SpringShot Festival @ 18th and Union (Seattle – Central District + streaming)

A celebration of our diverse garden of artists: 3 weekends, 6 showcases, over 20 shorts of 18 minutes or less.

Tickets ($10-$50 per showcase, sliding scale available to all) here.

Free tickets are also available. To request one, email 18thandunionseattle@gmail.com.

 

Festival schedule (3 weekends, 6 lineups):

 

Weekend 1.a: PEONY
Friday (4/21) @ 7, Saturday (4/22) @ 9, Sunday (4/23) @ 6

Miles Away From (and Into) My Body – Roland Carette-Meyers
A poem in seven pages (or a story in 300 lines), Miles. traces a journey from a failed suicide attempt in a Shanghai hotel to the start line of the Tacoma Marathon, a journey of 6,311 days and at least five times as many miles. Are we meant to be our bodies or to be with them. and what if you’ve become convinced your body isn’t the one you were meant to have?

The Old Man – Olga Kravstova & Jesimiel R. Jenkins
I want to share the story of a man preparing all his life for big luck and ultimately finding peace by surrendering to his destiny. This story reminds me of my father, a strong, patient man looking for a big fish all his life. He passed away in December 2019. Music, sound, and projection by Jason Okamoto.

Reaching – Magpie Artists’ Ensemble
In this experimental circular or “looping” play, the Sun and Moon are in a passionate but bittersweet relationship. Together they dance endlessly through the cosmos, awaiting their fleeting reunions.

 

Weekend 1.b: TULIP
Friday (4/21) @ 9, Saturday (4/22) @ 7, Sunday (4/23) @ 4

Boyself/Girlself – Jack Seamus Conley
A short play about a pre-transition transmasculine person (Girlself), who is in the early stages of “coming out” and uncertain of what the future may hold for them. Girlself receives a surprise visit from a future version of them (Boyself), who only has foggy memories of the exchange from the “other” side. As they talk together about everything and nothing, both “selves” learn something unexpected about who they are collectively.

A Working Title Is Fine – Katherine Jana & Carly Cipriano
Woke, broke, and tellin jokes. This is for you, dad. How will young neoliberals react to two young neoliberals making everyone uncomfortable?

Daughter of / Wife of / Mother of – Nelia Miller & Sara Maslanka
She’s afraid of losing herself in identities tied to other people. “daughter of / wife of / mother of” questions how the relationships of people dependent on us change (or shape?) who we are and how we see those who are dependent on us.

 

Weekend 2.a: LILY
Friday (4/28) @ 7, Saturday (4/29) @ 9, Sunday (4/30) @ 4

The Bootyful Princess and the Span King – Heather Joy Gosnell
A humorous musical story about butts, love and the vulnerability and courage required to give voice to, and make visible more of our truth with other humans. (Who must also be courageous and open enough to receive and dance with increasing truth and love.) “Fresh”, “Asinine”, “Titillating” “Divine Human Comedy”, “Inspired and Absurd”, “Huh?”

The Phantom of the Opera But Every Character Sings a Different Language and also I Play All the Parts – Alexei Cifrese
There comes a time in every artist’s life when they decide to subject the world to a solo show. Mine in particular came about one day after ~4 years of performing multilingual Broadway & musical theatre songs where the audience chose which languages I performed in – when I asked myself a dangerous question: what would happen if I just did an entire show like that? Well, my lovely captive audience, you and I are about to find out.

This is an 18min snippet of Act 1 of Phantom, featuring the 3 principal characters: The Phantom, Christine, and Raoul – and 6 languages for you to choose from: French, Spanish, Japanese, German, Russian and Hungarian.

Bawdy Positive – Jen Klouse
Jen Klouse is doing okay. for someone with crippling anxiety, depression, chronic pain and body dysmorphia. In this truncated version of her well received Seattle stand-up show, she examines navigating what it means to be a chronically ill, smart-mouthed, plus sized, sex positive female performer in a society that’s deeply uncomfortable with her body and her ideals. Because quietly fitting in while loudly bulging out is tricky.

 

Weekend 2.b: IRIS
Friday (4/28) @ 9, Saturday (4/29) @ 7, Sunday (4/30) @ 6

These Heavy Bones – Nicole Cardona & Devin Marie Munoz
Deals with the weight that depression and anxiety holds on our bodies. Witness as this iteration explores the ebb and flow these illnesses may have on us. Some days are good, some days are too mundane to function, some days you get by just by dissociation.

Sanctuary – Monty Rozema
How are we built by the spaces we inhabit? And where can we find sanctuary in a crumbling world? Come with me on a journey with me and my father. To the places that built us, the words we spun from those worlds, and our writers’ inheritance: him, me, us, and the world.

Fed With A Silver Spoon- Madeleine Kate Gregor
An examination of desire, Fed With A Silver Spoon includes two juxtaposing pieces. The first work “Lack” depicts the many layers and stages of discovering an unknown desire to the moment of succumbing to it. The half then dives into how excessive consumption of a desire can cause one to lose empathy, trust, control through quirky balletic movement.

 

Weekend 3.a: ZINNIA
Friday (5/5) @ 7, Saturday (5/6) @ 9, Sunday (5/7) @ 6

Sadcastle Cover Songs – Anthony Greene
Spring forward into your feels with a few Sadcastle and not so sad cover songs performed by Anthony Greene.

Alonequeer – Ben Swenson-Klatt
“If you come into your full queer glory in a pandemic and no one is around to witness it, did you really come out?” Alonequeer is a cowboylesque performance and tribute to everyone who finally felt comfortable to explore their queerness or come out during the years of pandemic isolation.

Soviet Kitsch – Doug Squirrel
A fun drag king romp through Eastern-bloc aesthetics, punk klezmer, and satirical Slavic machismo masculinity.

A Nighttime Puppet Show: The Secret of Love – Anna Mulia
What is love? Love is … like when you are really nice to someone and they give you a lot of hugs and like when your mom and dad read stories to you and give you dinner when you’re hungry so you stay alive for years and years maybe even forever because that’s love. Love! Also, look at my puppets!

Pearl – Zara Martina Lopez
“I transform surrounded by water, I am attracted to the depth, reaching something deeper within me. I love all this water surrounding me, holding me. I found a huge feeling of freedom. Water my tears, water my blood, water my sweat.”

 

Weekend 3.b: ASTER
Friday (5/5) @ 9, Saturday (5/6) @ 7, Sunday (5/7) @ 4

Dirty Laundry – Tracy Hyland
A reflection on growing up in a working class, Catholic family, Dirty Laundry airs out personal memories in an attempt to grasp at the stuff between mother and daughter, sensuality and purity, belonging and separation.

Atlantis Venture – Vivienne Minx
You can usually find this sultry seductress wandering the desert at dusk, but tonight, Vivienne Minx gives us a long awaited drink of water.

Warp Mike – Richard E.T. White
In 1960 the White family was fractured when younger brother Mike was unable to emigrate to the United States from BC with the rest of the family. Instead, Mike was enrolled in the Woodlands School in Vancouver. This is the story of how two brothers, Mike and Richard, were separated for decades and then came back together, of a journey of rediscovery that began with a question from the back seat of a car driving north from Seattle to Mission, BC, and of the power of a simple gesture of connection.

Five Signs You’re in Love With a Narcissist – Bryan Willis
Five signs and one possible solution.