Two shirtless men pose in a room with wooden walls, scattered chairs, darts on the wall, and a mounted deer head. One man raises his arms; the other has a long beard and holds flowers. Others stand in the background.
Two men holding yellow flowers and wired microphones stand in a marked area. Two shirtless men face each other in the background. Neon signs, flowers, and a mounted deer head decorate the wooden walls.
Three men perform on stage: one in a yellow shirt walks, one shirtless with a long beard raises arms, and another stands on a chair reading from a paper. The background features a neon sign and wooden panels.

Nature Theater of Oklahoma: Pizza or A Door In The Dark Does Not Dance or The Meaning of Life

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ABOUT

A pizza party. A dying guest. A portal to the next world. Nature Theater of Oklahoma returns to NYU Skirball with Pizza or A Door in the Dark Does Not Dance, a chamber opera that is miniature in scale and uncompromisingly epic in ambition.

Act one starts innocently, with friends, festivity, and slices going around, until a guest reveals she is dying of a mysterious illness and vanishes from the party. Her presumed death cracks open a doorway to the next world, where the ghosts of the dead, or possibly undead, are still working through unfinished business: scores to settle, questions that demand answers. By turns intimate and cosmic, irreverent and aching. Small opera. Largest things. Pass the parmesan.

RUN TIME
100 minutes

Three reasons to go

HAT TRICK – A third visit to NYU Skirball from a company Young Jean Lee has called one of the best ensemble theater companies in the world.

GENRE-DEFYING – An opera built from the company’s singular method of taking ordinary speech and gesture and exploding them into something strange and moving.

LARGER THAN LIFE – A work that holds the domestic and the cosmic in the same hand, irreverent on its surface and quietly aching underneath.

THE ARTISTS

Nature Theater of Oklahoma

Nature Theater of Oklahoma

CREATIVE CREDITS

Conceived, Written and Directed by: Pavol Liska and Kelly Copper
Featuring: Gabel Eiben, Robert M. Johanson, Tobias Kerschbaumer, Bence Mazei, Jula Zangger and Roger sowie ein lokaler Laienchor
Original Music: Robert M. Johanson, Feat. Bernhard Fleischmann
Set And Light Design, Production Manager: Luka Curk
Light And Sound Technician: Leon Curk
Dance Captain: Bence Mezei

Co-commission, co-producers, supporters, etc.:
A production of Nature Theater of Oklahoma and GOLD & PECH Theater in coproduction with Zürcher Theater Spektakel and made with support from the
Bundesministerium für Kunst und Kultur Österreich and Land Steiermark

BEYOND THE STAGE

Culturally curious? We’ve got you. For each NYU Skirball production, we create extracurricular engagement resources to support the University’s larger academic mission. Whether you’re a student at NYU or a student of life, please explore our Prep School study guides, scholarly essays by NYU faculty, and online artists’ conversations to learn about our artists, their creative process, and all kinds of insights into the shows.

Indefinite Articles

Pursuit of Happiness

Julia Jarcho on Nature Theatre of Oklahoma

While you were living somewhere else, Nature Theater of Oklahoma became the coolest theater company in New York City.

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SUPPORT

NYU Skirball’s programs are made possible in part with support from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature; and the Howard Gilman Foundation; Dance Reflections by Van Cleef & Arpels; Culture Ireland; The Shubert Foundation; Collins Building Services; General Delegation of the Government of Flanders to the USA; Goethe Institut New York with support from the Foreign Office of the Federal Republic of Germany; Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation; Fan Fox & Leslie R. Samuels Foundation; New England Foundation for the Arts; Harkness Foundation for Dance; and Marta Heflin Foundation; as well as our valued donors through memberships, commissioning, and Allies for Arts Access Fund support.