ZOË GELTMAN BRINGS HER SHOW, PUFFY HAIR,
DIRECTED BY JULIA SIRNA-FREST, TO THE VANCOUVER
FRINGE FESTIVAL, SEPTEMBER 7-17, 2023
Existential Stand-Up Meets Raw Feminist Rant in One-Woman Show
Writer and performer Zoë Geltman is proud to bring her show, PUFFY HAIR, directed by Julia Sirna-
Frest, to the Ballet BC, from the duo’s native Brooklyn, New York, to be part of the 2023 Vancouver
Fringe Festival. PUFFY HAIR uses the confessional structure of stand-up to send-up the oppressive
power structures of the male gaze. Performances take place September 7th, 10th, 11th, 13th, 16th, and
17th, at The Ballet BC on Granville Island (1286 Cartwright Street, Vancouver BC V6H 3R8, Canada).
Tickets are on sale at vancouverfringe.com.
PUFFY HAIR is a night of existential stand-up laced with a theatrical embrace of the absurd. Using
Vaudeville-cum-Fosse dance moves, Puffy Hair investigates one woman’s ambivalent and tortured
relationship to the male gaze, which she alternately cozies up to and execrates. The show is a catharsis
of self-hatred, body dysmorphia, and self-aggrandizement. A vigorous dose of lipstick smears and
shoulder pads. A marriage between Joan Rivers and gastrointestinal turbulence. A struggle to make
space for the existential pressure of a bun.
PUFFY HAIR had a successful run at The Tank Theater in New York City in 2021, with costume and set
design by Enver Chakartash and lighting design by Sarah Lurie. Natalie Rine of Onstage Blog wrote
that the “mesmerizing” show “transforms beyond stand-up comedy to shocking and delicious intimacy,”
and that it is an invitation into Geltman’s “extravagant mind palace of feminine guts and glory…as she
zips and bops around the space, capturing a caricatured showman’s energy akin to Joan Rivers meeting
Liza Minelli.” New Yorker writer Alexandra Schwartz wrote that the show was “wickedly funny and
totally unnerving. Surreal and too real.” Puffy Hair was performed in previous iterations at NYC’s The
Pit and The Wild Project as part of Big Art Group’s SFX Festival.
“Confessional, cathartic, and theatrical – this is my mantra,” says Geltman. “I love making theater that
examines the mundane and then pries it open to uncover the horrible weirdness that lurks inside all of
us. By embracing the confessional framework of stand-up, my hope is that audiences will recognize the
absurdity of living inside a body that is pulled between the burning desire for truth and the need for
comfort and avoidance.”
Six performances of PUFFY HAIR take place on September 7th, 10th, 11th, 13th, 16th, and 17th, 2023 at
Ballet BC, located at 1286 Cartwright Street, Vancouver BC V6H 3R8, Canada. Critics are welcome.
Tickets, priced at $17, can be purchased online at www.vancouverfringe.com.
About the Artists
Zoë Geltman (Writer and Performer) is a performer and writer and born-and-bred New Yorker. As a
writer, she has developed/presented work at/with The Bushwick Starr, New Georges, The Brick, The
Tank, CATCH, Dixon Place, Little Theater, The PIT, NACL, Dragon’s Egg Studio, Big Art Group, and
coming up, with The Hearth. As a performer, she has been praised by The New York Times for her
”delicious, comic” performances. Some favorite credits include Spindle Shuttle Needle and The World
My Mama Raised (Clubbed Thumb), Kara and Emma and Barbara and Miranda (The Playwrights’
Center), Evelyn by Julia May Jonas (Bushwick Starr & Incubator Arts), and PIONEERS #goforth by
William Burke (JACK). She also sings, puppeteers and lends her voice in toy theater pieces by
playwright Megan Murtha and visual artist Mark Fox. She is a company member of The Mercury Store
and a New Georges affiliated artist. www.zoegeltman.com.
Julia Sirna-Frest (Director) is a performer, director, and musician. As a director, she has worked with
her artistic soul-mate Zoë Geltman on Puffy Hair (at the Tank), Lolly Lolly Lolly (New Georges), This
Dump is a Dump (Bushwick Starr), and Sea Fraud (The Brick). She is part of the 2022-2024 WP Lab
Cohort. Favorite performance credits include: Riddle of the Trilobites (New Victory Theater), Lunch
Bunch (Clubbed Thumb), [Porto] (WP theater, The Bushwick Starr); Seder (Hartford Stage); A Tunnel
Year (The Chocolate Factory); The Offending Gesture (Mac Wellman); Comfort Dogs: Live from the
Pink House (JACK); She is a founding member of the Obie award winning Half Straddle Company,
productions include: Ghost Rings (TBA/PICA); Ancient Lives (The Kitchen); Seagull (Thinking of
you) (The New Ohio, International Tour), In the Pony Palace/Football (The Bushwick Starr,
International Tour); Nurses in New England (The Ohio); The Knockout Blow (The Ontological).
Composer/Performer with Chapman/Sirna-Frest and Co-Front woman of Doll Parts, Brooklyn’s
Premiere Dolly Parton cover band. www.juliasirnafrest.com
Media release and image provided by Zoë Geltman. Publicity Images by Sammy Tunis
