Faust Syndrome is a new adaptation of the Faust myth, performing this fall in NYC. The piece follows three activists who strive to end the genocide in Gaza, abolish ICE, and bring an end to American imperialism. When they are approached by the Devil's agent Mephistopheles and offered extraordinary –and terrifying!– power, the age-old Faustian bargain cycle unfurls yet again. The production will feature puppets, a choir, and urgently-need questions around movement building, individualism, and violence.

THEATER IN ASYLUM:
Theater in Asylum makes rigorously-researched, ensemble-driven theater to challenge and empower. We prize the theater as a space — as an asylum — where we can process and question, where reality is temporarily suspended, and where we can create with joy. Since 2010, Theater in Asylum has brought New York artists and not-yet-artists together to read, research, devise, and perform politically charged, of-the-moment new plays.

To learn more about Theater in Asylum, see here.

WHERE:
The Episcopal Actors' Guild in midtown (29th & 5th Ave)

WHEN:

• Rehearsals: September 19-October 28, 2026
• Rehearsals will mostly be nights and weekends.
• Not every actor will be called to every rehearsal. We aim to schedule around people’s availability.
• Performances: October 29-November 15, 2026 (15 total)

PAY: 

• $900 stipend
• All collaborators working on the entire process (from first rehearsal to closing night) are paid the same full stipend. Collaborators coming in for just performances or for a short portion of the process are paid a half stipend or hourly. All collaborators are shared on the complete show budget. More on how Theater in Asylum works to share power, time, and money is here.
• Theater in Asylum is seeking an Equity Showcase Code for this production.
• Food: Theater in Asylum provides a snack at all activities longer than 3 hours and a meal at all activities longer than 6 hours.
• Theater in Asylum’s community agreements are here.

THE ROLE:

• Name: Inés
• Latina, in her 70’s or 80’s or 90’s. 
• An artist-activist puppeteer and sculptor. 
• She has seen a lot and knows –fully– who she is and what she is doing. She is a small piece of a larger movement fighting against the Empire. 
  
• She is an unstoppable force with little patience for stupidity and vanity, and has no patience at all for self-centered, so-called “individuals.”
  

TO SUBMIT:
If this project sounds exciting to you, please email a headshot and resume to Paul Bedard & Katie Palmer at [email protected].

Bookkeeping Job Description
Contractor Role
January–December, 2024

Theater in Asylum is looking for a skilled part-time Bookkeeper to maintain our financial records, including purchases, sales, receipts, and payments. This position is a one-year contract position, and we anticipate the person working five to ten hours a month. Bookkeeper job duties include working closely with our Managing Director to process accounts payable and receivable and manage invoices and payments. Our ideal candidate has bookkeeping experience for a non-profit and is familiar with QuickBooks accounting software.

Ultimately, the Bookkeeper’s responsibilities are to accurately record all day-to-day financial transactions of our company.

Responsibilities:

• Record financial transactions in Quickbooks and budgets
• Monitor TIA’s balances and cash flow
• Verify that transactions are recorded correctly
• Enter data and maintain records
• Process accounts receivable/payable 
• Catalogs receipts on all TIA expenditures to prepare for potential audits.

Requirements and skills:

• Proven bookkeeping experience
• Solid understanding of basic bookkeeping and accounting payable/receivable principles
• Proven ability to calculate, post, and manage accounting figures and financial records
• Data entry skills along with a knack for numbers
• Hands-on experience with spreadsheets and Quickbooks
• Proficiency in Google Suite
• High degree of accuracy and attention to detail
• Compliance with Theater in Asylum's Community Agreemetns

Compensation:
We are a very small fiscally sponsored theater company with an operating budget in 2024 of around $18,000. Everyone working as part of the administrative contracted staff (including the role of the Bookkeeper) is paid $1,200 for the year. See our budget transparency commitments here.

To apply:
Please email TIA Managing Director Kathryn Appleton.

Theater in Asylum (TIA) is a New York-based theater company founded in 2010 to challenge and empower our community. TIA joyfully pursues rigorous research and an ensemble-driven approach to theater-making. We create performances to investigate our past, interpret our present, and imagine our future. We prize space to process, space to question—asylum—for ourselves and our community.


Core programs include original productions; themed cabarets, presenting new work from our community; and Cold Readings, a program to read and discuss published plays.

Community is of utmost importance to Theater in Asylum. Some of our strategies for community safety and empowerment may be found here. See Theater in Asylum’s transparency commitments and company pay structure here.

