About Us
We are Em and Jo. We’ve been silly together since 2010. Here is a list of things we’ve successfully done together: write, produce, direct, make films, improv, sketch, duo stand-up, musical parodies, act, some marginally easy partner acrobatics, start a production company, end a production company, bartend, karaoke, taught children’s theatre, got a couples massage, top tier maid of honor speeches at each other’s weddings, boudoir photo shoot in a bowling alley, watched Fried Green Tomatoes 100+ times. Best Halloween Costumes: Sexy US Presidents, Sexy Sesame Street Characters, Justin Bieber fans, Sexy trees. Em’s dog is named Bill Paxton and Jo’s dog is named Kevin Costner. Karaoke Duet Go-To: Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy. Create theatre, watch theatre, talk about theatre.
Em Perez is a producer and director who also enjoys playwrighting and set design. She specializes in directing physical comedy and farce, and is currently enjoying exploring the intersection of comedy and horror on a stage. She finds herself most engaged in the creation of “theatre magic,” playing with how theatricality offers a unique storytelling experience. Whether reading new plays, watching new shows, or creating her own, Em is always searching for surprising and delightful ways that explore connecting a story to an audience. Favorite Play: The Clean House by Sarah Ruhl. Favorite Musical: Little Shop of Horrors. When not creating theatre, Em is really into tabletop games, homebrewing beer, drinking beer, skiing, cycling, trivia, Girl’s Nights, watching reality television and bad movies, making her husband laugh, and being a dog-mom.
Jo McIver Lee is a producer and playwright who also enjoys improv, stand-up, and sketch comedy. She specializes in character theory, and writes and creates as a way to explore deep human emotion, but mostly in a funny way. Jo’s love of theater stems from a love of people. She wants to explore human connection and celebrate character in the most fun, cathartic, and dynamic ways she can conjure. Also, she’s all about shared experience. Jo wants to make her play, Sisters Séance her favorite play. That’s why we do this right, to create the shows we need? Hoping, along the way, you fill a need and make a connection with your audience as well. Philosophy: Perfect is impossible, failing is much more fun. Outside of theater, Jo loves playing with her toddler babe, playing Magic the Gathering and watching early ‘00s music videos with her husband, talking to her sister on the phone, being a self-indulgent Taurus, and going out with the girlies.
We believe theatre is a powerful storytelling tool to explore the human condition and build community. But, like, in a cool, fun way. We want to create things that are new, weird and bold - and we want to focus on stories, venues, experiences, and audiences that are just, like, real people. Like You! Probably! Theatre should be fun, interesting, challenging, emotional, engaging. Theatre should spark curiosity. Theatre should be play. Play for us the creators, play for you as the audience, and most importantly - a space where we play together.
That’s cool and all, but we want to do something a little different. Because we believe theatre is and can be (and has been and will be again) fun, and weird, and hard, and goofy, and playful. It doesn’t have to cost an arm and leg, it doesn’t have to be intellectual, it doesn’t have to be just for them - it can be for you. We’re here for you. We’re here to give the people what they want.
Finally, we believe that theatre is a radical act of community - we are meant to come together and have a SHARED experience with friends and strangers. We want comfortable spaces, with affordable drinks (alcoholic or non, however you chill), and space to just sit in community for a bit and enjoy some plays and stuff.
Our Approach
What we think you want
-NEW plays by playwrights of color, women, trans and nonbinary folx, young playwrights, neurodivergent playwrights, playwrights who have fresh things to say, true things to say, wild things to say. Plays that can explore diversity not just through trauma-drama, but through joy, connection, exploration and all the other facets of a lived-experience.
-WEIRD plays that explore new ways to tell a story, or connect with an audience, or are just a little too funky to be picked up by conventional theatres - plays that won’t be picked up at other theatres because they are “hard to produce” because they are too experimental in how they play with a stage space. We want to do plays that you haven’t seen anywhere else. We want to do plays that you see and think “That was fucking weird. I think I liked it.”
-BOLD plays that may challenge you. You may not like them. And we’re here to tell you - that’s ok. Much like going to an Art Gallery - you don’t have to like every single thing you see. But you can appreciate the skill, the high quality production, the attempt to try something new, and the conversation you have with your friends afterwards where you dissect what spoke to you and what didn’t. Art is creation, and art is conversation.
We may be wrong, but EH, we’re still going to do it this way.
The Company
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Em Perez
Producer / Director / Set Designer
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Jo McIver Lee
Producer / Playwright / Sketch Captain
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Zach Perez
Technician / Sound Design / Actor
Values
UnLeashed Theatre believes in the power of diverse stories and artists. We welcome theatre makers and content from a wide variety of experiences including artists who identify as LGBTQ+, neurodivergent, having visible or non-visible disability, and artists of color. We are committed to keeping safe space and will not tolerate any harassment, disparaging remarks or discrimination of any kind, from theatre-makers or patrons. We are open to any conversion or feedback around being held accountable to these values. And we actively work to hold ourselves accountable for creating equitable access to opportunities to work with UnLeashed.