About Barn on Fire 2025
FIPAP and New York Theatre Barn will join forces for the 4th annual season of Barn on Fire. The summer residency on Fire Island will make space for two musical theatre writing teams and their original culture-shifting musicals in development, including the new musicals Lewis Loves Clark and Sunken Cathedral.
Award-winning musical theatre writer Kirsten Childs (The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin, Bella: An American Tall Tale) serves as mentor to the residency, which includes the original musicals Lewis Loves Clark and Sunken Cathedral.
Joining the writers for the residency are actors Grey Henson (Shucked, Mean Girls), Eric Ulloa (On Your Feet!), Jasmine Aiyana Garvin (Poker Face), Kiana Kabeary (Empire), Skie Ocasio (Bombay Dreams), Luis Villabon (Destiny of Desire), Michael Wordly (Miss Saigon, Goodpseed’s Ragtime), Steven Alan Black, Ben Houghton, and Carley Lovito. Sirius XM Radio’s Julie James will host the final presentation with New York Theatre Barn’s Héctor Flores Jr., which will be directed by Artistic Director Joe Barros, with music direction by Patrick B. Phillips (The Wiz, A Strange Loop), and Molly Conklin is the stage manager.
The new musical Lewis Loves Clark, written by Richard Rodgers Award-winning writers Mike Ross and Dylan MarcAurele, is a funny, fast-paced epic about the famous Corps of Discovery expedition told through a queer lens. The show was featured in the 2024 NAMT Festival of New Musicals, and co-writer Dylan MarcAurele (Pop Off, Michelangelo!) is the recipient of the 2024 Jonathan Larson Grant.
The new musical Sunken Cathedral, written by Taylor Fagins and Chase Uram, is a musical journey of contending worlds, exploring the unhoused community, dementia, and familial caretaking. Michelle Feza Kuchuk serves as dramaturg for Sunken Cathedral.
Under the mentorship of Tony Award-winning director/choreographer Jerry Mitchell and Tony nominated director/choreographer Jeff Calhoun for its first three seasons, the residency previously supported eleven original musicals, including Martin Storrow’s King of Pangea which will open at London’s King’s Head Theatre this summer and Joriah Kwamé’s Little Miss Perfect will play Maryland's Olney Theatre Center in 2026.
The Barn on Fire residency is made possible with generous support from Dalip Girdhar + Paul Austin (The P. Austin Foundation), Straighten Your Crown Productions, Jonathan Lewis and Matt Boethin, Henry Robin and Bob McGarity, John Krawchuk and Vinnie Petrarca, David Kneuss, Denise Lucy and Francoise Lepage, Isaac Namdar and Andrew Mitchell-Namdar, Carlos de la Puente and Simeon Kline, Gary Clinton and Don Millinger, Richard Winger, and Matthew Woolf.
Centering the artist and their work, the 10-day intensive retreat in Fire Island Pines is for writers and their creative teams to collaborate and further develop their shows in a supportive, creative, and tranquil atmosphere. At the end of the week, the artists have the opportunity to present what they have been working on before a live audience on a remote barrier island off the southern shore of Long Island, New York. The final presentation will be on Saturday, June 21st, 2025 at 6PM in Whyte Hall’s Brandon Fradd Theater and tickets will be available at a later date.
The new musical Lewis Loves Clark, with book and lyrics by Mike Ross and music by Dylan MarcAurele, is a funny, fast-paced epic about the famous Corps of Discovery expedition. Combining bluegrass, folk and pop, this tragicomedy follows Meriwether Lewis (a depressed closeted alcoholic), William Clark (just breathtakingly oblivious), Sacagawea (permanently exasperated), and York (would rather be birdwatching) as they grapple with the not-so-great unknown. The show was featured in the 2024 NAMT Festival of New Musicals and the writers are the recipients of the 2023 Richard Rodgers Awards for Musical Theater.
The new musical Sunken Cathedral has book and lyrics by Taylor Fagins and music by Chase Uram. Within the fantastical world of the first act, the grief-driven desires of a king and a princess lead to the tragic sinking of their kingdom, while the second act parallels this in modern day through the estranged relationship of a homeless man struggling with dementia and his daughter. With an alternative rock vibe, Sunken Cathedral is a musical journey of contending worlds, exploring the unhoused community, dementia, and familial caretaking. The show was previously featured in New York Theatre Barn’s award-winning New Works Series.
Under the mentorship of Tony Award-winning director/choreographer Jerry Mitchell and Tony nominated director/choreographer Jeff Calhoun for its first three seasons, the residency previously supported the musicals Ghost in the Machine, Spectrum, King of Pangea, The Bubble, Coming Soon: A New Rock Musical, Skyward: An Ending Elegy, Sueños: Our American Musical, Buried, How to You: A Musical Guide to Black Boyhood, Little Miss Perfect, and Andy, Keith & Jean-Michel.
Fire Island Pine Arts Project
The mission of the Fire Island Pines Arts Project, a non profit organization, is to be integral to the creative life of our community and to aspire, though the production of accessible quality performing and fine arts events and activities, to reflect and encourage our community’s cultural vitality.
A history of the Fire Island Pines Arts Project
David Baker, pianist and composer of Broadway musical scores, wrote and produced musicals in the Pines. Working with FIPPOA, he wrote and staged “Pines Needles” in 1981. Bill Henckley, David’s partner, designed and built sets for those early shows. Sylvan Cole, an internationally recognized art dealer who helped foster the explosion of printmaking and print collecting in the Unites States, was also a historic figure in the growth of the arts in the Pines. John Laub painted landscapes in Fire Island and throughout the northeast. John, working with FIPPOA, produced art shows in the Pines. Tired of working with FIPPOA, David, Bill, Sylvan, and John, founded the Fire Island Pines Arts Project in the summer of 1986. Setting up a table in the harbor on Labor Day weekend, Bill and Sylvan sold membership in the nascent Arts Project. They raised three thousand dollars from Pines residents and FIPAP was born. With the mission to be integral to the creative life of our community and to aspire, through the production of accessible quality performing and fine arts events and activities, to reflect and encourage our community’s cultural vitality.
FIPAP’s first biennial art show, which continues today, featuring Pines artist, was produced by Sylvan at a bayfront home in 1987. The Arts Project range of events continues to grow and includes our annual musical, live performances by renown musicians, singers, and comedians, curated film exhibitions, artist salons, artist residencies, home and garden tours, and fashion shows. Most recently, in 2022, FIPAP, in association with New York Theatre Barn, ran a writers’ residency workshop called Barn on Fire. It was a huge success and garnered national recognition.
