Imagine it: God banished your bad ass lil cousins from your peaceful garden of paradise eons ago because they couldn't act right, and so for the rest of forever you've just been in the house ... not doing shit? No actually, you and your homegirls (gender inclusive) - your homegirls who can follow the rules (no shade) - have been growing closer to each other. Putting down roots and watching your flowers bloom, playing pretend, watching trash TV (God has great wifi), video gaming, being gay and shit ... and is it lonely? To feel like this kind of love only ever comes in small, safe, places and spaces? Do you wish you could all come to the garden party? Don't you miss your bad ass lil cousins sometimes?

Maybe it's enough to hope that the seeds you planted with them, all that time ago, will grow into gardens of their own one day. Until then ... maybe we keep sowing our other seeds together? Maybe one day we'll share our gardens together again.

The Other Gardeners is a multidisciplinary dance theatre performance created collaboratively by Very Good Dance Theatre by and for Black artists and/or those from African lineage. Gardeners playfully (re)imagines what remains of Eden after its more popular residents (Adam & Eve) have moved on, and reminds us that paradise cannot be destroyed, only lost. This project explores questions around lineage, diaspora(s), liberation, and asks all those in its midst to grapple with which burdens have been placed on them, by who, and how we can one another shoulder them. The Other Gardeners is a Black queering of our origin stories, both a prequel and a sequel, and a conjuring of all the auto-biographies that never came to be, or at least not yet?

Gardeners premiered as part of Cannonball’s Miniball festival in April 2023 and returned to Cannonball in September as a BIPOC New Work Track recipient, and has since has been performed at FringeArts in partnership with Cannonball and Odyssey Studios with the support of the Dallas Office of Arts & Culture.

“Swing by as our ensemble of multidimensional Philadelphia artists mod podge our stage. We have a collage of acts that will glue you to your seats. Have an appetizer and a drink from the bar as we delight your artistic palate with musical, comedic, drag, clown performances and more! Our clowns will serenade your table and our Queens will make you gag. You are in for a variety of delights!

Mod Podge is a  combination platter performance featuring local artists Colby Calhoun, Micah Lat, MK Korbish, Stephen Doutt, Esmé Eventide and more!

This production is presented by Pig Iron School Class of 2025’s Ryann Elise and Elizabeth Feinschreiber. We look forward to sharing a bit and a bite with you!”