A Story Beyond

“If there’s one show you Really must see, it’s A STORY BEYOND”

– Jared Bowen WGBH

A Story Beyond

ABOUT THE SHOW

Join an epic quest!

A young heroine struggles to save her village from the looming Dark Cloud. The stories we tell create the reality we live, in an original fable told with music, masks, and puppetry.

Inspired by folklore from around the world, A Story Beyond is a new fable for our time.

TELL A STORY, CHANGE THE WORLD

written by the LAB ensemble

A Story Beyond was created and presented with the generous support of the Massachusetts Cultural Council and the Boston Cultural Council.

Promo Video

Short Clip

Cast

Edith the CELLIST - Leahy Ardon

Leahy Ardon is an Israeli-American multidisciplinary artist. She has experience studying and performing both music and theater in London, Tel Aviv, and Boston, and is thrilled to join LAB as a cellist for A Story Beyond. Previous cello credits include Hold Your Tongue Hold Your Dead (Global Arts Corps), The Love of a Nightingale (Hub Theater Company), Electra (Emerson Theater Society).

Leahy has also written and directed several plays for children and adults, most recently receiving a “Best of Fest” Award for her one-woman play Conflict Zone at the Whitefire Theater Solofest in LA. She holds a Bachelor of Music from Berklee College of Music and a master’s from Harvard Graduate School of Education.

Mishka - Cal Callahan

After majoring in theatre through the pandemic and graduating from college in May 2022, Cal (formerly known as Clara) is back in their hometown, Boston! They are super excited to be performing with LAB. During college, Cal stumbled into the rabbit hole of physical theater, devised theater, puppetry and all things “experimental”. They haven’t looked back since. When not on stage or working as a teaching artist, Cal can be found writing and plunking out songs on the piano, showing off their 3 octave vocal range, and taking circus arts classes. Oh, and they were last seen around town in Beauty and the Beast (Wheelock 2018), and a table reading of All American Boys (Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, curated by Helga Davis).

Stanislav & WRITER - Jesse Garlick

Jesse Garlick is a Boston based actor and theatre educator. Selected Boston credits: A Christmas Carol, Journey to the West, Arcadia (Central Square Theatre) Good, Assassins (New Repertory Theatre) A Story Beyond, Yellow Bird Chase, Who Would be King (Liars&Believers) Hamlet, As You Like It (Brown Box Theatre Project). New York credits: Good (PTP/NYC), Who Would Be King (Ars Nova/Liars&Believers). International Credits: Yellow Bird Chase (Assembly/Liars&Believers). Jesse is also the Education Director of Liars&Believers in addition to being a faculty member at Boston Ballet’s Education and Community Initiative Department and a drama teacher at numerous high schools around Boston and the surrounding area. MFA: ASDS. BFA: BU.

JACQUES THE MANDOLINIST, MUSIC DIRECTOR & LEAD VOCALIST - Jay Mobley

Jay Mobley is a theatrical composer and singer-songwriter. He frequently develops new stage works and is thrilled to collaborate with Liars & Believers again! Previous credits with LAB include Who Would Be King (composer/music director/performer/sound designer), coLAB: Irresistible (composer/performer), ICARUS (MD/guitar), and the Pandemic Play productions Macbeth (composer/SD), Interventions (SD), The Bear (SD), The Huns (SD), and The Most Lamentable Comedy and Most Cruel Death of Pyramus and Thisby (Snug/Lion). Other regional credits include Beowulf (The Poets’ Theatre, MD) and The Juke (Queen Mab, MD/guitar). Jay’s music is dynamic and polystylistic, drawing on diverse influences. He often serves as music director for new music theatre productions, with several world premieres among his credits. Jay holds a Master of Music degree in composition from the College-Conservatory of Music and an MusB in composition from Fredonia.

Fergus & WRITER - Glen Moore

As an artistic ensemble member with Liars & Believers, Glen Moore was last seen at the 2022 Edinburgh Fringe Festival with the original show Yellow Bird Chase. He also played Saul in Who Would Be King, which he helped devise over the course of 2015.  New England Regional Premiere as Gene in The Last Schwartz with Gloucester Stage Company. Boston area credits include; BLINDERS (Flat Earth Theatre), The Importance of Being Ernest (Moonbox Productions), Of Mice and Men (Boston Children’s Theatre), CLOSER (Bad Habit Productions), Of Mice and Men (Moonbox), The Time of My Life (Zeitgeist Stage Company),  And Nither Had I Wings to Fly (BHP),  Arcadia (BHP), Eurydice (Independent Drama Society) Regional Theatre; Speech And Debate (Curious Theatre Company). He holds a degree in Acting from The University of Northern Colorado and also studied briefly at The National Theatre Conservatory. Glen has also worked as a theatre educator, acting coach, fight captain, set builder, sound and light designer in both New England and Colorado. He would like to thank his friends and family for all their continued support.

