Watch the Teaser
With Say Something Bunny!, Alison S. M. Kobayashi and UnionDocs present an immersive and enthralling performance based on an amateur audio recording made over sixty years ago. The origin of this audio was a mystery. Two spools of thin steel wire were found tucked inside an obsolete sound device purchased by a collector at an estate sale. There were no labels; no dates, no names, and no context. Through her obsessive research and active imagination, along with hundreds of hours listening through, Kobayashi decodes the rich dialogue and discovers the detailed history of an unforgettable Jewish family from New York that bursts with humor, surprise and drama. The one-woman show annotates, illustrates, and reconstructs the scenes of the recording, while revealing the stranger-than-fiction biography of the eldest son, David, whose teenage impulse to capture the voices of his family is the reason why the recording exists. Using video, installation, performance and plentiful archival material, Kobayashi leads the audience through a close listening, spinning “a multigenerational yarn of Rothian heights.”
Contact Christopher Allen for press inquiries.
[email protected]
Say Something Bunny runs at at 511 W. 20th Street and is currently extended through July 2019.
Performances are Thursday to Saturday at 7:30 pm, with matinees on Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 pm.
Tickets start at $65 and can be purchased at saysomethingbunny.com .
Photos available upon request.
“The Best New Theater in town.”
-Vogue
“Say Something Bunny isn’t a line in the sand, it’s a gambit—an irresistible one. If you want to see a great performance, try to get tickets to Dear Evan Hansen on Broadway. If you want to reconsider the way you see, head to Chelsea.”
Press Coverage
“This beautifully produced one-woman show, a delicate and kindly object itself,…the care and thoroughness and love-of-archive will remind you of Serial; the sweetness will remind you of your own grandma.” Vulture: New York Magazine The Best New Theater Experience in Town is Nowhere Close to Broadway
“Say Something Bunny, the spectacular production that explores how theatre incorporates and interacts with found materials and real-life characters.” American Theater Wing: Working in the Theatre
“Say Something Bunny isn’t a line in the sand, it’s a gambit—an irresistible one. If you want to see a great performance, try to get tickets to Dear Evan Hansen on Broadway. If you want to reconsider the way you see, head to Chelsea.”
Vogue.com The Best New Theater Experience in Town is Nowhere Close to Broadway
“★★★★ Say Something Bunny! is light, sweet, funny and dear. But Kobayashi’s deep humanism has a way of moving you, even days later. She sifts through the details of strangers’ lives, a prospector who knows that the sand itself is precious. ”
TimeOut New York Say Something Bunny Review
“humor, pathos, and imagination combined with meticulous historical research”
THE BROOKLYN RAIL In Conversation: ALISON S. M. KOBAYASHI and CHRISTOPHER ALLEN with Tess Takahashi, 2016
“Deeply felt and most remarkably, close and real… a multigenerational yarn of Rothian heights.”
ART F CITY When Facts Become Art: Alison S.M. Kobayashi at Gallery TPW, 2016
“★★★★★ earns a rare perfect score … a work of profound empathy, lending meaning and drama to ordinary lives”
NOW MAGAZINE Found Audio Fuels Alison S. M. Kobayashi’s Project at Gallery TPW, 2016
“Alison’s charting exciting new territory, combining video, installation, visual art, performance, and found source material.”
CBC DOC PROJECT Hybrid media experiments with DNTO’s Sook-Yin Lee, 2016.
“Composing whole lives out of fragments of intimate conversation.”
CANADIAN ART, Say Something Bunny Review, Summer 2016 Issue
Read an interview with Kobayashi and JH Linsley.
About the Creators
Alison Kobayashi (director, performer, co-author, co-producer) makes performances and videos that have been exhibited widely in Canada, the United States and overseas. She was a guest artist at the 2008 Flaherty Film Seminar, a Spotlight Presentation at Video Out, Jakarta International Film Festival, a 2016 Yaddo Fellow and 2016 MacDowell Colony fellow. In 2012, she was commissioned by Les Subsistances in Lyon, France to produce her first live performance, Defense Mechanism. Alison S. M Kobayashi was born in Mississauga, Ontario and is based in Toronto and Brooklyn, NY where she is the Director of Special Projects at UnionDocs.
Christopher Allen (co-author, co-producer, dramaturgy, technical design) is a producer/director of documentary media projects and a programmer of multi-disciplinary events. He co-founded UnionDocs, a Center for Documentary Art in Brooklyn, and has been responsible for the organization’s growth from grassroots as the Executive Artistic Director. He has initiated many collaborative projects, uniting the creative efforts of hundreds of artists, documentary makers and communities including Living Los Sures, Documenting Mythologies, Capitol of Punk and Yellow Arrow. In addition to Say Something Bunny!, Christopher collaborated with Alison on Defense Mechanism and other performances.
Photos
High Resolution photos available upon request:.
E-mail requests to: [email protected]
All photos below credited to: Henry Chan
