Bio Archive
| The Femme Show was sponsored in part by The Neighborhood and MadFemme Pride | |
 © 2007 Steph Plourde-Simard |
Maggie Crowley Artistic Director of In the Streets Productions and Executive Producer of The Femme Show. Maggie Crowley is an artist, activist, and teacher committed to community, social change, and sequins. In 2006 she was named one of the Advocate’s 2006 Future Gay Rights Leaders. Her choreography has been featured at First Thursdays in Jamaica Plain, the Dance Complex, Shared Choreographer, Concert, the Boston Children’s Dance Festival, the Riverside Dance Festival, and Dances in Black and White at the Schubert Theatre. She has danced with numerous Boston choreographers and companies, including Kelly Donavon, Tanja London, Big Moves, Perceptions Dance Company, and Boston Dance Company. Maggie holds a BFA in dance and a BA in political communication from Emerson College. Maggie Crowley |
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 © 2007 Steph Plourde-Simard |
Havalah Backus Performer. Havalah hails from Chicago. She just recently moved to Boston by way of Durham, NC where she was an organizer for the Sweaty Southern Radical Queer and Trans Convergence. Havalah is an extremely sexy and fabulous femme who loves wearing anything that shows cleavage, knee high socks and any dress or skirt that is short and poofy! This is the fist piece Havalah has ever performed that she has also written! Havalah is currently studying at Emerson College to obtain her BA in Acting, and is so happy to be sharing the stage with strong amazing femmes and their allies. |
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Johnny Blazes Performer. Johnny received her first dance training at the JP School of Ballet, at age six. Now, after earning a BA in Dance Performance at Oberlin College, Johnny has returned to her home town and has already made her mark on the local burlesque, drag and circus scenes. She has been seen in several Truth Serum events, including Wreckage and The Anti-Slam, and has shared the stage with The Boston Babydolls. At Oberlin, Johnny founded a student circus in 2005, and spent June 2007 touring the Midwest and East Coast as director to a group of 12 circus cabaret performers. Known for her raunchy and somewhat bizarre sense of humor, Johnny irreverently combines drag, burlesque, theater, dance and circus arts to create genre-expanding works that titillate as well as entertain. |
 © 2007 Steph Plourde-Simard |
Ariel Federow Performer. Ariel is a NYC-based choreo-director, performer, and spectacle-maker. She has been seen recently in Big Moves’ Gargantua, Kosher ChiXXX, the JFREJ/Workmen’s Circle Purimshpiel, in the 5768 Sukkos Mob, and she recently turned in her crown as Miss Jew-S-A. She’s a dancer by training (BA, University of Washington) and originally from Seattle, where her work with Ying Zhou and Amy Bollinger was seen in Ladyfest Seattle, Velocity Dance Center’s Under Construction Series, and in 12 Minutes Max at On the Boards. She throws great parties that raise money for even better causes, does trapeze tricks on the subway, and has been known, in the right circumstances, to play with fire. |
  © 2007 Steph Plourde-Simard |
Amanda Johnston (aka Alhena) Performer. Amanda has loved playing dress up since she was a little girl in Elyria, Ohio. But a life dedicated to academics, political activism, and reasonableness didn’t offer much room for it - until she discovered Belly Dance in a post-grad-school frenzy in Austin, Texas. Dancing now for more than ten years, Amanda is currently a performer and board member with Big Moves Boston. Big Moves Marina Wolf Ahmad Performer. Marina got her groove back in 1998, when she started taking hip hop lessons and debuted as a dancer at a fat feminist gathering in San Francisco. She got her femme back (after 11 years in hiding) in 2002, when she began performing burlesque with Heather Macallister’s Fat-Bottom Revue. The founder and artistic director of Big Moves, Marina is fully committed to being the biggest, baddest power-femme fattie to ever storm (off-)Broadway. Big Moves |
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Kate McDonough Performer. Kate recently graduated from Emerson College where she earned a double degree in Film and Political Communications. She currently works as a political organizer and enjoys making campy films in her spare time. Past works include fun little films such as Heterosexual Danger (Emerson College 2004), Tooth Incorporated (Emerson College 2005) and Lusting for Relief (Women in Motion 2006). Kate is super excited to be a part of the Femme Show. |
