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Stories of Origin is a collaborative exploration of our beginnings. It's composed of individual pieces, conceived and created by Theatre of the Electric Mouth's members. The entire project is produced by Molly Cohen with mixing and mastering by Zach Trebino. It features: Funny Little Stories About Mother's Day from Reddit by Ali Rojek & Jake Regensburg, Box by Rachel Thomas-Levy, Advice from Early 20th Century Parenting Guides by Davis Alianiello, My Mother Reads Poetry by Lyubomir Parushev, It Would Have Been Enough by Molly Cohen, Excerpts from Plan C by Molly Cohen, The River Took Her by Kristen Aldrich & Justin Evans, Pinoy Market Shuffle by Steve Barroga, Mommy is Dead by Cara Dodge, Sauce Talk by Zach Trebino, You're Going to Be the Worse by Eric Fleising, and A Planting by Tessara Morgan

In a post-mortem letter to his daughter, a mysterious man reveals a life-long secret he’s maintained for the safety of humanity. Will she be able to handle The Truth? ########## written by Eric Fleising and directed by Andrew Clark, with sound by Zach Trebino featuring Lyubomir Parushev as Jason, Cory Ringdahl as Cornelius, and Samantha Turret as Beth mastered by Will Koch

We gathered with ThEM members near and far to bring you the fifth installment of "From the Electric Mouth." March's reading is a psychedelic wormhole of epic proportions - like if Ken Kesey met Richard Feynman inside of Deepak Chopra's mind. As always, we fed our AI a sumptuous feast of texts and it has regurgitated an absurdist masterpiece. Will this reading make sense? Or will it slide deep into the uncanny valley, never to be seen again? No one knows and that's all part of the fun! ########## AI whispering by Justin Evans and directed by Rachel T-L featuring Saalika Khan, Lauren Kriel, and Teddy Lytle

Cross of Crying Dogs is a Dadaist manifesto, a call to (in)action from an exasperated population forcing us to ask, "How many crosses is too many crosses to bear? And who’s cross am I really carrying?" The answers don't matter though, cause all of us'll be buried in the rubble of the crosses we failed to bear soon enough - at least that's what these crying dogs are saying. ########## written by Justin Evans and directed by Lyubomir Parushev, with sound by Lyubomir Parushev and Zach Trebino featuring Andrew Clark, Justin Evans, Lexi Hauck, Rachel Thomas-Levy, and Zach Trebino

We gathered with ThEM members near and far to bring you the fourth installment of "From the Electric Mouth." February's reading is a white-knuckled bunch of nonsense in the style of a noir. Imagine if Dashiell Hammett met up with David Fincher for a new version of that movie Panic Room but the script was written by a robot that's only read about noir on Wikipedia. As always, we fed our AI a sumptuous feast of texts and it has regurgitated an absurdist masterpiece. Will this reading make sense? Or will it slide deep into the uncanny valley, never to be seen again? No one knows and that's all part of the fun! ########## AI whispering by Justin Evans and directed by Cara Dodge featuring Blake DeVaney, Bree Ogaldez, and Lyubomir Parushev

Sometimes, no one is nobody, but in this case, No One is someone and they’re knocking at the door. It doesn’t matter that you’re in the shower or munching on chips and dip; if No One’s knocking at the door and you don’t answer, No One’ll never go away. Or, if they do, No One might just have to take you with them. ########## written by Lyubomir Parushev and directed by Molly Cohen, with sound by Zach Trebino and video by Steve Barroga featuring Samantha Turret as Sam and Tom Vinson as Jack

We gathered with ThEM members near and far to bring you the third installment of "From the Electric Mouth." January's reading is an absurd and poetic diatribe that positions the past squarely in the present - something like if a Ken Burns imitator made a documentary about a fictitious Civil War-era QANON movement. As always, we fed our AI a sumptuous feast of texts and it has regurgitated an absurdist masterpiece. Will this reading make sense? Or will it slide deep into the uncanny valley, never to be seen again? No one knows and that's all part of the fun! ########## AI whispering by Justin Evans abd directed by Davis Alianiello featuring Helen Laser and Samantha Turret

continuance is a dystopian dramatic cycle, spanning 3 generations. A man and a girl, a mother and a son, a son and a girl - all desperate for something like eternity amid a decaying world, gasping for hope while struggling to breathe, and forever stuck in the patterns of the past. ########## written & directed by Zach Trebino with sound by The Mysterious Mac featuring Andrew Clark as Son, Molly Cohen as Girl, Admiral Grey as Mother, Rachel Thomas-Levy as Young Girl, Patrick Scorese as The Narrator, and Zach Trebino as Man

