Neighborhood Staple - this monthly donation will cover a year's worth of nuts and bolts stuff like printing, application fees, and snacks for first rehearsals!

Friend - a yearlong membership to A.R.T./New York, transportation one way for production elements, or a month of miscellaneous overhead purchases.

Neighbor - this will support the pay of one artist for one week on a Neighbors' project.

Ambassador - two weeks of pay for a single artist, a year's worth of subscriptions (Zoom, web hosting, etc.), or performance space rental for a staged reading.

Legend - four weeks of pay for one artist, one year of insurance, or almost a year of rehearsal space at A.R.T./New York.

Patron - ten weeks' worth of pay for artists, three months' salaries for the executive team, or a year of overheard / general operating costs.

Fundraisers

$2,500 will support projects across the entire eighth season of WWTNS? Hitting this goal will mean standard pay for all artists, secured overhead for administration, continued free education and community programs, and great works of new theater.

What Will the Neighbors Say?

Since its inception, What Will the Neighbors Say? has premiered 11 original plays in 6 cities in 4 countries on 2 continents, and co-presented a further 24 new works. Over the course of these projects, the Neighbors have created jobs for over 200 artists - 75% of them female, trans or non-binary and 50% of them members of the global majority or immigrants.

Supporting WWTNS? this month will ensure that we can continue to make thought provoking works of theater, offer free community programs and uplift social justice causes across sectors.

What Will the Neighbors Say? is a 501(c)(3) investigative theatre company that provokes questions through untold stories. Founded by a collaborative cohort of international artists, the Neighbors present overlooked social, cultural and historical narratives that challenge the audience to reflect on the current moment. Through a combination of original plays, arts education workshops and dynamic community gatherings, the troupe encourages rowdy and rigorous debate at the theatre and throughout the Neighborhood.

What Will the Neighbors Say? fights for a more empathetic world by presenting risky, provocative theatre that sparks conversations and facilitates greater understanding. Championing our community's capacity to explore ambiguous and nuanced themes, we create morally complex genre-bending work that challenges our audiences before, during and after a presentation. Armed with the understanding that meaningful conversations require varied perspectives, we build Neighborhoods across borders to facilitate new connections throughout our communities.

 - we build accessible communities which are radically transparent, and allow folks to make new and enriching global relationships that lead to intersectional conversations and civic action.

 - we value diversity amongst our collaborators and the voice it gives to the varied perspectives in our Neighborhood, multiplying conversations and elevating the artistic process and product.

 - we know that with rebellious storytelling and expressive designs that confront and arouse, the Neighbors dare audiences to question their beliefs and be transported.

 - we believe that, in order to galvanize our Neighborhood, we must present relevant work that speaks to the lives and concerns of its citizens.

Who We've Served & Who Your Donation Will Support

 - through our work as Adjunct Faculty and Artists-in-Residence at CUNY Queens College, our partnership with the Queens Memory Project and our free writing workshops with the Queens Public Library, the Neighbors have established strong links with immigrant communities in the borough. We have deepened these links further through our original documentary play, “TRACES,” a multilingual story of four immigrant families in Flushing commissioned by CUNY Queens College and twice recognized by the NEA. This piece was devised in collaboration with the faculty and students of CUNY Queens College, the team at Queens Memory project and Flushing’s immigrant residents. It is a work by, for and of this community.

 - our company, founded by a 50% bi-lingual Latinx team, has built and nurtured deep connections with that community in Brooklyn since its inception. Our work in this community includes: providing free arts education at El Puente Presente, a Latinx youth leadership center; curating free bi-lingual writing workshops in collaboration with THE CITY Newspaper and the Brooklyn Public Library; and pairing with MITU580 and Pregones/P.R.T.T. to present “Agua, Vida y Tierra,” a bilingual documentary theatre play dissecting the colonial relationship between the US and Puerto Rico. We have also uplifted Latinx social justice organizations including La Sombrilla Cuir, House of Grace and the Feminist Solidarity Post-Hurricane Relief Fund through fundraisers. 