2023 will be a big year for Theater in Asylum, and we have a lot of money to raise in Fall 2022 to make it happen. With multiple grants due in September and October and our fundraising launching in December, we are looking to bring on a new staff member to help coordinate it all. We are not looking for someone with connections to funding, but instead someone who can help us make all our fundraising efforts happen. This includes keeping us on track with deadlines, helping pull together materials for grants applications, following up with perk-providers, and thanking donors. While this role could grow in the future to a more traditional development position, at present we are looking for a coordinator/project manager for our fundraising efforts.

Please send a resume and a cover letter to [email protected]. In the letter, please tell us:

• A little about yourself.
• What is your background, if any, with Theater in Asylum?
• What drew you to apply for this position? Or what excites you about it?

Theater in Asylum believes in Equal Opportunity Collaboration. We are committed to diversity in all areas of our work, on and offstage. We encourage applicants with a unique cultural perspective inclusive of race, ethnicity, gender identity and expression, class, physical ability, and sexual orientation to apply.

Thank you!

Overview

• Theater in Asylum is seeking one actor to complete the ensemble of Occupy Prescott.
  
• Occupy Prescott is written by Andy Boyd and will be co-directed by Paul Bedard and Katie Palmer. Theater in Asylum will produce.
  
• All performances will be outdoors at Jalopy in Red Hook, Brooklyn.
• Show dates: Saturdays and Sundays, October 16, 17, 23, 24, 30, 31, 2021. 3pm shows. Possible 12pm shows could be added.
• Rehearsal dates: September 15-October 15, 2021 (online and in-person, nights and weekends)
• Seeking 1 actor: woman of Asian descent, age 30 and above.
• Unfortunately we are not able to work with actors who are in Actors Equity.
• Compensation: $300 honorarium, all show collaborators paid equally regardless of role.
• Audition date & location: Thursday, August 26th from 3:30-5:30pm. ART/NY South Oxford Space 138 South Oxford Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217
• To submit, please email a headshot and resume to [email protected] 
  
• Theater in Asylum’s website hosts our Community and Transparency commitments.
  

About Occupy Prescott
10 years ago this fall, activists gathered in lower Manhattan to peacefully occupy Zuccotti Park and to declare opposition to an economic system clearly inadequate for the majority of Americans, the 99%. Occupy Wall Street galvanized people around the world and inspired hundreds of activist occupations, big and small, united in a call to radically rethink the economic order.

Playwright Andy Boyd hones in on Prescott, Arizona to follow five Occupiers in their efforts to change their town and the world. They broadly agree that the one percent is too powerful, but agreement breaks down as they search for specifics. Reaching consensus on what a better world looks like—and how to get there—is frequently frustrating and rarely glamorous. Never easy, but urgently necessary. On the 10th anniversary of the rallying cry heard round the world, we are thrilled to produce the prescient and hopeful play: Occupy Prescott.

The Role we’re looking to fill
We are looking for a woman-identifying-or-presenting actor, aged 30+, of east-Asian descent, to play Connie, whom the play describes as a Japanese American woman in her sixties.

When Connie introduces herself to the group, she explains that... "I heard about acid and Mao and the Grateful Dead all in one day, ran away from home, and joined a commune." After recounting the disillusionment of the era she continues, "So I did what a lot of us did, us ex-hippies. Lit out for the territories, to the Berkshires or Taos or Austin or Prescott and hunkered down, tried to keep the fire burning until the next time America was ready to try out some new ideas. There's this line by Lawrence Ferlinghetti: 'I am perpetually awaiting a rebirth of wonder.' I have been waiting for forty years."

Of everyone in the group, she has the most experience working to change the world. She has seen toxic interpersonal dynamics destroy promising coalitions, but she has also experienced the joy of true community. She relentlessly presses her compatriots to think more radically (meaning from the root) about what is wrong with this country. She presses the group to mean it, to be actually revolutionary with the world they're envisioning and fighting for.

About the Audition
Dates: Thursday, August 26th from 3:30-5:30pm.
Location: ART/NY South Oxford Space: 138 South Oxford Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217

Please prepare a 1-2 minute monologue. You may be asked to stay and read a side, if time allows.

Theater in Asylum seeks to make this audition as easy and friendly as possible. When you arrive, you can expect someone to greet you and show you to a waiting area. Once it is your turn, you’ll be met by Andy (the playwright), and Katie (one of the directors). We will all be on our feet and eager to work with you. Please prepare a short contemporary monologue (1-2 minutes). If you’re cool with it, we would love to play with it a little bit after you present it. We anticipate each audition taking between five and ten minutes.

