Digital Program – The Index of Forbidden Books
Directed by Carly DW Bones
Assistant Directed by Joseph Baca
Sound Design & Original Composition by Erik Shiboski
Video Design by Veronica Mullins Bowers
Lighting Design by Jakob Klein
Scenic Design by Zachary Aronson
Technical Assistance by Milo Gephart
Produced by Elisa Rosin, Joseph Baca, Kendall Johnson, Marguerite French, and Zach Davidson
Co-Produced by Leo Garcia and Highways Performance Space
The Index runs approximately 75 minutes and will be performed without an intermission.
Unless otherwise noted, all projects were directed by Carly DW Bones.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Prologue: “Forgive Yourself” (Gallery Installation)
by Ray Karam (he/him)
Book One: “Nigga Neurosis”
by Kendall Johnson (he/him)
Book Two: “Moneybags”
by Julia Finch (she/her)
w/ Additional Direction by Veronica Tijoe (they/them)
Book Three: “In Good Hands”
by Ashley Eskew (she/her)
Directed by Adam Lebowitz-Lockard (he/him)
Book Four: “Emiliano Zapata (How to Love a Man)”
by Hector Zapata (he/him)
Directed by Dan Lovato (they/them)
Book Five: “All Vows”
Choreographed by Shenandoah Harris (she/her)
Performed by Mizuki Sako (she/her), Psychopomp Dance Theater
Music by McMurray
Costume Design by Ryan Howard
Book Six: “Grief Box TM”
by Kathleen Leary (she/her)
w/ Additional Punch-Up by Maddie Downes
Book Seven: “Christopher Nolan Hates Women”
by Theo Motzenbacker (he/they)
MEET THE MISFITS
PROLOGUE: “FORGIVE YOURSELF” (GALLERY INSTALLATION)
Created by Ray Karam (he/him)
Ray Karam is an artist focused on Arabic calligraphy and photography. In his own words: “Having grown up between Saudi Arabia and Lebanon, my artistic practice is a way to connect and draw inspiration from my cultural heritage, a way to showcase its beauty. Since moving to Los Angeles, I’ve tried to expanded my horizons and experimented with new forms of expression; this is my first time working in an impressionism-esque style as my way to connect with people and communicate emotions. I am so excited to showcase my art through Coin & Ghost’s “Index” and to share my love for creativity and self expression.”
BOOK ONE: “NIGGA NEUROSIS”
Created by Kendall Johnson (he/him)
PRODUCER, C&G ASSOCIATE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
Kendall grew up in Chicago, where he first fell in love with acting. He started out as a junior in college performing in small productions; his love for the craft only grew as he attended USC Master’s of Fine Arts for Acting. Completing that program and doing a three play rotation repertory is one of his greatest accomplishments.
You may remember Kendall as Gary Hall from Amazon Prime’s A League of Their Own or in his breakout role as Dave the Mage from C&G’s The Quest of Quests. Other select credits include the webseries Sexless (Black & Sexy TV), Dunsinane (the Royal Shakespeare Company), Ajax in Iraq (Not Man Apart Physical Theatre Ensemble), and The Tempest (Off Square Theatre). Kendall is a founding member of Coin & Ghost, where he serves as an Associate Artistic Director.
BOOK TWO: “MONEYBAGS”
Created by Julia Finch (she/her)
w/ Additional Direction by Veronica Tijoe (they/them)
Julia Finch is a teacher and theater artist based in Los Angeles, CA. She is a founding member of The Attic Collective theater company, which focuses on ensemble-based, devised projects. She was recently seen onstage in The Mating Ritual of Snails (Brisk Festival winner) at the Morgan-Wixson Theater and can be found spitting sonnets unrehearsed with Shakes on the Rocks. She has worked with the Actors’ Gang and Will Geer’s Theatricum Botanicum.
BOOK THREE: “IN GOOD HANDS”
Created by Ashley Eskew (she/her)
Directed by Adam Lebowitz-Lockard (he/him)
Ashley Eskew, an LA based writer/producer and actor thrilled to be making her debut with the Coin & Ghost Team. Proud Northwestern and MFA USC grad. To read the original Elite Daily article this piece is based off please visit: https://www.elitedaily.com/dating/sex-work-babysitting
BOOK FOUR: “EMILIANO ZAPATA (HOW TO LOVE A MAN)”
Created by Hector Zapata (he/him)
Directed by Dan Lovato (they/them)
Hector Zapata is an actor from Mexico City where he studied theatre at UNAM. He is now based on Los Angeles where he graduated from the professional conservatory at The Art of Acting Studio. He was part of the show “Plagio” now streaming on amazon prime. He was part of the cast of one of the most important shows in Mexico (La leyenda del Nahual). Part of multiple productions like “El Castillo”, “Mátame muy suavemente”, “La Hora”, “Todo Cambió (el musical)” at ART HOUSE Mexico.
