Miss Manhattan Hangs Out with Amygdala
Jesus is a drag queen.
The tail of a long blond mullet cascades over Amygdala’s shoulders at Stone Circle Theatre, by evening a performance venue and by day a Presbyterian church. Stained glass colors the windows. Pews will be rolled out as seating for the night’s show, Cetacea. This is the latest installment of Amygdala’s series Pleasure Dome, named for Kenneth Anger’s 1954 film Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome.
The first time I met Amygdala we had an extended conversation about glamour, particularly Virginia Postrel’s 2013 book The Power of Glamour: Longing and the Art of Visual Persuasion. Every time I have seen Amygdala perform, she infuses these ideas through her own lens–her own amygdala, if you will–and glamour becomes not just lashes batting into infinity but curved lips and cheeks, maybe a red or pink contact lens, shoulders topped with devil horns, feather robes, braided extensions and more. She filters glamour, drag, fiber art, and new media through a visual language she’s created for herself. With Pleasure Dome, she allows artists to do the same. In the brain, the amygdala is the essential portal for processing emotions.
Tonight’s theme, Cetacea, is inspired in part by whales–Amygdala has a whale tattoo on her arm. She is fascinated by their vastness, their unknowability, and even their nonlinear evolution–at one point, they may have even had feet. Maybe nothing moves in a straight line.
Amygdala points to lights and moves pews and discusses acts with the artists. The entire time, she’s gracefully checking items off a list as she and the team transform the theatre into the Pleasure Dome. If she is anxious or nervous, I can’t tell. Rehearsing, she climbs into a pair of ripped pantyhose spread across her arms and chest–it looks cooler than anything I’ve ever worn in my life.
The setting sun bends into the space and eventually fades to black. Jesus alternately gets lit up and turned off in the background, another star of the show this evening. He is a drag queen, Amygdala quips. Overhead, the ceiling morphs into an oceanic layer of blue and green lights that twinkle as guests arrive.
Each artist in the show has interpreted the theme in original, thought-provoking ways. This is by design, Amygdala tells me–they’re all given 15 minutes to create a performance (or performances) matching the theme, and can split up the time however they like: short scenes, dance, drag, puppetry, all of the above. It gives the artists an opportunity to create work for themselves, that doesn’t have to have the energy of the club, that doesn’t have to be a tip spot (although the Pleasure Dome audience still definitely tips)--it’s more Bjork’s “Hyperballad” and Madonna’s “Candy Perfume Girl” than Top 40.
Several numbers leave me agape, as they have every other time I’ve gone to Pleasure Dome. I shouldn’t be surprised. In addition to her own work, Amygdala also has taste and vision, themselves artforms. The show’s success is as much in the magic of creation as it is curation.
