Welcome to cultivate., with Jessica Taghap – a new podcast exploring different art forms and their creative processes through interviews with some of the most exciting artists working today.

From an unexpected message on LinkedIn to witnessing an equally unexpected night at the theater—first-time theatre-maker Colleen Murphy keeps on surprising us all with her debut play, I Wore What When, a solo performance presented at the United Solo Festival based on her memories of growing up in suburban Massachusetts. Featuring actor Michelle Shupe and directed by Shole Milos, I Wore What When is a piece that explores memory and trauma.

I’m sitting down today with all three to talk about the process of bringing this story to the stage. We talk about Colleen’s experience stepping into the role of a playwright for the first time, how Michelle and Shole navigated her own steps onstage in the role of Maura, and what they each took away from collaborating with one another.

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Visit iworewhatwhen.com and follow the show on Instagram at @iworewhatwhen_play for news about future productions.

cultivate. is produced, presented, and conceived by Jessica Taghap and is a Resident Artist production. Our intro music is by Bohdan Kuzmin, and our outro is by Taffy Rhythm. New episodes available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, here on Substack, and wherever you get your podcasts. You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, and get updates on residentartist.substack.com.

Welcome to cultivate., with Jessica Taghap – a new podcast exploring different art forms and their creative processes through interviews with some of the most exciting artists working today.

From an unexpected message on LinkedIn to witnessing an equally unexpected night at the theater—first-time theatre-maker Colleen Murphy keeps on surprising us all with her debut play, I Wore What When, a solo performance presented at the United Solo Festival based on her memories of growing up in suburban Massachusetts. Featuring actor Michelle Shupe and directed by Shole Milos, I Wore What When is a piece that explores the link between memory and trauma— specifically, trauma which surrounds the dark underbelly of the Catholic Church within Boston and surrounding Massachusetts communities, as famously chronicled in the Boston Globe.

To talk about the play’s important message regarding sexual violence is playwright Colleen Murphy; Executive Director of The New York City Alliance Against Sexual Assault, Emily Miles; and Ex-Officio at Respect Together, Yolanda Edrington.

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You can follow NYC Alliance on their website at svfreenyc.org, as well as on Facebook and Instagram. You can also find Respect Together on their website at respecttogether.org and on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn; as well as their subsidiary, the Pennsylvania Coalition to Advance Respect, on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

cultivate. is produced, presented, and conceived by Jessica Taghap and is a Resident Artist production. Our intro music is by Bohdan Kuzmin, and our outro is by Taffy Rhythm. New episodes available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, here on Substack, and wherever you get your podcasts. You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, and get updates on residentartist.substack.com.

Welcome to cultivate., with Jessica Taghap – a new podcast exploring different art forms and their creative processes through interviews with some of the most exciting artists working today.

I first encountered the collective work of Robert Lyons and Daniel Irizarry when I reviewed their hit absurdist musical, My Onliness, for Off Off Online back in 2022. It was one of the most unique theatrical experiences I’ve ever had in my years covering downtown theatre, and as it turned out, I wasn’t the only one who thought so. The production received rave reviews during its run at the now-shuttered New Ohio Theatre, where Robert Lyons served as Artistic Director from 1993 until its closure in 2023, and where he and Daniel first began their collaborative partnership. The two, along with fellow performer and composer Rhys Tivey, are now back with their latest collaboration, Class Dismissed, which is currently running at La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club.

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You can follow Robert, Daniel, and Rhys on their respective websites.

cultivate. is produced, presented, and conceived by Jessica Taghap and is a Resident Artist production. Our intro music is by Bohdan Kuzmin, and our outro is by Taffy Rhythm. New episodes available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, here on Substack, and wherever you get your podcasts. You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, and get updates on residentartist.substack.com.

Welcome to a special episode of cultivate., with Jessica Taghap – a new podcast exploring different art forms and their creative processes through interviews with some of the most exciting artists working today.

In a special bonus episode of cultivate. (recorded just before the heady combination of Jess’ birthday and the Christmas holiday), we’re letting loose and going super casual here at cultivate. HQ.

What was initially intended as a chat about our mutual love for the culinary world and Anthony Bourdain (we did do a mini-food tour for #BourdainDay, after all, as I wrote about previously) turned into a chat about my friend Josh and I’s origins in what I called the “dark dungeons of the netherworld that is Broadway fan forums”—particularly, one such forum pertaining to a certain show called Spring Awakening.

Here, we discuss our individual fan journeys with the show, parasocial relationships, and Broadway fan culture past and present.