To Submit
Please send a headshot and resume to [email protected].

About the Production
Occupy Prescott will perform outdoors at Jalopy in Red Hook, Brooklyn. All performances will be matinees, with 3pm shows (additional 12pm shows possible), Saturdays and Sundays, October 16-31, 2021. In the event of a rained out performance, a 12pm show may be added on another show day.

Occupy Prescott is written by Andy Boyd, and co-directed by Paul Bedard and Katie Palmer of Theater in Asylum. Producing work is shared by Andy, Paul, and Katie, as well as Theater in Asylum’s managing director Kathryn Appleton and community engagement manager Hilarie Spangler.

About the Process
Occupy Prescott will rehearse September 15 - October 15, 2021 with a combination of online and in-person rehearsals. Online rehearsals (table work, etc) will utilize Zoom. In-person rehearsals will typically take place in Brooklyn either at Jalopy or at ART/NY’s South Oxford Space. We will do our absolute best to work around everyone’s schedule (day jobs, other commitments, etc) and anticipate rehearsals to be nights and weekends.

To protect ourselves from the ongoing pandemic, we are requiring that all collaborators and audience members be vaccinated against Covid-19. The cast will also test weekly and mask when rehearsing indoors.

About You
Theater in Asylum prizes community and seeks to create a safe and invigorating environment for all. We are looking for friendly, respectful, and caring folks to join our community. Occupy Prescott will have a fast process and our hope is to foster a strong team to present the most compelling possible work to our audience.

All applicants must be vaccinated against Covid-19.

Unfortunately due to the size of our budget, we are not able to work with union artists, including those in Actors Equity.

Theater in Asylum believes in Equal Opportunity Collaboration. We are committed to diversity in all areas of our work, on and offstage. We encourage applicants with a unique cultural perspective inclusive of race, ethnicity, gender identity or expression, class, physical ability, and sexual orientation to apply.

Compensation
All performers will receive a $300 honorarium. This position will be considered an independent contractor of Theater in Asylum.

Please note that all collaborators on Occupy Prescott, regardless of role, will be paid equally. We know that this honorarium is less than you (and we!) are worth. We understand that this is not a living wage and certainly limits things. We commit to do everything we can to respect and support folks to make the process as sustainable and rewarding as possible for all of us.

Theater in Asylum values transparency and always shares the complete show budget with signed-on collaborators. See our full Transparency commitments here.

About Theater in Asylum
Theater in Asylum (TIA) is a New York-based theater company founded in 2010 to challenge and empower our community. TIA joyfully pursues rigorous research and an ensemble-driven approach to theater-making. We create performances to investigate our past, interpret our present, and imagine our future. We prize space to process, space to question—asylum—for ourselves and our community.

Core programs include original productions; themed cabarets, presenting new work from our community; and Cold Readings, a program to read and discuss published plays.

Community is of utmost importance to Theater in Asylum and some of our strategies for community safety and empowerment may be found here.

Theater in Asylum’s Community Agreements
Theater in Asylum strives to prevent harm in all of our spaces. We acknowledge that multiple systems of oppression intersect and permeate our lives (including racism, sexism, classism, ableism, and others). While we know that no space is ever 100% safe for all people, we hope to make our spaces safer with these Community Agreements. We ask everyone entering our space to, in good faith:

1. Take care of ourselves, and each other. We know that everyone has different needs, and we strive to honor and respect those needs. In addition, we affirm that we all have the agency to leave a Theater in Asylum event whenever we need to, no need to explain.
   
2. Be mindful of difference, and value it. We acknowledge that each of us moves through the world with different privileges and obstacles. We honor our differences and respect each other's experiences and identities, including pronouns. We use "I" statements, and we resist assumptions and generalizations about experiences that are not our own. 
   
3. Make space / take space. If we are someone who tends to speak a lot, or are of an identity that has been historically privileged to take space, we challenge ourselves to make space for others. If we are someone who tends not to speak a lot, or are of an identity that has been historically discouraged from taking space, we challenge ourselves to take more space. 
   
4. Assume good intent while acknowledging impact. We strive to give each other grace and work together if harm occurs.
   
5. Strive for growth as individuals and as a community. We listen, learn, and love with intention. We follow Maya Angelou’s advice to, “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.”
   

If any of these Community Agreements are not being lived up to, or if there is something Theater in Asylum can do to support your full engagement, please know that dialogue is welcome. See leadership contact information and an anonymous contact form at theaterinasylum.com/community.