SEASON 32 | February 2020
The Hands That Feed You
February 13-15, 2020
Created by Annie Danger
with special guest Erica Nix
The hand that feeds you is not always who you think it is in this surreal evening of theft and collaboration! Thrill to the scent of a live studio audience at a taping for the surreal new game show that is sweeping the nation: The Hands That Feed You--the game in which players craft alliances and rewrite the rules for their co-players in a series of challenges that test their cunning and their ethics. Critics have been raving about The Hands That Feed You, calling it "A thrilling blend of Family Feud and Risk" with a "Heart of gold and the wits of Machiavelli!" When the stakes are high and true intentions revealed, will you have bitten The Hands That Feed You?
Annie Danger (The great Church of the Holy Fuck, It's That Easy! With Terry VanWeen!, The White Stuff) blasts into Austin with her new work, The Hands That Feed You. Horrified at the present state of our world - ecologically, socially, governmentally - and disturbed by a nihilistic focus on dystopic futures, Danger has been making work about utopias both salvageable and realistic. How are we steering this ship toward disaster? Will compostable of drinking straws and a centrist House keep your family healthy in the coming crisis? How can we survive?
With this work, Danger has been studying game theory and restorative justice to produce a surrealist game show to push players to conspire against or collaborate with each other in order to win real cash prizes.
Strategic scenario planning meets The Price Is Right in this fully-interactive, tech-enabled romp through our dystopic US pop culture. Attendees will be the contestants and the remaining audience can play along with a free app they can download at the theater.
Come ready to play!
About the artists
Annie Danger is a San Francisco Bay Area-based performing artist hellbent on conscripting you into an army of revolutionary love and thoughtful hilarity. She is the flavor on the back of your tongue that makes you wonder with excitement what you just ate. Annie is the joke that's not a joke. She works in pop-cultural archetypes, deeply interactive theater, extravagant farce, and all the profound little details to bring radical philosophy into praxis. Annie has toured nationally with It's That Easy! With Terry VanWeen!, The Great Church of the Holy Fuck, and The Fully Functional Cabaret. She has written, directed, and produced interactive happenings like The White Stuff, How To Cook A Frog, and Hex for the Future, performing at the National Queer Arts Festival, Fusebox Festival, and Sister Spit: The Next Generation. You can find her on Facebook as Annie Danger or at anniedanger.com
Erica Nix is Austin’s local fitness guru and heroine, a bright and raucous force in the community for well over a decade. Her memorable performances, professional photography and career as a queer and trans-inclusive, body positive activist and personal trainer are well documented. From interactive poolside provocative variety shows to rallies and demonstrations and featured showcases at OUTsider Fest and aGLIFF, Ms. Nix works with a wide-ranging audience, transforming our hearts and our bodies one being at a time. She was awarded the Austin Critics’ Table for best independent project in 2016 and for Best Personal Trainer in 2017 and 2018. Recently ending her business venture Transform Fitness, one of the only LGBTQIA-focused gyms in the country, her mission remains strong in its current independent state. Her collaborations with her teams of dancers from her workout classes are a continual gift to promote self-esteem and community growth. Erica Nix is the ambassador of fitness and self-love for people that feel unlovable, invisible or simply intimidated by normative culture. Reach for the stars!
The Hands That Feed You is funded and supported in part by VORTEX Repertory Company, a grant from the Texas Commission on the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, and by the Cultural Arts Division of the City of Austin Economic Development Department.