Yale Cabaret: Tempo & THE MASTER'S TOOLS (2022)

A Note from the Cab Team

In our sophomore offering of the Cabaret 55: Parachute season, we thought it was time to properly introduce ourselves. So we sought plays that hit a little closer to home for us as a leadership team. Tempoby Harron Atkins and THEMASTER’STOOLSby Zora Howard examine the Black experience of yearning… wanting… needing… demanding… answers. Reciprocity. Freedom. Justice. Love. Both traverse time in unexpected and enlightening ways, exploring Black pasts alongside Black futures, Black love alongside Black pain. They ask us to question what we really know to be true. They beckon us to ask, “What if it were me?”

The heart of what brought us together as friends and co-leaders is a belief in the power of theater to illuminate our shared humanity. Theater can make us feel seen and teach us how to more clearly see. The Parachute experiment is one of risking discomfort for the sake of personal and communal growth. We invite you to take a leap with us because we believe we’ll all be better for the fall. The soft landing will have been earned, and we’ll always have the memory of our shared feat.

That’s why we keep coming back. That’s the good stuff. Enjoy the jump. We’ll see you on the other side.

A Note from the Director

At first glance, each of these one-acts couldn't be more different from one another. But then when you read the scripts, and I mean reallyread the scripts, they start talking to one another. They start talking to you.

You're invited into a world of "what ifs" through technology and magic. There's a special place that is created in between these two plays that asks us to appreciate a kind of vulnerable storytelling in a not-sodistant past and a very present future. We're asked to think about what the truth truly is and who gets to tell it? How would we tell our own story if we had an app at our fingertips? What about a spell?

These plays celebrate and affirm Black life, filling in for the void reality leaves behind. Unfortunately, there aren't enough apps or magic known to humans to do so in our time.

In one of my favorite songs, Jay Electronica offers, "unknown forces move some known objects / That's magic."

I'd offer up to Jay, that's theater it moves us as an audience, some of us unknown to each other, beyond ourselves in the dark, with a little bit of technology, and the spell of a few words.

Tempo

By Harron Atkins & THEMASTER’STOOLS

By Zora Howard

CREATIVE TEAM

Director Ashley M. Thomas Producer Anne Ciarlone*

Scenic Designer Suzu Sakai

Asst. Scenic Designer Patrick Blanchard

Costume Designer Kyle Artone

Lighting Designer Suzu Sakai

Asst. Lighting Designer Kyle Stamm*

Sound Designer Evdoxia Ragkou

Projections Designer Hannah Tran

Technical Director Cameron Waitkun

Stage Manager Chloe Liu

Asst. Stage Manager Adrian Hernandez

CAST

Jay in Tempo Malachi Beasley*

Dom in Tempo Christopher Paul Jordan*

Advertisement in Tempo Malik James*

Tituba in THEMASTER’S TOOLS Tyler Cruz

SPECIAL THANKS

Frank Ocean

Marcelo Martinez García

Content Transparency: THEMASTER’STOOLShas strong sexual content and violent imagery

*Yale Cabaret Debut

Mission

Yale Cabaret 55 is a transition; a space to place your art and watch it transform. We do not suggest that your art begins or ends with us, but it will change with us. We invite our community to take risks with us. Failure is not an option; it is an illusion. Like Pantone Color of the Year: Very Peri, we know that “as we emerge from an intense period of isolation, our notions and standards are changing, and our physical and digital lives have merged in new ways.” We seek to be a holding space to explore these changes. Cabaret 55 is a shared experiment of what it means to come back to theater.

Values

• The Cab is a studio

• The Cab is a space for trial and error

• The Cab is a space for fellowship

• There is no utopia, only risk and commitment

• There are no assignments, only invitations

Land Acknowledgement

The state of Connecticut and Yale University occupy the traditional, ancestral, and unceded lands of the Mohegan, Mashantucket Pequot, Eastern Pequot, Schaghticoke, Golden Hill Paugussett, Niantic, Quinnipiac, and other Algonquian speaking peoples. We honor and respect their continued relationship with and stewardship of this land, and we acknowledge that Yale University, Yale Cabaret, and those affiliated have benefited from the oppression of these Nations.

Labor Acknowledgement

Yale University does not exist independently from the centuries of forced labor and economic extraction of enslaved people, primarily of African descent, on which this country was built. We are indebted to their labor and their unwilling sacrifice, and we must acknowledge the ongoing violence inflicted on Black and brown people and the resulting impact and generational trauma still felt today.

Leadership Team

Executive Artistic Director

Jason Gray

Graphic Designer

Mikayla Johnson

Website Designer

Kayodè Soyemi

Stage Management

Nakia Avila

Theater Management

Fanny Abib-Rozenberg

Dramaturgy

Lily Haje

Playwriting

Danielle Stagger

Producing Artistic Director

Producing Artistic Director

Ashley M. Thomas Collaborators

Kayodè Soyemi

Community Engagement a.k. payne

Marketing Associate

Roman Sanchez

Advisory Board

Sound Evdoxia Ragkou

Scenic

Cat Raynor

Projections

John Horzen

Acting

Lucas Iverson

Anchor Spa x Yale Cabaret

Chef Kendall Thigpen

Cabaret Assistant

Adrian Hernandez

Technical Design

Eugenio Saenz Flores

Lighting Jiahao (Neil) Qui

Directing

Garrett Allen

Costumes

Kyle Artone

Board of Directors

Chair

Wendy Davies

Samanta Yunuen Cubias

Eric M. Glover

Libby JollyStone

Linda-Cristal Young

What’s Next

Fall Season

Cab 3

October 20-22nd

FourMeddlingKids&OneDumbDog

By Augustine Lorrie

Cab 4

December 1-3rd

helloworld

By John Horzen & Austin Channell

Cab 5

Yale Cabaret 55: Parachute presents

The International Theater Festival

Curated by Co-producers, Stefani Kuo, Sebastian Eddowes Vargas and Matthew Sonnenfeld

Thank you to our Sponsor!

$8 Crafted drinks during late night happy hour!!

About the Cab

In 1968, David Geffen School of Drama at Yale students established a basement performance venue in the former home of the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity at 217 Park Street. Envisioned as an alternative outlet for drama school students’ creativity and experimentation, Yale Cabaret became a forum for our expanded New Haven communities, whom we invite to gather around food, drink, conversation, fellowship, and artistry.

Since its founding, the Cabaret has remained in continuous operation, including pivoting to virtual performance during the 2020/21 season. The Cab has produced hundreds of plays, old and new, alongside musicals and musical revues, comedy shows, dance, performance art, and genre-defying performance.

Our supporters have made this storied history happen. With their partnership, we continue this tradition into 2022 and beyond.

Our Supporters

Honorary Season Producer ($7,500+)

Indira Etwaroo

Champion ($2,500-$4,999)

Wendy Davies

Partners ($1,000-$2,499)

Bennet Pudlin & Ann Judd

Bill & Sharon Reynolds

Elaine Ring

Show Sponsors ($500-$999)

Joan Channick

Audrey Conrad

Jim & Eileen Mydosh

Enthusiasts ($250-$499)

Sarah Cain

Erin Rocha

Pamela Jordan