In the last episode of Season 1, Christina D. Eskridge sits down with Brisa Areli Muñoz to talk about how her public health background has elevated her artistry. Pun intended, because Christina is the founder and executive director of Elevate Theatre Company LLC in New York City.

"Christina D. Eskridge, MPH grew up in Oakland, California. She performed all over the state in regional and community theater productions while studying for her Master’s in Public Health. After a few years of working full-time in Public Health, Christina moved to New York City to pursue performing arts full-time. She attended the CAP21 2-Year Professional Musical Theatre Training Program and began performing around the country in plays, musicals, readings for new shows, and in New York venues like Lincoln Center, 54 Below, Rockwood Musical Hall, and Don't Tell Mama NYC. Christina played Lisa in the North American Tour of the smash hit musical, Mamma Mia!, Lily Livingston in On Strivers Row and Joan in Fun Home. In 2018, Christina was seen performing in her own one-woman show, A Night at Sheridan Square in the New Ohio Theatre’s Up Close Festival. Christina is also the founder and executive director of Elevate Theatre Company LLC in New York City. Elevate creates space for audiences and artists to explore health and well-being through the art of storytelling."

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About MTF MTF equips artists to create musical stories as a collective force for justice, healing, and radical imagination.

Stay in Orbit: Website: www.mtf.nyc Instagram: @mtfmusicals YouTube Give Back

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CREDITS

Produced by | MTF Musicals

Hosted by | Brisa Areli Muñoz

Featuring | Christina D. Eskridge Elevate Theatre Company Arts for Everybody

Production

Creative Director | Andrea Negrete

DP | Andrew Young

Editing | Andrew Young

Sound Mixing | Falan Nuhring

MTF Team

Abigail Grubb | Director of Interdependence & Collective Care

Andrea Negrete | Director of Access & Advocacy

AriDy Nox | Director of Decolonization & Sustainability

Brisa Areli Muñoz | Director of Artistic Innovation & Emergent Magic

Brandon Powers | Artistic Innovation Lead

Falan Nuhring | Coordinator of Connectivity & Systems

Sidney Erik Wright | Artistic Programs Lead

MTF Board of Directors

Amy Goldwasser

Ariel Estrada

Catherine Pulley-Dennison

Cheyenne Myrie

Isabel Quinzaños Alonso

M Von Nida

Special Thanks To

The MTF Community & MTF Makers Past and Present

Kelindah Bee | Producer of Fast Forward Live Tapings

Sol & Yue Productions

Shakina Nayfack | Founding Artistic Director

Mei Ann Teo | Former Artistic Director

Walter

MTF’s Institutional Support

The Mellon Foundation

Joseph F. Savage Jr. Charitable Foundation

Howard Gilman Foundation

The Jerome Foundation

Fast Forward is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

Cheeyang Ng and Brisa Areli Muñoz sit down to talk taking more risk, the creation journey of Legendary, celebrating the moment, & their relationship with MTF over 12 years.

"Legendary: The Myth of Creation is a solo musical that reimagines the act of myth-making through a queer, diasporic lens. It follows the journey of the Narrator, a queer Asian immigrant living in the U.S., as they navigate the question: Should I have a child? Along the way, they confront what it means to belong: across borders, between binaries, and within family.​

This is not some imagined realm. It is our world, where ancient legends and dominant narratives have long failed to make space for queer bodies. The Narrator asks: Why have our stories excluded us? Why is the world so obsessed with either/or? Through personal memories, Chinese mythology, and a fractured relationship with their father, they begin to deconstruct what legacy, lineage, and love truly mean.

This is not a passive performance. Through circle singing, call and response, and shared storytelling, the audience becomes a vital part of the experience, co-authors of a new myth. By the end of the evening, together, we create a new story: one where queer people don’t just exist in the margins of myth, but are central to its creation.​

Legendary is not just a retelling; it’s a reimagining. A communal ceremony. A collective act of reclamation."

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About MTF MTF equips artists to create musical stories as a collective force for justice, healing, and radical imagination.

