Stars of the AVT #29: Michele Carlo
This post is one of a series profiling the hundreds of performers I’ve presented through my American Vaudeville Theatre in celebration of its 15th anniversary. Don’t miss the American Vaudeville Theatre’s 15th Anniversary ExTRAVaganza in the New York International Fringe Festival this August!
I’ve already written about Michele Carlo at some length here in my review of her swell book Fish Out of Agua: My Life on Neither Side of the (Subway) Tracks. I met her when we were both running with the Surf Reality/ Collective: Unconscious crew…she wound up in our 2001 revival of Orgy of the Dead, as well as some of our vaudeville shows, including the September 11 benefit in 2001. This was when she was still performing as “Carmen Mofongo”, the L.E.S.’s One And Only Latin Lady With Stuff On Her Head . Not long after that, the gifted writer/performer (who has lived in four of the five boroughs of NYC) launched the “It Came From New York” storytelling series, and began telling stories at The MOTH, both of which eventually led to her first book, which came out to great acclaim last summer.
Says Carlo of the transformation: “This is the umpteenth time I’ve re-invented myself as an artist since I discovered the talent-nurturing haven that was the LES alternative comedy/theater scene of the mid 1990s/early 2000s. I was referred to Surf Reality’s open-mike by a fellow performer after a car accident left me unable to audition for legit acting parts. So I began as an actress, then segued (very) briefly into a stand-up comedian, then became a performance artist, sketch performer, playwright and solo artist, then a burlesque and variety emcee, then a storyteller, writer and now, a published author. It’s been a long, awesome ride, yet it feels like it’s just beginning. “
On influences: ” The open mikes at Surf Reality and Collective:Unconscious both mentored and inspired me, specifically: Faceboyz Open Mike and Rev. Jen’s Anti-Slam. I’ve also been inspired by performers and writers as diverse as Carmen Miranda, John Leguizamo, Gilda Radner and Tracey Ullman; Sandra Cisñeros, Esmerelda Santiago and Junot Diaz, Dorothy Parker, J.R.R. Tolkien and Legs McNeil, along with every storyteller I’ve met through The MOTH and all its offshoots.”
To read some awesome press on Michele in the Wall Street Journal, New York Daily News, Time Out New York, et al., go here.
To learn more about vaudeville past and present, consult No Applause, Just Throw Money: The Book That Made Vaudeville Famous, available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and wherever nutty books are sold.
