Miss Manhattan Hangs Out with MTHR TRSA
High and Scared.
In a dressing room at Performance Space New York, MTHR TRSA is brushing a wig as bodies twist themselves into a host of pantyhose, spandex, and ALMOST NONBINARY t-shirts (yes, you can buy them–here, along with her ACTIVELY EATING shirts). Today, in about two hours, she’ll be debuting her performance piece High and Scared, an experimental work in progress, the title of which she also has tattooed on her back in stick-and-poke script. Until showtime, wigs need fluffing, costumes need adjusting, lighting cues need organizing. It’s a periodic dash up and downstairs.
If High and Scared is at all similar to the work of TRSA’s that I have seen previously, my brain will positively fall out of my head. From the first time I saw her perform–at an outdoor version of Bushwig in Maria Hernandez Park during the pandemic, in rhinestoned New Balances, no less–I have watched her bend and twist the possibilities of drag, of performance, of what it means to take up space, of what it means to be vulnerable. She does this not just through her work onstage, though, but in images and production–some of her clients include Condé Nast, Paper Magazine, and Adidas, among others–and even as a DJ. I have come to anticipate cultural commentary, wry self-awareness, and innovative storytelling in anything she does.
Even backstage, these qualities start to reveal themselves, as TRSA directs her cast, many of them denizens of drag and nightlife themselves, into wig caps, bungee cords, blazers, and singlets. Downstairs in one of PSNY’s black box spaces, she runs them through the show, where they’ll enter, where they’ll get their microphones. She places the run of the show by the door.
Performers retreat to the dressing room until the start of the show, and the low hum of a crowd buzzes outside. People who have shown up tonight know TRSA’s magic. Soon the audience is big enough that the venue has to add more chairs.
Set in the flickering lights, loneliness, and listlessness of the club, the performance becomes a meditation on loss and identity through a nightlife lens. It is “built on endurance choreography and physical therapy-inspired movement” that pulses under vibrant hues as a story of grief reveals itself, glossed with TRSA’s signature dark humor. Sometimes the only way to survive is to keep going. But, as TRSA asks us to consider, maybe it was just a fashion show all along.
Not only is my brain separate from my skull, it is now merely hanging on by a thread. This is the only kind of performance I ever want to see, the kind I leave realizing there are ways to tell a story I didn’t even know existed. And this is just a work in progress? TRSA is a fucking genius. I pick my jaw up off the floor, but I leave my brain unattached for a while, reveling in the magic of disconnection, feeling fed, feeling grateful for her work and swimming in awe of this artist.