We've gathered with ThEM members near and far to bring you the second installment of our double feature of "From the Electric Mouth." For December, we have the holiday treat none of you have asked for - dueling AI readings. Two casts, two directors, same AI-generated script. Will tonight's crew emerge from the uncanny valley unscathed? Or will its competitor best them in this nonsense sense-making competition? You'll have to tune into both to find out!

A seemingly typical mid-century American family sits down to dinner, and a Daddy looks his beautifully beaked baby b(oy)ird in the eyes and tries not to see all the pieces of himself he most loathes, while a Mommy tries her best to care for both of her special boys. To what lengths will this family go to maintain Daddy’s carefully constructed illusion of normalcy? ############ written by Zach Trebino and directed by Rachel Thomas-Levy, with sound by Corey Regensburg featuring Corey Regensburg as Icky, Patrick Scorese as Ren, and Samantha Turret as Pearl

A breakfast of spectacular toast, the faded memory of a murderous mountain train ride, and the hell of endless telephones. Memories are mashed up, the past is confounded, and the present is confused. We can't be sure anything is real, except the toast. ########## written by Justin Evans and directed by Molly Cohen sound by Molly Cohen & Justin Evans featuring Kristin Aldrich as Martha, Cara Dodge as Jessup, Lexi Hauck as Laura, Jake Regensburg as Jim, and Cory Ringdahl as Spade

For December, we have the holiday treat none of you have asked for - the first of two dueling AI readings. Two casts, two directors, same AI-generated script. Will tonight's crew emerge from the uncanny valley unscathed? Or will its competitor best them in this nonsense sense-making competition? You'll have to tune into both to find out!

Newman, Newman, Newman, or NewMan is a madcap game show where contestants guess whether clues point to Paul Newman, Randy Newman, Newman from Seinfeld, or a synthetic human android, NewMan. Will anyone win or will all contestants be assimilated into NewMan’s core AI? You’ll have to tune in to find out! ############ written & directed by Zach Trebino, with sound by Zach Trebino, too featuring Andrew Clark as The Announcer, Cara Dodge as Tina, Justin Evans as Dave, Sarah Lacy as EMT, Lyubomir Parushev as One-Eared Rob, Cory Ringdahl as NewMan, Patrick Scorese as Tony, Rachel Thomas-Levy as Tarah, and Zach Trebino as Rat Rattigan

We gathered with ThEM members near and far to bring you the first installment of our new series "From the Electric Mouth: a reading series of AI-generated scripts" We've got our hands on an AI skilled at slinging words. We fed it too many Bytes of gameshow scripts, and it spit out a script for TheM. Lucky for us, we also have some intrepid performers who are going to read this script. We have no idea how this will go, so join us to see if we devolve into total chaos and self-immolate or emerge from the uncanny valley unscathed! ########## directed by Molly Cohen, with AI whispering by Justin Evans featuring Kristen Aldrich, Cara Dodge, & Jake Regensburg

Like most nights lately, Hannah can’t help anxiously combing through the previous day’s thoughts as she drifts to sleep. This night, however, she discovers an unexpected occupant in the recesses of her mind. And he's not going anywhere. ############ written by Helen Laser and directed by Rachel Thomas-Levy, with sound by Justin Evans featuring Andrew Clark as Otto & Lexi Hauck as Hannah

We all need advice sometimes, and who better to seek advice from than the yawning abyss; the gaping maw of oblivion; the endless, cascading nothingness that daily threatens to engulf us all? The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, the ceremony of innocence is drowned, etc. etc. Tune in for some good, solid pointers on how to deal. ############ written & directed by Davis Alianiello, with sound by The Mysterious Mac featuring Andrew Clark as Christian Office Fan with Cravings of the Flesh, Molly Cohen as Bad Night Moon, Helen Laser as Me, Lyubomir Parushev as Brrr! Shoulder!, Cory Ringdahl as The Void, and Samantha Turret as Suspicious