Audio
Familiar • Gigolo Serenade Part Two • I've Been Thinking A Lot About Death Lately • Michaelangelo's Pieta • Courting •
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Writing Samples
Post-Prom Poetical • An Experiment In Love With Two Performers Who May Or May Not Be Involved With Other People • Twitter Plays •
Post-Prom Poetical
[Each ensemble member asks a member of the audience to slow dance with her/him. Don't be pushy ;) if no one will dance with you. Stand by one of the walls. You're now a wallflower, sucka. Slow dance prom music plays. GREG sits on a block or stands by a wall.]
RYAN
Mandy, captain of the Nicolet dance team, was my prom date.
JACQ
I took Billy to my senior prom; he'd been one of my best friends since the fourth grade, when he gave me a hilighter with a heart on it. I was Prom Princess so Billy and I got matching blue sashes and the second dance of the night.
DESIREE
I went with Brian. He did musical theater, played piano, dated this girl Megan Ferry who was Little Miss Musical Theater.
JACQ
Bill and I are still great friends: he graduated from Georgetown and now he lives in a convent in the ghettos of Chicago and teaches in the inner-city Catholic schools, donating his entire salary back to the school. Three years ago he told me he was gay via an email from Australia. I was sort of surprised, and sort of not.
DESIREE
I remember everyone saying he was gay. And he was like, "I am totally not gay." Even after he went to UCLA and did nothing but sleep with boys for his first semester.
RYAN
I thought that after an evening including a rose petal covered bed and "promise rings" engraved with our initials, that we would be together forever.
JACQ
I used to tell Billy he was a genius in our midst, and was certain he'd become the Greatest Writer of Our Generation, and I meant it. I haven't said that to him in a long time.
DESIREE
I remember he was going into political stuff, and he was harping on me the summer after senior year because I started smoking pot, and he kept going, "it's illegal!" Like being gay wasn't technically illegal in some states... whatever.
RYAN
After a dabble of lesbianism, drugs, and 3 different colleges, I heard she was getting engaged to a guy who works at a grocery store.
LINDSAY
No one asked me to my prom. a week before the dance, i sprained my knee in the spring musical and had to wear a brace from my hip to my ankle. i spent the night of the prom with friends listening to irish music in a pub with my immobilized leg elevated on a barstool. i used to be really bitter about the prom, but now i'm getting married which involves a better dress, a bigger party, non-crappy sex and legal drinking. so there.
Curtain.
Post-Prom Poetical • An Experiment In Love With Two Performers Who May Or May Not Be Involved With Other People • Twitter Plays •
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Photography Samples
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Publications
A Gathering Of The Tribes • In Our Own Voice • Maganda Magazine • Bamboo Girl •
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Performance
Providence Improv Festival • TOO MUCH LIGHT MAKES THE BABY GO BLIND • Bard College • The Poetry Project at St. Mark's Church • Vassar College • Jigsaw • La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club • Asian Arts Initiative • the Kelly Writers House • Acentos • Bowling Green State University • National Asian American Poetry Festival • Asian American Writers' Workshop • the 215 Festival • The Philippine Embassy • Philadelphia Poetry Festival • Philadelphia Free Library • Bowery Poetry Club • Lehigh University • Borough of Manhattan Community College • Hampshire Poetry Festival • University of Connecticut • Poetry Dialogues: Balagtasan @ the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival • Yale University • Dixon Place • Fordham University • Swarthmore College • The New York Comedy Club • Fordham University • Princeton University • Polytechnic University • the Cornelia Street Cafe • Pace University • Franklin and Marshall College • Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University • the Philadelphia Fringe Festival • SKETCHOFF!#%!! 4th Annual Asian Comedy Night • the Philadelphia Fringe Festival • the New York Fringe Festival • Columbia University • Amherst College • Cantab Lounge • Juna's • Princeton University • Cornell University • Williams College •
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Bio
F. Omar Telan was born in Industrial Philadelphia during the beginning of the 1876 centennial. With his decidedly halo halo background, Omar adds a singular perspective to Asian American expression. Influenced heavily by Neo-Surrealism and absolutely suburban fabulous, Omar appeals to his fellow artist who understands how satire sometimes involves eating children. Bombastic and introverted, he fascinates the casual audience with his ability to plumb the underbelly of his own psyche while simultaneously appreciating delicious, chilled plums.
After his father transplanted the family in the summer of 1876, Omar grew up in the then rural outskirts of Philadelphia. Omar's sole escape from the farmer's hard life was his imagination. Omar lived a separate life in the land of Honah Lee. By sheer force of will, Omar would transfer his entire body through the looking glass.
Later moving to Boston in 1894, Omar enrolled in the fledgling school of oratory known as Emerson College. To further pursue his own deification and immor(t)ality, he moved to New York City in 1897. But then came the Great Exodus of the Aughts when many fled the Naked City for greener pastures such as the City of Brotherly Love. As of 1907, he has made his home in the Sylvania. Omar has challenged audiences ranging from the La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club to the Dodge Poetry Festival to the Philippine Embassy with his brand of humor, social commentary, and gulliness. Word.
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Serious Bio
Born in Philadelphia and raised in its outlying suburbs, F. Omar Telan graduated Emerson College and the Radcliffe Publishing Course. Making his directorial debut at La Mama E.T.C. (NYC) with THE EDGE OF THE WORLD, he has performed theatrically at P.S. 122 (NYC), the New York Fringe Festival, and the Philadelphia Fringe Festival. His poetry has been published in journals such as A GATHERING OF THE TRIBES and OUR OWN VOICE; and he has read his work at the Poetry Project at St. Mark's Church (NYC), the Kelly Writers House (Philadelphia), the National Asian American Poetry Festival (NYC), the Philippine Embassy (DC), and the Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival (Waterloo Village, NJ). As a member of the New York Neo-Futurists, he shared a 2006 New York Innovative Theatre Award for Outstanding Performance Art Production for TOO MUCH LIGHT MAKES THE BABY GO BLIND.
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Social Networking
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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution - Noncommercial - No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
photo of me peeking by Jen Cleary