https://www.glenmooreactor.com/

ISABEL & LEAD WRITER - Rachel Wiese

Rachel Wiese is an actor, divisor, director, dancer, and puppeteer. Her work as a LAB Artistic Associate includes A Story Beyond – A Musical Fable, Yellow Bird Chase, MacBeth (Pandemic Play), Irresistible, Beowulf (In collaboration with Poets’ Theatre), and Who Would Be King. Other local works include a one woman show, Walking Toward America, and Light on a Dark Winter’s Night with Heart Forward in Worcester, and the touring short, Be Clean. Regional credits include: Metamorphoses, and Wildflowers (Zach Theatre), Lifelines and Hometeam (Vetworks), Sacred Space Redux, Circle the Wagons, and A Streetcar Straight to Hell (The Exchange Artists), Frankenstein, The Jungle, and The Head (Trouble Puppet Theatre), Marvelous Things, and People Will Talk About You Sometimes (Poison Apple Initiative), Oceana (The Vortex). Rachel lives in Princeton, MA and teaches in the Visual and Performing Arts Department at Worcester State University.

ARTISTIC TEAM

DIRECTOR & LEAD WRITER - Jason Slavick

Jason Slavick is a director, writer and educator. At the LAB he wrote and directed Yellow Bird Chase, Who Would Be King, ICARUS, Song of Songs: a LoveRomp and Le Cabaret Grimm – a punk cabaret fairy tale {sans fairies}, for which he also wrote lyrics. He also directed 28 Seeds, the LAB collaboration with Walter Sickert & The Army of Broken Toys, and the two coLAB productions, Talk to Strangers and IRRESISTIBLE. Jason wrote and directed Heaven & Hell – The Fantastical Temptation of the 7 Deadly Sins, a musical adapted from the album by Joe Jackson that was presented at The Boston Conservatory in 2007. As a company member of Boston Theatre Works, Jason directed Othello (Elliot Norton Award nominated for Best Production and Best Actor), The TempestAntony & Cleopatra, Macbeth, Emily Mann’s critically acclaimed Meshugah, Olga Humphrey’s Veronika Vavoom Volcanologist, and his own play J: A One-Act Improvised Tragi-Comedy. He also directed numerous developmental workshops and readings including The Tattooed Girl by Joyce Carol Oates, Paranoia by Olga Humphrey and others. Jason directed Professional Skepticism at The Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theatre, The Good Woman of Setzuan and The Cherry Orchard at The Boston Conservatory, Betty and Mortie at The New Theatre, Frankenstein at The Stanley B. Theatre, Baby with the Bathwater for InCharge Productions, The Stronger at The Left Bank Theatre in Tel Aviv, and Aristotle Doesn’t Live Here Anymore and A Land Without Trees at The Second Hand Independent Theatre, which he founded in Philadelphia. Other plays Jason has written include The Dancing BearThe GolemIcaphish and Alice: A Grotesque Turn in Twelve Scenes. Jason received his MFA in directing from The Trinity Repertory Conservatory in Providence, where he was awarded the Pell Scholar Award and directed Richard IIIWaiting for GodotThe Caucasian Chalk Circle and others. He studied at the Eugene O’Neill National Theatre Institute and at the Warsaw Theatre Academy in Warsaw, Poland.

MUSIC & LYRICS - Nathan Leigh
Nathan Leigh is an award-winning composer, producer, and writer. He plays in the bands Super Mirage, A Thousand Ships, and Nathan Leigh and the Traveling Salesmen. As a national touring act, Nathan has performed in nearly every state in the country at legendary venues like Pianos, the Webster Theatre, Copperfield’s, The Middle East, Galapagos Art Space, and The Blue Note. As a composer for theatre, Nathan has written scores for shows at Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theatre, the Berkshire Theatre Festival, American Repertory Theatre, Connecticut Repertory Theatre, Williamstown Theatre Festival, PS122, and Off-Broadway at New World Stages. In 2007, his work on the Debate Society’s The Eaten Heart was the Gothamist’s Sound Design of the Year. He won the IRNE for Best Sound Design in 2009 and 2010 for his scores for Strangers on A Train at the Stoneham Theatre and The Hound of The Baskervilles at Central Square Theatre respectively. Nathan was a recipient of the Boris Segal Fellowship in 2008 to develop the musical Big Money with Super Mirage bandmate and Obie Award-winning playwright Kyle Jarrow at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. In 2011 Nathan received a fellowship from the Banff Center for the Arts to develop the score for the play Froggy by Jennifer Haley. With Kyle Jarrow, Nathan is the co-author of Big Money, and The Consequences (world premiere: Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theatre June 2012). With book writer Jesse Geiger, Nathan is the co-author of the musical Darling. Nathan has written music and lyrics for Song of Songs (world premiere: BCA Plaza June 2011) and Icarus (world premiere: Cambridge YMCA May 2013) with book writer Jason Slavick for Liars and Believers. Nathan is currently developing the new musical Sealand, which ran in serialized form from July to December 2011 as part of the #serials@TheFlea. Nathan writes a regular column for #SoundCheck for Afropunk.com, and is a founding member of the Occupy Wall Street Puppetry Guild. His latest solo full-length album is A Life In Transit.
PUPPETRY DESIGN & DIRECTION - Faye Dupras

