Empty Room

[The evening news broadcasts a terrible climbing toll. You start to wonder if your neighbors will ever even know your name. Silence is not an option. Silence is not an option.] A new experimental radio play by poet and essayist JP Seabright. In a dystopia seemingly shuttering in on itself, two companions try to mine meaning from one another's fading memories and desires, hushed by the drone of television static and flickering industrial lights. Written to be performed in a randomized sequence each evening, CONTROL. HALT. DELETE. drums out the mundane rhythm of two lives under tyranny, refracted through an alien drama that borrows its stilted moods from Orwell, Lynch, Beckett, Brecht, and Ballard. Voiced by Lizzy McCabe and Spike Pulice. Directed and designed by Jarid McCarthy. . . . EMPTY ROOM 2024 VARIANT: ULTRAVIOLET Read Along: emptyroomradio.com/chd-seabright-3

[You know someone might be watching, but not who or why. This room is familiar enough that it could be home, for now. You don't know how long it's been this way. Is it all a show?] A new experimental radio play by poet and essayist JP Seabright. In a dystopia seemingly shuttering in on itself, two companions try to mine meaning from one another's fading memories and desires, hushed by the drone of television static and flickering industrial lights. Written to be performed in a randomized sequence each evening, CONTROL. HALT. DELETE. drums out the mundane rhythm of two lives under tyranny, refracted through an alien drama that borrows its stilted moods from Orwell, Lynch, Beckett, Brecht, and Ballard. Voiced by Lizzy McCabe and Spike Pulice. Directed and designed by Jarid McCarthy. . . . EMPTY ROOM 2024 VARIANT: BRONZE Read Along: emptyroomradio.com/chd-seabright-2

[The way here is hard to remember. You work without a break, but don't know what your job is. A nightly lottery is required viewing. Someone familiar is at the door.] A new experimental radio play by poet and essayist JP Seabright. In a dystopia seemingly shuttering in on itself, two companions try to mine meaning from one another's fading memories and desires, hushed by the drone of television static and flickering industrial lights. Written to be performed in a randomized sequence each evening, CONTROL. HALT. DELETE. drums out the mundane rhythm of two lives under tyranny, refracted through an alien drama that borrows its stilted moods from Orwell, Lynch, Beckett, Brecht, and Ballard. Voiced by Lizzy McCabe and Spike Pulice. Directed and designed by Jarid McCarthy. . . . EMPTY ROOM 2024 VARIANT: MARINE Read Along: emptyroomradio.com/chd-seabright-1

Broadcasting April 10th: A NEW PLAY by JP SEABRIGHT A dystopian lottery. Lights flickering on and off according to schedule. Two partners sitting in their usual places, trying to remember how they got there. Presented in three variations, and performed in a randomized order, JP Seabright's modular drama follows a couple's futile and stilted attempts to understand one another in the midst of a totalitarian regime. Voiced by Spike Pulice and Elizabeth McCabe.

"Well, it's true what they say. Practice makes perfect." An all-night rehearsal that stretches into morning. A pianist straining over their instrument– and their instrument straining back. CHROMATIC SCALE is the first one-act play of poet Leela Raj-Sankar, exploring a musician's relationship to the art that confounds them. Voiced by Claire Wagner, the pianist, and Diego Noll, the piano. Performed in phantom-concert with a frustrated arrangement of Chopin's Ballade No. 1 in G Minor by Matthew M. Hayashi. Read the full piece online: emptyroomradio.com/chromatic-scale . . . EMPTY ROOM SUMMER 2023 @emptyroomradio

SIDE B: An interview with Garett Strickland. Empty Salon contributor Garett Strickland meets with the operator to explore Ordealism & Liminalogy; his books UNGULA (2020) and A PLACE BEYOND (forthcoming, 2023). Jarid and Garett discuss the all-encompassing task of struggling to leave a mark on deep-time, the horrors and hopes of technology, the failure of mediation, as well as wonder about what remnant of the human experience will survive the flood. Islands of plastic incubating new life, a thousand years of unwatched security footage, a dollar bill anointed as a final image. Listen to Garett's original composition, 'MUTATIS MUTANDIS' in the COMPULSION PETAL anthology: emptyroomradio.com/garett-strickland-s2 Garett Strickland is a love-singer, portalogist, so-called Nervous Appalachian, and also the author of UNGULA (Inside the Castle, 2020), SCRIMS (Cloak, 2023), and A PLACE BEYOND (Inside the Castle, 2023). He can be found on Twitter or Instagram at @grotstricken where one can often see his cat or sometimes hear him singing from behind a curtain. This is the second of two artist-dialogues with contributors to the second installation of Empty Salon. Recorded in June of 2022. Featured music: Scott Walker - Angelica View the full anthology /// Empty Salon: COMPULSION PETAL /// emptyroomradio.com/salon-2 . . . EMPTY ROOM 2023