Stay in Orbit: Website: www.mtf.nyc Instagram: @mtfmusicals YouTube Give Back

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CREDITS

Produced by | MTF Musicals

Hosted by | Brisa Areli Muñoz

Featuring | Cheeyang Ng, Legendary

Production

Creative Director | Andrea Negrete

DP | Andrew Young

Editing | Andrew Young

Sound Mixing | Falan Nuhring

MTF Team

Abigail Grubb | Director of Interdependence & Collective Care

Andrea Negrete | Director of Access & Advocacy

AriDy Nox | Director of Decolonization & Sustainability

Brisa Areli Muñoz | Director of Artistic Innovation & Emergent Magic

Brandon Powers | Artistic Innovation Lead

Falan Nuhring | Coordinator of Connectivity & Systems

Sidney Erik Wright | Artistic Programs Lead

MTF Board of Directors

Amy Goldwasser

Ariel Estrada

Catherine Pulley-Dennison

Cheyenne Myrie

Isabel Quinzaños Alonso

M Von Nida

Special Thanks To

The MTF Community & MTF Makers Past and Present

Kelindah Bee | Producer of Fast Forward Live Tapings

Sol & Yue Productions

Shakina Nayfack | Founding Artistic Director

Mei Ann Teo | Former Artistic Director

Walter

MTF’s Institutional Support

The Mellon Foundation

Joseph F. Savage Jr. Charitable Foundation

Howard Gilman Foundation

The Jerome Foundation

Fast Forward is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

In this episode, Brisa Areli sits down with writing duo Melliot (Mel Hornyak & Elliot Valentine) of Makers Cohort IV! We get into the joy & importance of Queer/Trans art, speculative fiction as a genre, and how they're writing their communities directly into their art. Listen in and learn more about the various project Melliot has been cookin' up!

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About MTF MTF equips artists to create musical stories as a collective force for justice, healing, and radical imagination.

Stay in Orbit: Website: www.mtf.nyc Instagram: @mtfmusicals YouTube Give Back

----------

CREDITS

Produced by | MTF Musicals

Hosted by | Brisa Areli Muñoz

Featuring | Melliot

Production

Creative Director | Andrea Negrete

DP | Andrew Young

Editing | Andrew Young

Sound Mixing | Falan Nuhring

MTF Team

Abigail Grubb | Director of Interdependence & Collective Care

Andrea Negrete | Director of Access & Advocacy

AriDy Nox | Director of Decolonization & Sustainability

Brisa Areli Muñoz | Director of Artistic Innovation & Emergent Magic

Brandon Powers | Artistic Innovation Lead

Falan Nuhring | Coordinator of Connectivity & Systems

Sidney Erik Wright | Artistic Programs Lead

MTF Board of Directors

Amy Goldwasser

Ariel Estrada

Catherine Pulley-Dennison

Cheyenne Myrie

Isabel Quinzaños Alonso

M Von Nida

Special Thanks To

The MTF Community & MTF Makers Past and Present

Kelindah Bee | Producer of Fast Forward Live Tapings

Sol & Yue Productions

Shakina Nayfack | Founding Artistic Director

Mei Ann Teo | Former Artistic Director

Walter

MTF’s Institutional Support

The Mellon Foundation

Joseph F. Savage Jr. Charitable Foundation

Howard Gilman Foundation

The Jerome Foundation

Fast Forward is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

Brisa Areli and Brandon sit down with EmmaLee Kidwell & Maria Andreoli to talk about how technology intersects dramaturgically with their process and new piece in development Come See Your Future.

Come See Your Future is a hybrid musical theatre and virtual reality piece that unfolds in a sci-fi, dystopian world ravaged by climate change. The project explores capitalism’s impact on the environment and how political division inhibits humanity’s ability to live sustainably and find solutions to the climate crisis.

Every audience member steps inside the world of the show in VR as the experience weaves live performance and interactive virtual reality sequences, propelling the story forward. With VR, the audience embodies each character's perspective, creating a form-bending immersive experience.

Learn more about Maria & EmmaLee and Come See Your Future Below!

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About MTF MTF equips artists to create musical stories as a collective force for justice, healing, and radical imagination.

