*This project/Liza Bielby is a participant in the Global Connections – IN the LAB program, funded by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and administered by Theatre Communications Group, the national organization for the professional not-for-profit American theatre

Steven DeWater – Manifest Destiny! (there was blood on the saddle) co-creator and performer.

Artpolis – Breaking Bread Performance Project 2010 partners. Amazing organization empowering Kosovar youth through theatre. See this Kosovar organization’s work here.

Jamie Van Camp – The Dead Road (2010) – co-creator, performer, and mask-maker. This Placerville, California king-of-play splits his time between the Bay Area and Norway. See his work here.

Brian Moore – Isaac Newton is Our DJ - co-creator and performer. A comic genius, Brian can be found in Chicago.

Norah Sadava – Isaac Newton is Our DJ – performer and puppeteer. Norah’s a performing dynamo-globetrotter with local sensibilities.

Deepal Doshi – Isaac Newton is Our DJ – performer and puppeteer. Deepal is Founding Artistic Director of international performing ensemble Rangeelay.

Branden Byers – Isaac Newton is Our DJ – design, construction and tech. Check out his mask-making work here.

Tara Smith – Isaac Newton is Our DJ - design and puppets. Tara rocks the Chicago puppet world.

LIZA BIELBY, The Hinterlands co-director, is a physical theatre artist dedicated to forging meaningful international bonds among traditional artists across the globe. A former Fulbright Scholar to Sichuan, China, where she became one of six non-Chinese nationals globally to ever study and perform traditional Sichuanese folk “opera” (chuanju), Liza understands the value of preserving local traditions in the face of globalization. In addition to being a founding member of The Hinterlands, she is also the co-founder of the multi-media arts collective (con)temporary works exchange, a founding member of the character-based marching band Glasnost and a member of the Detroit Party Marching Band. Liza is a graduate of Kalamazoo College (major: Theatre Arts, minor: Anthropology) and received her MFA in ensemble-based physical theatre from Dell’Arte International School of Physical Theatre.

Breaking Bread 2010 was funded by a grant from CEC Artslink and the generous support of individual donors. Project facilitators included Richard Newman, Liza Bielby, Eleni Zaharopoulou, Kushtrim Hoxha, Kushtrim Qerimi, and Zana Krasniqi-Hoxha.

Isaac Newton is Our DJ from The Hinterlands on Vimeo.

Isaac Newton is Our DJ was created by Liza Bielby, Brian Moore, and Richard Newman.

Featuring Richard Newman, Liza Bielby, Eleni Zaharopoulos, Steven DeWater, and Dave Sanders. Directed by Richard Newman; Design by Anthony Cerrato. Produced by Alverno Presents. Learn more about the team.

“Not only does it take you to the fundamental roots of the theatrical experience, it’s likely to change your existing views of the nature of theater.”- John Quinn, Encore Michigan

“This is a frenzy of mood and emotion. It’s a weird, theatrical Rorschach prism with the suggestion of certain themes about destiny, brutality and survival flowing through it all.” – Russ Bickerstaff, Express Milwaukee

Manifest Destiny found footage film by Eleni Zaharopoulos

25-minute version of Manifest Destiny! called The Dead Road premiered at The Cooking Fire Theatre Festival, Toronto, Canada and featured Richard Newman, Liza Bielby, Jamie Van Camp, and Jason Waszak

February Community Training: Come experience our creative process, push your physical and creative limits, and interact with other Detroit artists! Our open training session invites anyone 15 and older to participate in our highly physical and unique training. Push beyond your own boundaries. Location and time coming soon.

The Hinterlands Ensemble formed in September 2009 and is made up of core members Richard Newman and Liza Bielby.  Before forming The Hinterlands, Newman and Bielby worked with diverse international ensembles including Double Edge Theatre (Ashfield, MA), The Dell’Arte Company (Blue Lake, CA), Jinjiang Yishu Tuan (Chengdu, China), Bond Street Theatre (New York, NY), Great Small Works (New York, NY), and Changfu Jutuan (Chengdu, China).  They have performed throughout North America as well as in Kosovo, Bali, Germany, Macedonia, Poland, Spain, and China.

The Hinterlands premiered Isaac Newton is Our DJ, an interactive dance party, science experiment, and clown play celebrating and debating the life and laws of Sir Isaac Newton, in January 2010.  A twenty-five minute adaptation of William S. Burrough’s The Place of Dead Roads called The Dead Road premiered in Toronto, Canada, as part of the Cooking Fire Theatre Festival in June 2010. In October 2010, The Hinterlands mounted the second phase of The Breaking Bread Performance Project, a long-term collaboration between U.S. and Kosovar artists initiated by Hinterlands Co-Artistic Director Richard Newman.  Partnering with Kosovo-based Artpolis, Urban Theater, and Balkan Sunflowers, The Hinterlands conducted workshops and created a non-verbal touring performance with a group of Albanian, Serbian, Roma, and Ashkali teenagers in Prishtina, Kosovo.  Most recently, The Hinterlands premiered their psychedelic wild west show Manifest Destiny! (there was blood on the saddle) in Detroit’s historic Jam Handy Building as a part of the Alverno Presents summer presenting series (Milwaukee).

Currently, the ensemble is embarking on a two-year investigation of vaudeville, subculture and common culture beginning with a month-long training exchange and workshop performance with traditionally trained xiqu (“Chinese opera”) artists in Chengdu, China and funded by Asian Cultural Council and TCG/ITI. The Hinterlands are also partially funded by The Puffin Foundation and CEC ArtsLink.

Contact us at: info@thehinterlandsensemble.org