Faye Dupras is a theater artist who began her puppet journey over twenty years ago when she met and apprenticed under her childhood hero, puppeteer Noreen Young.  Since then she has performed around the world and has worked as a director, designer and educator throughout Eastern Canada and the USA. She’s collaborated with Liars and Believers on Icarus and Yellow Bird Chase and is excited to back as a creative on Beyond. When not devising with the gang at L&B, Faye creates and tours original puppet productions for all ages.  Critics have described Faye’s award-winning shows as “spellbinding,” “imaginative,” and “powerful.”

PRODUCER - GEORGIA LYMAN

Georgia is pleased to return to A Story Beyond having produced the original version in 2018, with a newborn baby in tow. This is her first full production as Executive Producer, having spent the last 18 months since joining LaB selling and touring with Yellow Bird Chase. Georgia’s past experiences include the honor of being the first Artistic Director of TEDxCambridge and the first in-house producer for White Snake Projects, a Boston-based company premiering original opera. Her work has been seen at Harvard Square’s Mayfair, with immersive spectacle theater in nightclubs, for Medicine Wheel at the historic Cyclorama and at Lawn on D. She served as the Artistic Director of Outside the Box, Boston’s largest interdisciplinary outdoor performing arts festival, where she presented over 2000 individual artists over 3 years. She currently sits on the board of Cambridge Historical Tours.

STAGE MANAGER - Melanie R. Mather Mills

Melanie is thrilled to be collaborating with LAB and revisiting her Boston theater roots. Previous Stage Management for Taproot Theatre (Seattle), Intiman Theatre Company (Seattle), G4 Productions, Speakeasy Stage Company, Boston Theatre Works, and Shakespeare & Company. Production Manager for The Berkshire Fringe. In her spare time, Melanie is also a veterinary Hospital Manager and technician. She thanks Chris, Gwen, and Katelynn for cheering her on and making it all “Go!”

ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER - Talene Pogharian

Talene Pogharian (Assistant Stage Manager)- Other projects include Lyric Stage Company of Boston: Fabulation, The Play That Goes Wrong, Williamstown Theatre Festival: Most Happy in Concert, Just For Us, Jimmy Naughton and Friends, Northern Stage: Spamalot, Commonwealth Shakespeare Company: Cymbeline. Originally from Watertown MA, Talene graduated from Hofstra University in 2021 with a BFA in Theatre Arts. She wants to thank her family and friends for their unwavering support!

COSTUME DESIGN - Kendra Bell
For Liars & Believers, Kendra Bell has designed costumes for Yellow Bird Chase, Who Would Be King, Icarus, 28 Seeds, Song of Songs, and Le Cabaret Grimm. Kendra spends her daytime making beautiful things and teaching Costume Production and technology at Tufts University. Before settling at Tufts, she has worked for Costume Works Inc., Chicago Shakespeare Theater, Glimmerglass Opera, and Hubbard Street Dance. Some of her other design work includes The Kiss, Cabaret, and Alice in Wonderland for Berklee College of Music, The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity (Company One), and Peter (Braintree Films). She is honored to have received an Elliot Norton Award for the Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity, a Best Design Award for Le Cabaret Grimm from the New York Musical Theatre Festival and an KCACTF Excellence in Costume Construction. In 2017, she participated in an Artist Residency Program in Korpo Finland. She holds a BFA in Studio Art from Millikin University and a MFA in Theatrical Design from Rutgers University.
LIGHTING DESIGN - PJ Strachman

PJ STRACHMAN (Lighting Designer) Previously at L.A.B.: A Story Beyond and Yellow Bird Chase Other recent designs include; Flat Earth’s King of Shadows, Delicate Particle Logic, Antigone, A Bright Room Called Day and Silent Sky; Blue Spruce’s Pandora and The OK Diaries; Gloucester Stage’s My Station in Life and Every Christmas Story Ever Told; Boston Public Works’ Los Meadows, Bad Habit’s The Real Inspector Hound, How Soft the Lining, A Man of No Importance, Speech and Debate, Six Degrees of Separation and The Goat or, Who Is Sylvia; and many other area shows. PJ is the regular designer for Gordon College, Merrimack College, and Gann Academy, as well as several area colleges, high schools, and middle schools. PJ is also the coproducer/lyricist at Blue Spruce Theatre.

