup Foods, the police, with their bodycams, or Darnella Frazier. BBOS is about the violence of these multiple perspectives; it’s about seeing, being-told, and then re-told.”
-Riting.org, Badly Licked Bear and Lauri Scheyer on BigBlackOctoberSurprise [Full article]
“Powerful, honest, and disturbing…This is not an easy production to watch, but one that I think everyone should see.”
“…an enchanting storyteller and in this zoom moment, we (me) crave the live, the unexpected, and even a direct gaze…brings the powerful mélange of ideas into a concrete realm. Here is what resistance looks like. Here is a Black man who is not giving up this space or this fight.”
BBC (Big Black Cockroach)
“…gut-wrenching…Beautifully directed by Sara Lyons and enhanced by the severely stark and aggressive lighting by Chu-hsuan Chang, Outlaw confronts and exposes both white and black stereotypes, fears of “the other” and common racist statements made by people who think of themselves as non-racist or bigoted.”
“The best use of space…the use of light set each new scene and the writing was superb…The power of this work is a see-for-yourself kind of experience. Paul Outlaw will challenge you and leave you stunned.”
“this challenging work impacted me the most of all the works in the festival this year…the power of BBC’s exploration of xenophobia, black virility, and gender confusion left me speechless and stunned.”
“The internet was uncharted territory in the 90s. We didn’t know what the rules were, and we were often making them up as we went. With the inaccessibility and disappearance of real life queer spaces, online spaces continue to hold a special importance for queer people. While laughing that in some ways I’m Very Into You is “a rom com for nerdy queers,” Sara also acknowledges very sincerely that, “Part of the goal of the project is to honor Kathy Acker and help to pump her legacy and her work and her iconography back into the culture.” More than 20 years after her death, the culture might finally be ready.”
"...Sara Lyons’s epistolary play, based on the published 1995 emails of the late Kathy Acker, is worth keeping an eye out for in the future. Acker had a “three-day stand” with Australian academic McKenzie Wark, and the two followed up that dalliance with intense and flirty emails across the Pacific. This is no ordinary romance, as they analyze the nature of sexual power games and their own queer identities. These academic writers tussle with the challenges of communicating their desires—being too honest or blunt, misconstruing each other, untangling meaning, and battling their own complicated minds in the process."
-American Theatre Magazine [Full article]
"Baby Mama is a shining diamond of a show: beautiful storytelling and intimate staging come together to create a heartbreakingly cathartic experience that you should not miss...Sara Lyons’ directorial influence gives this story, and its author, space to breathe...Five Stars." -BroadwayBaby.com [full article]
"With radical intimacy and humor, she offers a candid look at love, family, friendship, and sacrifice–and there’s even some burlesque to boot...Voice Choice!” -Village Voice [full article]
"...funny, moving and unapologetically candid" -Time Out New York [full article]
Ask A Director
"I want our work to consistently be part of widespread national conversations and for the powers that be to recognize its discursive potential in terms of politics and culture." -Sara Lyons