 - we serve Queer communities across New York through a range of programming and partnerships. This includes our residency with the Gender, Love and Sexuality Alliance (GLASA) at CUNY Queens College, where we present our "Queering the Archives” program, partnering with the Queerly Festival for benefit performances to raise crucial funds for Queer organizations and our work with Queer advocacy groups including the Audre Lorde Project, the Trans Formations Project, Gays Against Guns and Sing Out, Louise!

 - since 2016, the Neighbors’ Co-Artistic Directors have created and commissioned a number of source-based history plays, including WWI drama “Sources of Light Other Than the Sun,” Romanov epic “Four Sisters,” media thriller “The Diana Tapes,” historical multimedia drama “Beauty Freak,” pop culture study “MEDEA/BRITNEY” and Spanish Civil War music play “At the Barricades.” During the course of over 175 performances worldwide, these works have been described by critics as "magnifying" (TimeOut), "intricate" (BroadwayWorld), "provocative" (the Providence Journal) and “intellectual” (Theatre is Easy).

 - using their signature devising methodology, the Neighbors have developed and facilitated a number of research-based devised documentary theatre plays. Some recent examples include: “TRACES,” a devised play about immigrant communities in Queens, presented at the Kupferberg Centre for the Arts, described as "strong and specific” (The Theatre Times); “Agua, Vida y Tierra,” a multi-media piece about Hurricane María and the colonial condition in Puerto Rico, presented at MITU580, recognized by the Brooklyn Arts Council and selected for a BRIClab residency; as well as a number of community-created one-act projects with presenting partners including the Brooklyn Public Library, the Queens Public Library and the Queens Memory Project.

 - the Neighbors originally met as students at the Experimental Theatre Wing at NYU, and a significant portion of their work falls strongly into that category. These include: a political clown show, “Dogs of DC,” presented at the Living Gallery to raise funds for Planned Parenthood on the eve of the 2017 Inauguration; the “Untitled Shape Show,” a TYA folk musical that uses non-gendered “shapes” to address bullying and mental health, which has extensively toured North America; and “Third Law,” a devised interactive multi-media theatre game, which was part of the 2022 BRICLab residency and received a sold-out workshop run at MITU580 in Brooklyn.

 - What Will the Neighbors Say? has been proud to support more than 20 new works in development, presenting or co-presenting them at venues including Catskill Mountain Shakespeare, Alchemical Studios, BRIC House and through the NY International Fringe as co-producers of the “Fringe Club” series at the Nuyorican Poets Café.

 - through the What Will the Kids Say? initiative, the Neighbors have provided free arts education for young people aged 5-17 via their flagship theatre-for-young-audiences musical, the “Untitled Shape Show,” in Providence, New York and Toronto. The Neighbors have also provided free arts education to young people at Central Falls Summer Camp in Rhode Island and at El Puente Presente Youth Leadership Center in Brooklyn. The Neighbors both ​​have NYC DOE clearance.

 - the Neighbors have taught their primary source devising methodology at CUNY Queens College (where they were Adjunct Faculty and Artists-in-Residence for three years), the Wuhan Institute of Design and Science, Ohio State University and the National Alliance of Acting Teachers. They will be joining the Adjunct Faculty at Marymount Manhattan College in this academic year. Other higher education experience includes curating and hosting the 2022 Applied Theatre Convergence at NYU Tisch School of the Arts, “A New Intimacy.” The Neighbors have also worked with interns from CUNY and NYU, providing course credit.

 - over the past seven years, the Neighbors have curated and led a number of free Public Arts Education Projects for a range of communities. This work has included free public writing workshops with partners such as the Brooklyn Public Library, the Queens Public Library, the Queens Memory Project and the Queens College Gender, Love and Sexuality Alliance (GLASA), as well as creative writing initiatives with organizations including THE CITY newspaper, the Interfaith Centre of New York and Let's Re-imagine.