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Peggy Munson Performer. Award-winning writer and editor, Peggy Munson wrote the Project Queerlit Award winning novel, Origami Striptease, and edited the acclaimed anthology, Stricken: Voices from the Hidden Epidemic of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Her poetry manuscript, Pathogenesis, was a finalist for the Dorset Prize, the Winnow Press Open Book Award, the Tupelo Press First Book Competition, the Word Works/Washington Prize, and the Carnegie-Mellon Poetry Series. She has also been a finalist for the Astraea grant and the Spoon River Poetry Review’s Editor’s Prize. In addition, Peggy was a winner of the San Francisco Bay Guardian Fiction Contest, and she is the most-published writer in the Best Lesbian Erotica series. Peggy Munson |
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Parker Phillips Performer. Parker is a New York City-based conceptual artist who does everything but nothing in particular. |
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Elizabeth Whitney Performer. According to NYTheatre.com, Whitney is a skilled comedienne with a Kristin Chenoweth! voice and excellent timing, but she’s also thought provoking and insightful. Recent accomplishments include the 2005 & 2006 Curve Magazine Lesbian Theatre Award; the 2004 & 2006 Columbus National Gay and Lesbian Theatre Festival Best Solo Performance Award; and the 2004 Fresh Fruit Festival Best Performance Award. Elizabeth is Scholar in Residence at the Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies at Emerson College in Boston. She holds a PhD in Performance Studies and performs work about gender, sexuality, and popular culture. Elizabeth Whitney |
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Lea Robinson Performer. As a student-athlete, Robinson enjoyed a successful career as a four-year letter winner at Western Kentucky University, playing in the 1991-1992 NCAA Final Four as a National Championship runner-up. Robinson’s coaching experience includes Newbury College, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, UW-Milwaukee, Morehead State University, Southern Illinois University, and Murray State University. She currently serves on panels and encourages dialogue surrounding the intersectionality of racism and homophobia in sports through work with It Takes a Team! and The National Center for Lesbian Rights. Lea Robinson |
  © 2007 Steph Plourde-Simard |
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Amy Rain Artist. A femme-dyke-womyn artist/activist working in Portland, Maine. She has taught numerous workshops on art and activism and is currently an advocate/educator in the Domestic Violence Movement. She is known for the creation of the Portland feminist ‘zine Why Is Cunt A Dirty Word?! (WICAD Word). Working from personal narrative, her art investigates topics such as: gender, feminine spirituality, relationships, sexuality, language and women’s health. Her current work, Rendering Feminine Emotion Series depicts portraits of emotions and what they may look like while inside the body. The paintings include emotions that aren’t culturally acceptable for feminine bodies to express, such as anger or sexual appetite. Wicadword |
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AB Commendatore Web Designer/Production Manager. AB is a freelance Web Designer & Stage Manager. She’s worked with many companies around Boston including WERS 88.9, CentaStage, The Longwood Players, The Boston Children’s Choir, The Súgán Theatre, Handel & Hayden Society and Emerson Stage. Upcoming Productions include: The Importance of Being Earnest with the Longwood Players in November. Recent credits: Fort Point Channel Theatre’s 4:48 Psychosis & Small World Big Sky’s Indian Ink. AB holds a BFA in Production/Stage Management from Emerson College. AB Commendatore |
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Lyndon Cudlitz Vendor. Maker of magnets, patches, and light switch plates that are fun, queer, feminist, sex-positive and progressive. Lyndon’s work has been seen at the Vagina Monologues, Translating Identity Conference (Burlington) , Southern Maine Pride, Reproductive Rights Conference, and an Earth Day fair. |
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Katie Diamond Logo Designer/Vendor. Radical Feminist Comic Artist. She strongly believes in the direct cross-over of art and politic, and uses this dogma in her every-day art practice. She’s done many illustrations and cartoons about gender, sexuality, and sex education. She’s also designed many pamphlets, flyers, and posters for various local organizations. Katie will be offering comic books and hand-printed t-shirts. Katie Diamond |
