IT GIRL
"dazzlingly smart, heartbreaking, genre-defying"
Created by Brenna Geffers, Amanda Schoonover,
and Anthony Crosby
Starring Amanda Schoonover
and Anthony Crosby
Directed by Brenna Geffers
Photos: Plate 3 Photography/ Simpatico Theater Project
IT GIRL splays open our obsession with the Next Big Thing when it comes to women in the entertainment industry. Looking through the lens of the original “It Girl” Clara Bow and her tumultuous raise and fall in the Silent Film Industry, this original piece becomes the actress’ nightmare for contemporary women. A fantasia of silent film, clown, tap, ballroom, boxing, vintage gags, and innovative storytelling, IT GIRL pits an actress in a dance to the death against ShowBiz to find out if anyone can really have It all?
PRESS
Masterfull...
“This dazzlingly smart, heartbreaking, genre-defying theater piece about the great Clara Bow (and much more) should be seen by every lover of theater and film.” -Philly Magazine
“It is a physically and emotionally demanding performance that not only displays her command of the emotive style of silent acting of the ‘20s, but also captures the exhilaration, stress, loneliness, and pain felt by the woman behind the scenes with poignancy and empathy.” - Phindie Independent Arts Coverage
“The It Girl is an engrossing study of the machinery of show business and sexuality through the prism of one fascinating life… Schoonover captures not only Bow’s love of performance but also her desperate sadness and willingness to please.” DC Metro
“Geffers, Schoonover, and Crosby are onto something real in examining both our hunger for the new - especially when that new thing is a woman - and, on the flip side, what fuels the desire to be that thing…”- Philadelphia Inquirer
“The performance holds us entranced, particularly Schoonover’s depiction of electric shock therapy and a final apache dance of abuse with her stage partner, Anthony Crosby.” -Broad Street Review
BLOGS
“Like all the best period pieces it’s actually about right now, and how sharply it addresses the horrifying truth that 90 years later showbusiness still chews women up and spits them out…You must, must go see it.”
“It is masterful work and is as laudable, as much for its seemingly inexhaustible variety as it is for the skill and nonchalance with which Schoonover goes through her paces. The treat is as choreographic as it is histrionic. Schoonover’s versatility and flexibility fascinates.”
History
It Girl was first developed for the Philadelphia SoLow Festival. 2014
Further development came through the Jilline Ringle Solo Performance Program 2015
The extended World Premiere was produced by Simpatcio Theatre Project 2016
It Girl was a featured performance at the First Annual New Jersey Fringe Festival at the Eagle Theater in 2016
It Girl was nominated for Outstanding Choreography for the 2016 Barrymore Awards for Excellence