Is This A Wedding?

Overview

In 2014, two people with the same genitals were permitted to marry each other in all fifty United States. With a great deal of emphasis put on the equality, queer people are left to figure out exactly what marriage entails, sorting through 10,000 years of recorded nuptial baggage. Doing just that, real-life engaged American couple Alison and Crys wade through their personal and cultural histories to investigate what marriage even means for a white lesbian and an Asian American non-binary bisexual. Marrying a pan-historical interrogation of traditional wedding practices with a combined thirty years of performance art training, the couple leaves no stone unturned in their attempt to define and refine what gay marriage is before signing on the dotted line. Concocting deeply weird takes on everything from ancient Greek threshold crossing and sixteenth century European bridal journeys to the obscured history of American miscegenation law and 21st century cake smushing debates, the performers disassemble, and perhaps ruin, the wedding as it is currently understood. From the aisle walk to the first dance to the confounding queer wedding night, the couple pontificates, playacts, and pirouettes their way to answering: is this a wedding?

About the Artist

Previously Philly-based, Alison Hyde Pascale (she/her) and Crys Clemente (it/they/he) are frequent artistic collaborators. Alison is an actor, dramaturg, and performance history scholar whose work centers questions of historiographic equity and agency. Crys dabbles in a little bit of everything production-wise. Together Crys and Alison co-produced Villanova Theater's 2023 Studio Show: STUPID F*CKING SHIP. Crys participated in the 2023 Cannonball Festival via their solo show FAIRE PLAY, as well as working as a festival box office manager and stage manager. After helping to load out Cannonball 2023, Crys jumped into a U-haul drive by Alison to move up to the Bronx together with their cat, Erebus. Alison is currently pursuing a PhD in Theater and Performance at the CUNY Graduate Center. Meanwhile, Crys has been working as a stage manager, lighting designer, and production sound mixer. Crys has an MA in Theater and a BFA Dramatic Writing, while Alison holds an MFA in Dramatic Writing from Fairfield University, an MA in Theater from Villanova University, and a BA in Art History.