seapony sizzle reel edited by Julia Sharpe-Levine, featuring footage by Julia Sharpe-Levine (at Dixon Place), Bart Lentini (at Asbury Park), and Fivel Rothberg (at Frigid NY, Under St. Marks).
seapony
seapony is a trans-masc pregnancy ritual inspired by the reproductive cycle of male seahorses, who take the lead in childbearing. Told through poetry, puppetry, and dad jokes, this semi-autobiographical solo-show follows a trans Dad-to-be who wishes to bear biological babies. He looks to the ocean as our original parent for guidance on alternative ways to create life and to queer family. He consults memory, fantasy, and future to determine if he is fated to be a promising pregnant father, or destined to repeat ancestral patterns.
Along the way he meets campy, clownish characters that highlight the deep ancestral quandaries of parental attachment and identity formation: how we become who we become, and how on earth and under the sea might we change our becomings. With the help of the sea, the audience is invited to relinquish into the water what once was to make room for what can be: from daughter to seahorse daddy.
Work-in-Progress versions of seapony have been performed at TRANSFORMER’s Siren Arts residency at Asbury Park, on August 15th, 2024, and at Dixon Place’s HOT Festival on September 14th, 2024.
Photos by Sara Stadtmiller at TRANSFORMER’s Siren Arts, Asbury Park.
Footage by Bart Lentini at TRANSFORMER’s Siren Arts, Asbury Park.
Key collaborators for this work are Kate Bornstein (mentorship and voice-over), Orion Johnstone (consulting direction), Julia Sharpe-Levine (audio editing), Joshua Holden (puppet consulting and creation), Chevy Lace (seahorse costume), Rara Darling (guest performer).