Taking Dadplications

Guest Lyndsay drops major knowledge on the dad-less Jessie Wayburn.

Lyndsay (no last names, we’re keeping it casual) is a recovering Theatre kid, pro-am burlesque show producer, and film & television hobbyist. She’s a middling #plantmom and an aspiring #bourbonauntie (like a #vodkaaunt, but Black and more standoffish). When not in executive dysfunction freefall, she enjoys crafting, cooking, yin yoga, and Duolingo for three different languages! During executive dysfunction freefall, she enjoys drinking, glaring at people who sneeze too loudly, and singing 3-5 word snippets of showtunes at random intervals. #Geminiproblems, amirite?!

Taking Dadplications is an Opus Nox Media production.

Music and cover art by Nick Jenkins.

Jessie Wayburn dives deep into spirituality with Dhaya Lakshminarayanan.

Dhaya Lakshminarayanan is the 2016 winner of the Liz Carpenter Political Humor Award (previously awarded to Samantha Bee, Wanda Sykes and satirist/humorist Mark Russell) presented by the National Women’s Political Caucus. Comedy Central Asia crowned her the Grand Prize Winner of “The Ultimate Comedy Challenge” filmed in Singapore. She is the sole subject of the documentary “NerdCool” which premiered at the LA Comedy Festival in 2018

KQED named her one of the twenty “Women to Watch” a series celebrating women artists, creatives and makers in the San Francisco Bay Area who are pushing boundaries in 2016. She was named one of “The Bay Area’s 11 Best Standup Comedians” in 2016 and “13 San Francisco Standup Comedians to Go See Now” in 2018 by SFist. The SF Weekly named her one of the “16 Bay Area performers to watch in 2016.” The San Francisco Bay Guardian named her Best Comedian 2013 in the “Best of the Bay” Readers’ Poll.

She has opened/featured for or worked with the following: Janeane Garofalo, Marc Maron, Greg Behrendt, Jello Biafra, the late Dick Gregory, Anthony Jeselnik, Maz Jobrani, and Greg Proops. Dhaya  introduced former Vice President Al Gore at an event. He then laughed onstage at her joke, so technically she once opened for Al Gore.

She has performed internationally in Shanghai, China; Kuala Lumpur Malaysia, and Singapore. In the US she has been an invited performer at Bridgetown Comedy Festival (Portland, OR), San Francisco Sketchfest, the Boston Comedy Festival (semifinalist), the Limestone Comedy Festival (Bloomington, IN) and Laugh Your Asheville Off (Asheville, NC).

Dhaya was one of the chosen artists by The Asian Art Museum of San Francisco to take the entire museum over for one night. During Takeover:Dhaya Lakshminarayanan, she programmed content including stand-up comedy, humorous fake tours of the museum, and an absurdist interpretation of Indian mythological comic books. The only other artist invited to takeover the museum in 2017 was RZA from the Wu-Tang Clan

Dhaya is also a TV host and storyteller. She hosted the premier year of the Emmy award-winning series High School Quiz Show on PBS’s WGBH. She is a frequent comedic storyteller on NPR’s Snap Judgment and has appeared live in Austin on The Risk podcast. She is currently the host of San Francisco’s monthly Moth StorySLAM after winning a Moth StorySLAM and competing in the GrandSLAM at the Castro Theater (capacity 1400). ON24 awarded her the grand prize for “Best Travel Disaster Story.”

Dhaya is a solo performer, and her first play “Nerd Nation” was funded in parts by The Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center of San Francisco and support from DIVAfest which supports new and developing works by female playwrights. Her workshop run in San Francisco sold out.

The Boston Globe, The Bay Guardian, and The San Jose Mercury News have all run profiles about her. Prior to funny and show business Dhaya was a venture capitalist, management consultant, and two-time MIT graduate. You can indeed call her a nerd.

Taking Dadplications is an Opus Nox Media production.

Music and cover art by Nick Jenkins.

Jessie Wayburn explores the importance of water and punning with Myq Kaplan.

Myq Kaplan is a comedian named Mike Kaplan.

He has been seen on the Tonight Show, Conan, The Late Show with David Letterman, Late Night with Seth Meyers, and in his own half-hour Comedy Central Presents special. He has his own one-hour special on Amazon, Small, Dork, and Handsome, and two podcasts, The Faucet and Broccoli & Ice Cream. He has been a finalist on Last Comic Standing and has appeared on America’s Got Talent. His album “Vegan Mind Meld” was one of iTunes’ top 10 comedy albums of the year, and his newest album "A.K.A."  debuted at #1. The New York Times called it "invigoratingly funny" and included it among its five "coronavirus best new comedy specials"..."to remind you of the old normal." And here we are in the new weird! Enjoy!

Taking Dadplications is an Opus Nox Media production.

Music and cover art by Nick Jenkins.

Jessie Wayburn interviews Nic Jenkins, a visual artist, musician, and a real father to a real baby. They explore the topics of boundaries and time as different kinds of potable liquids.

Taking Dadplications is an Opus Nox Media production.

Music and cover art by Nic Jenkins.

Jessie talks turkey-- er, brisket, rather, with Lindsay Jones for his Dadplicant interview,

Lindsay Jones is an award-winning composer and sound designer.

In theatre, he has been nominated for the Tony Awards of Best Score and Best Sound Design of a Play. His Broadway credits include Slave Play, The Nap, Bronx Bombers and A Time To Kill. His off-Broadway work has been heard at Playwrights Horizons, The Public Theater, MCC, Primary Stages, and many others. International credits include works at Royal Shakespeare Festival (UK), Stratford Festival (Canada), and many others. Lindsay has created music and sound for over 500 productions in regional theatres across the US. Awards include seven Joseph Jefferson Awards and twenty-four nominations, 2 ASCAP Plus Awards, two Ovation Awards and three nominations, a Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award, a San Diego Theatre Critics Circle Award and two nominations, as well as multiple nominations for Drama Desk Awards, Helen Hayes Awards, Barrymore Awards, and many others.

Taking Dadplications is an Opus Nox Media production.

Music and cover art by Nick Jenkins.

@natashamuse is our first dadplicant and we get to "Chatting about Dadding" pretty in depth! Natasha is a joke writer and performer living in San Francisco but thriving on the Internet. Her comedy is so good it's not even funny. (Reader, Natasha is so funny!)

Taking Dadplications is an Opus Nox Media production. 

Music and cover art by Nick Jenkins.

Jessie Wayburn grew up without a dad and is interviewing dadplicants for the position.