Stay in Orbit: Website: www.mtf.nyc Instagram: @mtfmusicals YouTube Give Back

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CREDITS

Produced by | MTF Musicals

Hosted by | Brisa Areli Muñoz

Featuring | EmmaLee Kidwell & Maria Isabella Andreoli & Brandon Powers

Come See Your Future

Production

Creative Director | Andrea Negrete

DP | Andrew Young

Editing | Andrew Young

Sound Mixing | Falan Nuhring

MTF Team

Abigail Grubb | Director of Interdependence & Collective Care

Andrea Negrete | Director of Access & Advocacy

AriDy Nox | Director of Decolonization & Sustainability

Brisa Areli Muñoz | Director of Artistic Innovation & Emergent Magic

Brandon Powers | Artistic Innovation Lead

Falan Nuhring | Coordinator of Connectivity & Systems

Sidney Erik Wright | Artistic Programs Lead

MTF Board of Directors

Amy Goldwasser

Ariel Estrada

Catherine Pulley-Dennison

Cheyenne Myrie

Isabel Quinzaños Alonso

M Von Nida

Special Thanks To

The MTF Community & MTF Makers Past and Present

Kelindah Bee | Producer of Fast Forward Live Tapings

Sol & Yue Productions

Shakina Nayfack | Founding Artistic Director

Mei Ann Teo | Former Artistic Director

Walter

MTF’s Institutional Support

The Mellon Foundation

Joseph F. Savage Jr. Charitable Foundation

Howard Gilman Foundation

The Jerome Foundation

Fast Forward is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

This interactive live Fast Forward event invited audiences to explore how musical storytelling extends beyond the stage to influence other sectors. At our Fast Forward: Technology as a Liberatory Tool, we began to investigate how technology can serve artists and creators.

To ground the discussion in lived artistic practice, we’ve engaged two artist case studies. EmmaLee Kidwell and Maria Isabella Andreoli are developing Come See Your Future, a mixed-reality musical that reimagines how audiences experience narrative across physical and digital space. Inyosi Sebenzekhaya is creating Priestess Portals, an evolving work exploring how spiritual technologies and extended reality can merge to generate new forms of ritual, embodiment, and collective transformation. Technologists Aaron Santiago and Dr. Courtney D. Cogburnwill joined the conversation to help audiences better understand how awareness can create agency as we imagine together how technology can be used to fuel the change we want to see in the world.

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About MTF MTF equips artists to create musical stories as a collective force for justice, healing, and radical imagination.

Stay in Orbit: Website: www.mtf.nyc Instagram: @mtfmusicals YouTube Give Back

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CREDITS

Produced by | MTF Musicals

Hosted by | Brisa Areli Muñoz

Featuring | EmmaLee Kidwell & Maria Isabella Andreoli, INYOSI Sebenzekhaya (b. Nia O. Witherspoon) PhD, Aaron Santiago, & Dr. Courtney D. Cogburn

Production

Creative Director | Andrea Negrete

DP | Andrew Young

Editing | Andrew Young

Sound Mixing | Falan Nuhring

MTF Team

Abigail Grubb | Director of Interdependence & Collective Care

Andrea Negrete | Director of Access & Advocacy

AriDy Nox | Director of Decolonization & Sustainability

Brisa Areli Muñoz | Director of Artistic Innovation & Emergent Magic

Brandon Powers | Artistic Innovation Lead

Falan Nuhring | Coordinator of Connectivity & Systems

Sidney Erik Wright | Artistic Programs Lead

MTF Board of Directors

Amy Goldwasser

Ariel Estrada

Catherine Pulley-Dennison

Cheyenne Myrie

Isabel Quinzaños Alonso

M Von Nida

Special Thanks To

The MTF Community & MTF Makers Past and Present

Kelindah Bee | Producer of Fast Forward Live Tapings

Sol & Yue Productions

Shakina Nayfack | Founding Artistic Director

Mei Ann Teo | Former Artistic Director

Walter

MTF’s Institutional Support

The Mellon Foundation

Joseph F. Savage Jr. Charitable Foundation

Howard Gilman Foundation

The Jerome Foundation

Fast Forward is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

To ground us in practical application, MTF dives into the process of developing Germono Toussaint's The Last Gatekeeper as a case study for the use of Technology as a dramaturgical and liberatory tool. "The Last Gatekeeper is an immersive, multi-media, musical theater piece inspired by the writings of West African shaman Malidoma Patrice Somé. The term gatekeeper refers to the indigenous belief that those who express themselves as same-gender-loving maintain the portals between the physical and spiritual world and are connected to both. They are guardians who restore balance and harmony when there is crisis." We get into technologies, both practical & spiritual, and how they can serve the story, the artist, & the development process.

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About MTF MTF equips artists to create musical stories as a collective force for justice, healing, and radical imagination.

