An irreverent comedy with music that serves as a sexy homage to the sultry, jazzy world of 1950's lesbian pulp fiction.

     In Pulp!, rough-edged Terry Logan finds herself booted out of the post-World War II Women's Army Corp after an intimate brush with the General's daughter.  Her wanderlust lands her in “The Well,” a Chicago watering hole for women who love women.  Pulp! is a fast moving, stylized piece featuring drag kings, cabaret jazz, love triangles and forbidden Sapphic lust.  “Infectious...It deserves a cult following and a long run...Long may it sizzle.” The Chicago Tribune

     MOXIE Theatre and Diversionary Theatre join forces to present Patricia Kane’s comedy with music Pulp!  The co-production will preview on May 12 at Diversionary, open May 13 and run through June 11.

     Pulp! is an irreverent comedy with music that serves as a sexy homage to the sultry, jazzy world of 1950’s lesbian pulp fiction.   Fueled by heat, hormones and whiskey, Pulp! is smart, sexy and all that jazz, with delicious characters and period music.  Kane also wrote the lyrics, with music by Amy Warren and Andre Pluess.

     The Diversionary/MOXIE co-production will be co-directed by Delicia Turner Sonnenberg and Jason Southerland.  The play with music will feature Jo Anne Glover, Jessica John, Liv Kellgren, Terri Park and Jennifer Eve Thorn.  The stage manager is Thomas McCreary.  David Weiner, Jeff Fightmaster and Shulamit Nelson make up the design team.

     Delicia Turner Sonnenberg is a founder and Artistic Director of MOXIE Theatre.  Acclaimed San Diego productions include the REP’s Proof (co-directed w/Sam Woodhouse), Dog Act (MOXIE/Patte award); Antigone, Children Of Heracles (6th @ Penn); The Haunting Of Jim Crow (UCSD); Fit To Be Tied (Diversionary/Patte); Kimberly Akimbo (Billie, Patte & SD Critics Circle awards); Othello (Women’s Rep/Billie award); and Taming Of The Shrew (Eveoke).  Delicia worked as the Artistic Associate of San Diego REPertory Theatre as a part of TCG’s New Generations Program: Mentoring Leaders of Tomorrow.

     Jason Southerland has produced eight mainstage seasons at Boston Theatre Works, where he is the Founding Artistic Director.  He has directed the East Coast premiere of Rebecca Gilman's latest play The Sweetest Swing in Baseball, as well as the New England premieres of Pulp, Homebody/Kabul, Not About Nightingales, The Laramie Project, and the world premiere of Low Flying Aircraft.  Jason began his career an assistant director at the Mark Taper Forum, the Old Globe Theatre, Playwrights Horizons, and the Women's Project.

     Patricia Kane is an Artistic Associate at Chicago’s About Face Theatre where Pulp! premiered in the spring of 2004, garnering After Dark Awards for “Best New Work” and “Outstanding Production” and four Joseph Jefferson Award nominations, including “Best New Work” and “Best Original Music.”
     In an article by Marion Zimmer Bradley, Kane said she wasn’t surprised that pulps are hot again. “The covers themselves are fun and have that campy, kitschy style,” she said.  “And pulps and the covers of pulps themselves are simply fun and sexy.  But pulps are also part of our history so it's also fun to appreciate the covers and read the books and be grateful that we're not living in that time anymore.”

     Lesbian pulp fiction started out as masturbation stories for men and were written by men using pseudonymous female names.  However, lesbians bought them too, and soon well-known lesbians such as Marion Zimmer Bradley, Patricia Highsmith and Marijane Meaker (best known as children's author M.E. Kerr) were also writing them under assumed names, mostly for Gold Medal Books, an imprint of Fawcett Books.  The books written by lesbians tended to portray lesbians as real women instead of predatory monsters, which lesbians of the era must have appreciated.  Even the trashier ones at least validated the lesbian experience and they were bought by the score.  In fact, lesbian pulp fiction became so popular that different sub-genres developed: there were lesbians in the military, lesbians in institutions, lesbians who seduced straight girls, lesbians saved by straight men and others.

     Kane’s new play isn't based on any of these books in particular.  Instead, it captures the flavor of the genre, culling visuals from the most vivid covers and plotlines from the most sensational books.  The language is melodramatic, Kane said, like old movies from the 1930s and 1940s.  The drama is heightened by using poses reminiscent of the original pulp covers.  However, Kane is careful to say that though the play is funny it isn't mocking lesbian pulp fiction. “It's not a send-up, so I guess it's not true camp.  In any case, the genre has its own inherent camp, so you don't need to punch that up anymore.  We enjoy the style of the genre but we don't make fun of it,” she said. (end of Bradley article)

Pulp!
A Co-Production with Moxie Theatre

Now thru June 11

Pulp! is the final show of

Diversionary's 2005-2006 season.

All tickets: $27
Students/Seniors 60+/Military: $23

Student Rush: $9.00 tickets for students w/ID starting one hour before curtain.

Thursday at 7:30pm

Friday & Saturday at 8:00pm

Sunday at 2:00pm & 7:00pm

CLOSING PERFORMANCE

SUNDAY, JUNE 11 at 2:00pm

Please ask for the discount
at time of purchase.

Bring a Group and Save!
Groups of 10+ /$4.00 off each ticket
Groups of 30+/$8.00 off each ticket

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