BOOK FIVE: “ALL VOWS”
Choreographed by Shenandoah Harris (she/her)
Performed by Mizuki Sako (she/her), Psychopomp Dance Theater
Music by McMurray
Costume Design by Ryan Howard
Psychopomp Dance Theater is grounded in viscerally athletic movement exploring social issues through the structure of Jewish culture and thought. Shenandoah’s ancestral heritage of collaboration and discourse informs the collaborative culture of Psychopomp. The company resists hierarchical structures in creation processes. This work style gives more responsibility and respect to the dance artists in the company. Inclusion and empathy based communication is at the root of our work style. Every artist in the company is asked to not only authentically represent their own identity but also question how their choices impact others. Psychopomp’s work pushes the limits of dynamically powerful athleticism and storytelling while remaining grounded in virtuosic dance technique through a ritualistic mental rigor. The movement style is rooted in complex floorwork, powerful acrobatic Parkour movements and draws spaciously powerful traveling techniques from Horton and Limon. For Shenandoah, movement and her ethno-religious Jewish identity are one in the same. Both offer ways to question and challenge standards to fulfill the duty of Tikkun Olam, repairing the world.
BOOK SIX: “GRIEF BOX TM”
Created by Kathleen Leary (she/her)
w/ Additional Punch-Up by Maddie Downes
LA theatre credits include Mama Mama Can’t You See, and Two Gents* with Coin & Ghost, Titus Andronicus, Green Grow the Lilacs, Dark Lady of the Sonnets, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream with Theatricum Botanicum, Richard II, and Cymbeline with Chase What Flies, and Thenardier’s Inn with CAC Studios. You can see her perform Shakespeare in bars around LA with Shakes On The Rocks and Riot Shakespeare. She is the lead concept artist at Puppet Time and co-created large-scale mammoth and dinosaur puppets for Skin of Our Teeth at Theatricum Botanicum, which were featured in the LA Times.
BOOK SEVEN: “CHRISTOPHER NOLAN HATES WOMEN”
Created by Theo Motzenbacker (he/they)
Theo Motzenbacker (he/they) is a director, producer, and occasional performer in Los Angeles. He produced Company Creation Festival, a devised work incubator, at Son of Semele for several years, has directed around town, and is currently expanding a fictional solo show, Spice Up Your Sex Life til it Burns. His most recent, all-consuming project was completing a master’s degree in social work. Ask him about the transgender period marriage farce he’s been pitching around.
DIRECTOR – CARLY DW BONES (SHE/THEY)
Carly DW Bones (she/they) is a theatre director, intimacy director/coordinator, sex educator, facilitator and thespomancer (theatre witch). She creates at the intersections of performance, sexuality, gender, community, trauma-sensitivity and social justice. Carly created and directed at the feminist theatre ensemble, The Illyrian Players, from 2011-2019. They have also directed at: Coin & Ghost, The Echo, EST LA, Inkwell Theater, Rogue Artists Ensemble, The Vagrancy. She works as a freelance intimacy director and educator in the Los Angeles area for theatre companies (A Noise Within, Antaeus, Coeurage, Coin & Ghost, EST LA, Ghost Road, IAMA, LGBT Center, The Road, StarKid, Son of Semele) and university theatre programs (Cal Lutheran University, Cal State LA, Occidental College, UCLA, USC, Pomona College). Connect with Carly: [email protected] and www.thespomancer.com
SCENIC DESIGNER – ZACHARY ARONSON (HE/HIM)
Zachary Aronson is an internationally collected artist and set designer best known for the artwork he creates with fire. Aronson uses blowtorches and flamethrowers to paint on wood, exploring relationships between man and nature through the use of organic materials and primal tactics.
A Los Angeles native, Aronson received his undergraduate degree in fine art from USC in 2012 and graduate degrees from CalArts in Art and Set Design in 2014 and 2016. He works as an artist, producer, and set designer in Culver City and has had 8 solo gallery shows to date.
COMPOSER – ERIK SHIBOSKI (HE/HIM)
Erik Shiboski picked up the bass at age 11 and started making beats when GarageBand first popped up on the iMac. Influenced as a teenager by artists like J Dilla and Flying Lotus, he began experimenting with music production as a side project to his jazz composition studies. After completing his degree studying under jazz legends Kenny Burrell and James Newton, he went on to launch a career as a bassist and music producer, releasing his own music under the name Shibo. His work combines the use of traditional instrumentation, hardware synthesizers, jazz-inspired harmony, and cinematic sound design.
