FEINSTEIN’S/54 BELOW, Broadway’s Supper Club, presents Bated Breath Theatre Company’s interactive art auction play, Beneath the Gavel, on September 14, 2018 at 9:30pm. Throw your paddle in the ring armed with fistfuls of cash as you rival your fellow audience members to be the last bidder standing at Bated Breath’s interactive high-end art auction play Beneath the Gavel which premiered Off-Broadway at 59E59 Theaters in the Spring of 2017. Feinstein’s/54 Below transforms into a Sotheby’s-like auction house complete with deep-pocket collectors, ruthless art dealers, celebrity artists, and cut-throat auctioneers all vying for a Daniel Zeigler painting from the prized Haddie Weisenberg Collection. With world-renowned auctioneer Barbara Strongin at the podium, Beneath the Gavel exposes the hidden agendas and dirty secrets of the art world. As the stakes rise, so does the tension of a world that deals in billions. Not a Rockefeller? Don’t worry, Bated Breath provides the money.
Beneath the Gavel is written and directed by Mara Lieberman in collaboration with Bated Breath Theatre Company. Lieberman, who has written and directed every Bated Breath production since she took the helm in 2012, specializes in creating interactive theatre in order to envelop audiences in multi-sensory, lived experiences in a way that sheds new light on old issues and responds to the changing demands of American theatre audiences. Some of her productions include The Un-making of Toulouse-Lautrec (performed in a secret location in the Flatiron District), award-winning Freedom: In 3 Acts, Wild Things: The Life and Work of Maurice Sendak. Lieberman has also developed Bated Breath’s museum series “Viewpoints &…” which brings the unique way Bated Breath makes theatre into gallery spaces to respond to installations. Most recently, Bated Breath responded to Nick Cave’s “The Let Go” at the Park Avenue Armory.Lieberman also leads the Bated Breath Physical Theatre Training Center which trains the next generation of theatre artists to respond to the changing landscape of American Theatre.
Audiences want experiences. They are stepping outside of traditional theaters and are gravitating to interactive live performance where they can get a piece of the action. Award-winning Bated Breath has a track record of excellence, custom making and performing new work in partnership with non-traditional sites to create interactive plays that address fascinating episodes from historical events and current cultural touchstones. Often these original works will go on to tour more traditional theatrical venues. Bated Breath’s plays have been seen in theatres, galleries, museums, historical landmarks, supper clubs, as keynote speeches for conferences, and in secret penthouses in order to reignite the theatre going experience.
Stories from auction world veteran, Barbara Strongin, who has decades of experiences working at both Christie’s and Sotheby’s, inspired Beneath the Gavel and Strongin will serve as the auctioneer for the play.
Beneath the Gavel plays Feinstein’s/54 Below (254 West 54th Street) on September 14 at 9:30pm. There is a $25 – $35 cover charge and $25 food and beverage minimum. Tickets and information are available at www.54Below.com. Tickets on the day of performance after 4:00 are only available by calling (646) 476-3551.