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You can follow Josh (at your own peril, har har) on Instagram at @forthedownfive.

cultivate. is produced, presented, and conceived by Jessica Taghap and is a Resident Artist production. Our intro music is by Bohdan Kuzmin, and our outro is by Taffy Rhythm. New episodes are available weekly on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Substack, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, and get updates on residentartist.substack.com.

Welcome to cultivate., with Jessica Taghap – a new podcast exploring different art forms and their creative processes through interviews with some of the most exciting artists working today.

In the second of my two-part chat with Mafe, I catch up with the artist shortly after attending the first of four performances of The Postpoetic Machine. We get into more detail about her guest performers (which consisted of movement artist Yoko Murakami, interdisciplinary performer Peter Sciscioli, and bird linguist Enrique Enriquez) and her thoughts and process with each one. We also talk about the important intersection between science and art, and what it means to be an artist.

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You can follow Mafe Izaguirre on Instagram and get updates on her work through her website.

cultivate. is produced, presented, and conceived by Jessica Taghap and is a Resident Artist production. Our intro music is by Bohdan Kuzmin, and our outro is by Taffy Rhythm. New episodes are available weekly on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Substack, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, and get updates on residentartist.substack.com.

Welcome to cultivate., with Jessica Taghap – a new podcast exploring different art forms and their creative processes through interviews with some of the most exciting artists working today.  

This week’s episode has me sitting down over Zoom with TheaterLab’s interdisciplinary artist-in-residence, María “Mafe” Izaguirre, on the first of two conversations.  Born in Venezuela, Mafe eventually settled in New York, where her work in cybernetics seeks to explore “the ways in which humans and technology could cooperate to amplify consciousness.”  In anticipation of her multimedia performance art piece, The Postpoetic Machine (which ran earlier this month alongside guest artists Enrique Enriquez, Peter Sciscioli, and Yoko Murakami), we talked about Mafe’s background in the sciences and visual arts, her eventual transition into multimedia performance art, and her intention behind her latest piece.

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You can follow Mafe Izaguirre on Instagram, as well as get updates about her future work through her website, mafeizaguirre.com. 

cultivate. is produced, presented, and conceived by Jessica Taghap and is a Resident Artist production.  Our intro music is by Bohdan Kuzmin, and our outro is by Taffy Rhythm.  New episodes available every week on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Substack.  You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, and get updates on residentartist.substack.com.

Welcome to cultivate., with Jessica Taghap – a new podcast exploring different art forms and their creative processes through interviews with some of the most exciting artists working today. 

I first met Holly Kaplan during this past summer’s Asian-American International Film Festival (#AAIFF47), and she was kind enough to set some time aside to chat with me about her short film Sunflower Girl, along with the film’s star, Malea Emma Tjandrawidjaja (previously seen in 2021’s After Yang).

In this episode, we talked about the delicate transitional phase of the tween years, the film’s casting process, and the impact of the recent wave of Asian-American and Asian-centered films.

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You can follow Holly on Instagram at @holly.maikin, as well as Malea at @maleaemma.  For those in the Boston area, can also catch a screening of Sunflower Girl this Friday at the Boston International Kids Film Festival – more info at bikff.org/schedule.

For further reading, check out my write-up on Sunflower Girl over on Asian CineVision’s publication, CineVue.

cultivate. is produced, presented, and conceived by Jessica Taghap and is a Resident Artist production.  Our intro music is by Bohdan Kuzmin, and our outro is by Taffy Rhythm.  New episodes available every Friday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Substack.  You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, and get updates on residentartist.substack.com.

Welcome to cultivate., with Jessica Taghap – a new podcast exploring different art forms and their creative processes through interviews with some of the most exciting artists working today.  For our inaugural episode, I chatted with director (or direk, for all my fellow Filipinos out there) Johmar Damiles and his colleagues, producer Anna Velario and co-writer, editor, and creative producer Julius Renomeron  — all of whom comprise the Metro Manila-based Gate 11 Collective.  Their short film, Hot Seat, recently made its international premiere at the New York Asian Film Festival back in July, where I briefly met Direk Damiles, who was kind enough to let me interview him and Gate 11.  

The group spoke with me about their early days meeting individually as students before forming the collective, the struggles and importance of collaboration in the Philippine indie film scene, and how to sustain creativity.

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You can follow all of Johmar, Anna, and Julius’ work with Gate 11 Collective on Facebook and Instagram.

cultivate. is produced, presented, and conceived by Jessica Taghap and is a Resident Artist production.  Our intro music is by Bohdan Kuzmin, and our outro is by Taffy Rhythm.  New episodes available every Friday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Substack.  You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube and get updates on residentartist.substack.com.