SIDE B: An interview with Rebecca Valley.  Empty Salon contributor Rebecca Valley meets with the operator to discuss Place, Performance, and the work of returning– to a body, a home, a piece of art. Despite timezone errors and podcast anxiety, Rebecca and Jarid debate Cornfields, Disneyland, Domestic Theater, as well as explore Rebecca's relationship to her hometown and its presence in her manuscript, LAKE ECHO.  Listen to Rebecca's poems 'Stage Directions for a Stick in the Wind' and 'The Word' from LAKE ECHO in the COMPULSION PETAL anthology: emptyroomradio.com/rebecca-valley-s2/ Rebecca Valley is a poet and essayist living in Cambridge, Vermont. She received her MFA in Poetry from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Her chapbook the Salvageman was published by o-blek editions in April 2022. She currently serves as the editor-in-chief of Drizzle Review and curates writing prompts on performing and making art in your home on Instagram @living_room_theatre. You can find her online at www.rebeccavalley.com. This is the first of two artist-dialogues with contributors to the second installation of Empty Salon. Recorded in May of 2022.  View the full anthology /// Empty Salon: COMPULSION PETAL /// emptyroomradio.com/salon-2 . . . EMPTY ROOM 2023

Jordan is on the edge with her fiancé, when a stranger enters her world and slyly turns it upside down. Insistent on honing his social skills with someone who seems as kind as her, he leads them into an increasingly pointed debate about the tides of culture, love, and Jordan's own looming commitment. Developed from a conversation overhead in a coffee shop, Richard Gustin's SOMEONE LIKE ME is a socially awkward comedy about the intimate places a total stranger can unexpectedly take us. Written by Richard Gustin and directed by Isabel Rodriguez. Sound design by Jarid McCarthy. CAST: Jordan (or 'Bri') - Marisa Taylor Scott The Man - Jalen Davidson Someone Like Me was first performed and recorded in September 2022 in San Diego, California. EMPTY ROOM • 2023 . . . Dramatists Guild of America · Copyright © 2023 by Richard Gustin For script production inquiries contact Richard Gustin: [email protected]

SIDE A: Sevilla, Waugh, King, Billingsley, Valley, Hardstark, Strickland, Glinnen, Rose, Galleran, Vincent, March & Georgeson.  An anthology of poetry, drama, sound art, and music. Featuring twelve performances, readings, and improvisations. Addictions, obsessions, swarming bees, shattering glass, gardens and flames. ‘The Failed Sorcerer’ by Karlo Sevilla, voiced by Tamla Quipse ‘Balance in the Spot Where I Stand’ by Seanan Palmero Waugh, voiced by Ramon Suzara ‘In which diagnosis makes it easier to get work done’ by Sophie King ‘Chaos is Your New / Garden’ compiled and performed by Jacob Billingsley ‘Stage Directions for a Stick in the Wind’ & ‘The Word’ by Rebecca Valley ‘Shoes’ by Michael Hardstark, performed by Erica Jackson ‘Mutatis Mutandis’ by Garett Strickland ‘Long Beach, Saturday Morning’ by Rich Glinnen ‘Leaving a Hole’ by Arianna Rose ‘Attachment’ & ‘Memory’ by Kate Galleran ‘Elegant Carnage’ by Allison Vincent, performed by Charlie Diamond ‘Death Chant’ performed by Mark Georgeson & Charles March . . . This episode is part one of the second installation of Empty Salon, a radio-gala and anthology series to complement and complicate our regular programming. Follow Empty Room on Twitter or Instagram @emptyroomradio for updates on the project and upcoming episodes of the salon. View the anthology online now at emptyroomradio.com/salon-2 

"But that's the first rule of good writing: kill your darlings, right?"  A short story about the fate of a forthcoming Romance novel being optioned for a Hollywood adaptation. An email from Dawn on behalf of Jacinda. An ill-fated love triangle. A love-letter from the angel Abdiel on behalf of Garett. Some slight editorial concerns. A roomful of imposters.  Written by Jesse Hilson. Voiced by Charlie Diamond. Read the full piece: emptyroomradio.com/the-love-prompts-hilson [Music samples include U.S. Girls and Guillaume Dufay.]  . . . EMPTY ROOM SPRING 2022 @emptyroomradio