by Ella Lee Davidson

January 15-18, 2025

Running Time: 90 Minutes

Self-identified real-ass bitch and Angry Black Woman, Peola is unlucky in love and constantly asking herself the age-old question: “When is it my turn to be happy?” After a near-death experience, she decides to make a change in her life and undergoes an experimental surgical procedure to get a BBI (Be Better Implant). Peola finally has a chance at happiness and embracing her divine feminine, as well as finding a man, but the implant and its creator are not without complications and not as perfect as they seem. Sapphire is a surreal afro-futurist satire about the stereotypes we give ourselves and others, the idea of perfection and the ideal woman, and the concept of change.

Written by Ella Lee Davidson

Directed by Jordan Powell

Produced by Paul William Levine

Stage managed by Qu’Raun Scott-McKoy

Set and projections by Leon Caleb Christian and Kai Hartman

Costume design by Jason Goodwin

Sound and original music by Camelia Muniz Torres 

Lighting by Iman Louis-Jeune 

Starring Scenarious Thurmond, Anike Sonuga, Doyin Ajijola, Jordan Jackson, and Enette Fremont

Social media content created by Chloe “Lulu” Mutebi

Show art created by @mastosmthg

Sapphire was originally developed with Fresh Ground Pepper.

Content warnings: This show contains depictions of physical and domestic violence.

~ A pleasure, a mess, a thrill, and a dream. ~

Exponential is a month-long January festival dedicated to New York City-based emerging artists working in experimental performance. The participants in this multi-artist, multi-venue festival are committed to ecstatic creativity in the face of commercialism. Exponential is driven by inclusiveness and a diversity of artists, forms, and ideas coupled with utopian resource-sharing, mentoring and the championing of risky, rigorous work in eclectic fields.