Okwui Okpokwasili: Bronx Gothic

Created by celebrated dance/theater artist Okwui Okpokwasili and directed by Peter Born, Bronx Gothic gives vivid physical force to the charged relationship between two girls on the verge of adolescence in the 1980s. Okpokwasili’s unforgettable performance pushes against extremes and reverberates with a potency that threatens to break the body. Memories surge in this fictive autobiographical invocation—as the lives of two 11-year-olds are revealed with unflinching honesty through their sex-saturated, hand-passed notes. Drawing inspiration from Victorian-era novels and West African griot storytellers, Bronx Gothic conjures a darkly powerful tale of sexual discovery and intimate entwinings in the outer boroughs of New York City.