SCENIC DESIGN & PROPS MASTER - Rebecca Lehrhoff

Rebecca Lehrhoff is a visual, performing, and teaching artist whose work ranges from acting, devising and dance to scenic design, art installation and mural painting. Rebecca was part of the original devising cast of A Story Beyond, but stepped out of the cast to have a baby! A LAB artistic associate, Rebecca’s company credits include: Who Would Be King, Yellow Bird ChaseIrresistible, and Interference. Other performance credit include: The Weird (Off The Grid Theater Company), Winter Panto 2018: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Winter Panto 2017: The Princess & The Pea (Imaginary Beasts), Beowulf, King Arthur (Poets’ Theatre), Sacred Spaces Redux (Exchange Artists), Enigma Variations (Flat Earth Theater), Beck: Song Reader (Chimera Lab Dance Theater). Select scenic design credits include: Winter Panto 2018: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (Imaginary Beasts), How Soft the Lining (Bad Habit Productions), The Farnsworth Invention (Flat Earth Theater- IRNE Award- Best Fringe Show), Penny Penniworth: A Tale Of Great Good FortunePolish Joke (Titanic Theater Company), From the Sea to Somewhere Else (Flotsam Productions), Chalk (Fresh Ink Theater). Rebecca holds a MFA in Contemporary Performance from Naropa University and a BS in theater from Skidmore College. 

MASK DESIGN - Becca Jewett
Becca Jewett is excited to join the phenomenal design team of A Story Beyond as the Mask Designer. Her most recent credits include New Rep’s production of We Will Not Be Silent and Heartland. She was also recently the costume designer Julius Caesar produced by Actors’ Shakespeare Project,  Steve Yockey’s Blackberry Winter produced by New Repertory Theater and A Taste of Honey produced by BCAP. Her other recent credits include Galt McDermot’s The Human Comedy, Edward Albee’s A Delicate Balance, and John Shea’s Erin Go Bragh-less, for which the show won best production at KC/ACTF in 2012. Other recent credits include Hair and Makeup Designer in Residence Opera North from 2012-2014 and Crafts Department at the Glimmerglass Festival 2014-2017.  She looks forward to working on many new creative projects.
TECHNICAL DIRECTION & ASSISTANT SCENIC DESIGN - Ben Lieberson

Ben Lieberson is excited to be working with Liars & Believers once again, after constructing scenery for Who Would Be King. Set design credits include This Place/Displaced (Artists’ Theater of Boston); The Taming, True West, and The Good Body (Hub Theatre Company); Crossing Flight (TC2 Theatre Co.); Really (Company One Theatre); Brilliant Traces, The Taming of the Shrew, and Echoes (Brown Box Theatre Project); Tales of a Fourth Grade Lesbo (Flat Earth Theatre), and It’s Not About My Mother (Fresh Ink Theatre). As a technical director and builder, he has recently worked with Central Square Theatre, Israeli Stage, Dorset Theatre Festival, Bad Habit Productions, and Open Theatre Project. Ben also supervises the scene shop for Wellesley College’s Theater Studies program.

VOCAL COACH - José Delgado

PRESS

“I loved it”

– Theater Mirror

“Exquisite”

– WGBH

History

Beyond Polarization: How Stories Can Save Community

February 23, 2023 at The Foundry in Cambridge, LAB hosted a post-show panel discussing polarization in American society and the power of story to heal division.

Our panelists were: visual and installation artist, Elisa H. Hamilton; NY Times best-selling novelist, Allegra Goodman; MIT Philosopher, Kevin Dorst; and poet, teacher, and activist, U-Meleni Mhlaba-Adebo.

Creation

January 2017 – A Story Beyond began development after the 2016 elections with discussions about current events. We went through two weeks of exploration of folklore from around the world and a week of mask training.

Summer 2017 – We explored story forms and ideas. We first introduced Maya and puppets.

October/November 2017 – We added a new actor and found our way into shadow puppetry. Nathan, our composer, joined the crew and began writing. Our mask training continued and was incorporated into out work more deeply.

February/March 2018 – We brought the show into the first complete form. We gave a free showing to the public and got feedback on how to move forward.

Summer 2018 – We continued revising the script. We further studied shadow puppetry, hand puppetry, and mask. We revised songs and wrote arrangements – and hired a mandolinist and cellist.

November/December 2018 – Final rehearsals and preparation.

December 2018 – World Premiere at the Boston Center for the Arts.