Stay in Orbit: Website: www.mtf.nyc Instagram: @mtfmusicals YouTube Give Back

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CREDITS

Produced by | MTF Musicals

Hosted by | Brisa Areli Muñoz

Featuring | Brandon Powers & Germono Toussaint

Production

Creative Director | Andrea Negrete

DP | Andrew Young

Editing | Andrew Young

Sound Mixing | Falan Nuhring

MTF Team

Abigail Grubb | Director of Interdependence & Collective Care

Andrea Negrete | Director of Access & Advocacy

AriDy Nox | Director of Decolonization & Sustainability

Brisa Areli Muñoz | Director of Artistic Innovation & Emergent Magic

Brandon Powers | Artistic Innovation Lead

Falan Nuhring | Coordinator of Connectivity & Systems

Sidney Erik Wright | Artistic Programs Lead

MTF Board of Directors

Amy Goldwasser

Ariel Estrada

Catherine Pulley-Dennison

Cheyenne Myrie

Isabel Quinzaños Alonso

M Von Nida

Special Thanks To

The MTF Community & MTF Makers Past and Present

Kelindah Bee | Producer of Fast Forward Live Tapings

Sol & Yue Productions

Shakina Nayfack | Founding Artistic Director

Mei Ann Teo | Former Artistic Director

Walter

MTF’s Institutional Support

The Mellon Foundation

Joseph F. Savage Jr. Charitable Foundation

Howard Gilman Foundation

The Jerome Foundation

Fast Forward is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

Brandon Powers joins us to talk all things MTFxR. We get into technology as a dramaturgical & liberatory tool, definitions, practical examples, fears, & more!

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About MTF MTF equips artists to create musical stories as a collective force for justice, healing, and radical imagination.

Stay in Orbit: Website: www.mtf.nyc Instagram: @mtfmusicals YouTube Give Back

----------

CREDITS

Produced by | MTF Musicals

Hosted by | Brisa Areli Muñoz

Featuring | Brandon Powers

Shout Out | Kelindah Bee& Melliot

Production

Creative Director | Andrea Negrete

DP | Andrew Young

Editing | Andrew Young

Sound Mixing | Falan Nuhring

MTF Team

Abigail Grubb | Director of Interdependence & Collective Care

Andrea Negrete | Director of Access & Advocacy

AriDy Nox | Director of Decolonization & Sustainability

Brisa Areli Muñoz | Director of Artistic Innovation & Emergent Magic

Brandon Powers | Artistic Innovation Lead

Falan Nuhring | Coordinator of Connectivity & Systems

Sidney Erik Wright | Artistic Programs Lead

MTF Board of Directors

Amy Goldwasser

Ariel Estrada

Catherine Pulley-Dennison

Cheyenne Myrie

Isabel Quinzaños Alonso

M Von Nida

Special Thanks To

The MTF Community & MTF Makers Past and Present

Kelindah Bee | Producer of Fast Forward Live Tapings

Sol & Yue Productions

Shakina Nayfack | Founding Artistic Director

Mei Ann Teo | Former Artistic Director

Walter

MTF’s Institutional Support

The Mellon Foundation

Joseph F. Savage Jr. Charitable Foundation

Howard Gilman Foundation

The Jerome Foundation

Fast Forward is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

On the other side of our live event/taping, ELC gathers to reflect on launching this new program, what curiosities we still have, and how we can imagine deepening this work. If you have a family member or friend at a senior center who can benefit from this type of work, please let us know at info@mtf.nyc! If you work in insurance and have valuable knowledge to add, we invite you to join the conversation. If you are asking yourself how you can apply this model to your own work, you're in the right place! We are so happy you're here. Thank you for listening.

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About MTF MTF equips artists to create musical stories as a collective force for justice, healing, and radical imagination.

Stay in Orbit: Website: www.mtf.nyc Instagram: @mtfmusicals YouTube Give Back

----------

CREDITS

Produced by | MTF Musicals

Hosted by | Brisa Areli Muñoz

Featuring | Andrea Negrete, Abigial Grubb, & Brisa Areli Muñoz

Production

Creative Director | Andrea Negrete

DP | Andrew Young

Editing | Andrew Young

Sound Mixing | Falan Nuhring

MTF Team

Abigail Grubb | Director of Interdependence & Collective Care

Andrea Negrete | Director of Access & Advocacy

AriDy Nox | Director of Decolonization & Sustainability

Brisa Areli Muñoz | Director of Artistic Innovation & Emergent Magic

Brandon Powers | Artistic Innovation Lead

Falan Nuhring | Coordinator of Connectivity & Systems

Sidney Erik Wright | Artistic Programs Lead

MTF Board of Directors

Amy Goldwasser

Ariel Estrada

Catherine Pulley-Dennison

Cheyenne Myrie

Isabel Quinzaños Alonso

M Von Nida

Special Thanks To

The MTF Community & MTF Makers Past and Present

Kelindah Bee | Producer of Fast Forward Live Tapings

Sol & Yue Productions

Shakina Nayfack | Founding Artistic Director

Mei Ann Teo | Former Artistic Director

Walter

MTF’s Institutional Support

The Mellon Foundation

Joseph F. Savage Jr. Charitable Foundation

Howard Gilman Foundation

The Jerome Foundation

Fast Forward is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.