The past eight years have been marked by nine world premiere pieces and three Philadelphia Fringe Festival “Spotlight” commissions, including one commission for the first Philadelphia Live Arts Festival.

New Paradise Labs has garnered an OBIE award, a Barrymore award, and a Pew Charitable Trusts Fellowship in Performance Art for NPL’s Artistic Director. The company has been presented at PS 122 and at the Ontological Theatre in New York City. It has also toured to the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, and the Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh.

NPL was deemed Ensemble of the Year by the Philadelphia Inquirer in 2000, Experimental Theatre Company of the Year by Philadelphia Magazine in 2002 and given a Best of Philly listing by the Philadelphia City Paper in 2002 and 2003. Its piece PROM, created in collaboration with the Children’s Theatre Company of Minneapolis was deemed Best Stage Production of 2004 by the Minneapolis City Pages.

New Paradise Laboratories is engaged in the exploration of the ways that the human body expresses itself as a crossroads where history and gesture intersect. The center of each piece is a physical world devised specifically for that piece. These worlds are composed out of gestured codes, physically articulated body sensation, architectures of proximity, and spoken texts (which are seen as gesture). New Paradise calls this material “physical dramaturgy”.

The company sets out to create one original, completely distinctive, meticulously crafted piece a year employing a process which it continues to develop and refine. Pieces created in Philadelphia include: STUPOR, THIS MANSION IS A HOLE: Hugh Hefner Throws A party at the Center of the Universe, THE FAB 4 REACH THE PEARLY GATES , RROSE SELAVY TAKES A LOVER IN PHILADELPHIA, and DON JUAN IN NIRVANA.

NPL also maintains education and community outreach activities designed specifically for its existing and potential constituency.