VIDEO DESIGNER – VERONICA MULLINS BOWERS (SHE/HER)
Veronica studied at California Institute of the Arts. She has worked venues around the world including Edinburgh Fringe, The Geffen Playhouse, Union Station LA, and Museum of Latin American Art. Her favorite collaborations include Kronos Quartet, Cornerstone Theater Company, Invertigo Dance Company, and The Industry Opera. She spent several years designing for Walt Disney Imagineering, creating soundtracks for theme parks all over the world. Specializing in fantastical, musical, and technology-infused theater and interactive design, she uses her backgrounds in music and electronics to create unique experiences.
LIGHTING DESIGNER – JAKOB KLEIN (HE/HIM)
With his degree in Media Arts Production, Jakob Klein has an extensive background in lighting for film, having worked on dozens of sets as a grip and gaffer. He ventured into theater lighting with The Attic Collective’s production of Hedda Gabler. You can find him light designing for Tiny Room Studios in Inglewood. He is excited to be working on The Index of Forbidden Books.
PRODUCER, C&G ARTISTIC DIRECTOR – ZACH DAVIDSON (HE/HIM)
Zachary Reeve Davidson (he/him) is a theatre resurrectionist, smuggler, and lighthouse operator. As the Founding Artistic Director of Coin & Ghost, Zach has remixed Shakespearean comedy, Greek tragedy, Italian romance, Mexican folklore, German legend, French opera, and American mythology. In his “spare time,” he is a sought-after arts administrator and creative consultant, having worked with a dozen organizations throughout Los Angeles including A Noise Within, Not Man Apart Physical Theatre Ensemble, Conga Kids, BLKLST, Overtone Industries, Invertigo Dance Theatre, and more. In 2023, he was named to The Nonprofit Partnership’s “Emerging Leaders” cohort and selected as a mentor for Arts For LA’s “Activate: Protege” program. Davidson is a co-author of the LA Anti-Racist Theatre Standards, a guest lecturer (CalArts, Denver University, American Academy of Dramatic Arts), and a regular panelist (California Arts Council, LA County Department of Arts and Culture, the Garry Marshall New Works Festival, the Jewish Play Project). Denver native, CalArts Mafia, on social as @reevecreates.
PRODUCER, C&G ASSOCIATE ARTISTIC DIRECTOR/DIRECTOR OF MUSIC – ELISA ROSIN (SHE/HER)
Born in Seattle into a family of theatre artists, Elisa Rosin (she/her) is an actor, vocalist, composer, and teaching artist. She is a founding member of Coin & Ghost, where she co-created and performed in Bad Hamlet, Two Gents*, Fortunate Son, and the workshops of OLYMPIA, Too Faust, and LEAVES. Elisa has performed at RedCat, The Odyssey, Seattle Opera, and the Fifth Avenue Theatre, as well as with LA-favorite companies like Salty Shakespeare, Not Man Apart-Physical Theatre Ensemble, The Speakeasy Society, and Shakespeare Santa Monica. She composed part of the original score for NMA’s Paradise Lost: Reclaiming Destiny, and produces/performs in burlesque shows under the stage name, “Cookie St. Cream.” Elisa studied vocal performance at California Institute of the Arts.
PRODUCER, C&G MANAGING DIRECTOR – MARGUERITE FRENCH (SHE/THEY)
Marguerite French (she/they) is a recent graduate of the Interdisciplinary MFA program at UCLA’s school of Theatre, Film, and Television, where she co-produced and starred in the Rabbit Bandini film, Death, and directed the short, Intimate Beauty. Her first role after graduation was “Alison” in Francis Ford Coppola’s Distant Vision. As the 2015 Cirque du Soleil Directing/Marketing Fellow, she directed a commercial for the Cirque production “Baz”, helped conceive the social media campaign #cirqueway, and learned to hang by her ankles from the aerial tissu. As an actor in New York, she studied with JoAnne Akalaitis, Jim Calder, Wynn Handman, and William Esper. She is a proud alumnus of Bard College.
AD/SM, PRODUCER, C&G DIRECTOR OF COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT/ENVOY OF JOY – JOSEPH BACA (HE/SHE/THEY/YAY)
Joseph Baca (he/she/they/yay) is a Los Angeles native who left the incessantly effervescent SoCal sun to pursue his undergraduate studies at Williams College in Western Massachusetts. Little did he know, he’d be trading ten months of summer for ten months of winter, so he studied abroad for two semesters in Italy at the Accademia dell’Arte studying mask and physical theatre, and one summer in Japan studying bunraku puppetry. Since acquiring his Bachelor’s in Theatre, he has studied and performed under companies such as Double Edge Theatre, the Suzuki company of Toga, Not Man Apart, and the Idiot Workshop. Now re-based in Los Angeles he uses his talents installing art exhibits in museums and galleries all across the city and teaching 5th graders the joy of ballroom dance under the non-profit organization Conga Kids. He’s ecstatic to be a part of the C&G team, helping to bring fresh and accessible theatre to the LA community.