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DigiREP!, Revival!, poetry, comedy, and Feria Del Barrio this weekend
Kyle V. Hiller
Listening is an invaluable practice, and this weekend’s roundup features a strong selection of events that promote just that. DigiREP! and Best & Newest are chances to discover voices you may not have heard yet. Poetry and conversation highlight events with AAMP, the Paul Robeson House, and IRC. And this year’s Feria del Barrio goes virtual this year, continuing its yearly tradition of celebrating Latinx culture in North Philadelphia.
It’s the last official weekend of summer. Enjoy it, for whatever it’s worth!
Black Lives Still Matter.
Coffee and a Play presents a DigiREP!, a BIPOC new work repertory festival, featuring new and up-and-coming Philadelphia playwrights. The event, as part of the 2020 Philly Fringe, will show three different plays including Discovering Blackness, a short film by Briana Gause, Young Money by Erlina Ortiz, and Lawrence’s Law of Pawn Shops by Jaedto Israel. Coffee and a Play is merging theater and film with their works, which can be seen September 17 through September 27. Find out more online via Fringe or the DigiREP! website.
Disruption: Poetry & Performance
The African American Museum of Philadelphia teams up with Nina “Lyrispect” Ball to curate a lineup of local artists for an evening of poetry and performance. Find out more about the lineup on Facebook, which kicks off on Thursday, September 17 at 7pm.
Off Mic Comedy School presents a special show, Best & Newest, a streaming event where you can get a first look—or first laugh in this case—at new comedians performing their “best” and established comics perform their “newest” sets in front of a pair of judges. The event is free on Friday, September 18 at 8pm. See the full lineup on Facebook.
The Paul Robeson House will host a pair of cultural workers for a conversation inspired by the poem We Are Each Other’s Harvest by the Chicago poet Gwendolyn Brooks in a tribute to Paul Robeson himself. The conversation includes Cassie Owens, a staff reporter for the Inquirer, and Niela Orr, deputy editor of The Believer and contributing editor of The Organist podcast. The event is free on Saturday, September 19 at 1pm online.
Into the Absurd with Jacqueline Goldfinger
The Idiopathic Ridiculopathy Consortium continues their Into the Absurd series with Philadelphia playwright Jacqueline Goldfinger on Saturday at 5pm. Catch up with her latest works and more online.
Celebrate Latinx culture with Feria del Barrio 2020 this Sunday. The festival goes virtual this year, its 36th edition of celebrating culture, family, and the economic and educational aspirations of North Philadelphia’s Latinx community. Keep an eye out for the premiere on Facebook.
Drexel University’s Pearlstein Gallery hosts Revival! A Virtual Celebration for Collective Joy and Resilience on Sunday, September 20 at 3pm. The free stream on Twitch is a celebration of “the visual and sonic frequencies that are contained within and spill out of Black ecstatic experiences.” Rashid Zakat, a Philly-based artist, will live-edit an archive of personal and public films to “produce a spontaneous and thoughtful visual narrative.” Find out more and RSVP.
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