Acting Alumna Kim Katzberg '09 Winner of 2019 New York Innovative Theatre Award

Alumna Kim Katzberg ’09 wins the 2019 New York Innovative Theatre Award in the Outstanding Solo Performance category for her production of Dad in a Box. This is Katzberg’s second award. She previously took home the 2016 award for Outstanding Original Short Script. An acclaimed actor and writer, Katzberg has debuted original work at alternative performance series all over New York. She has performed at the Bushwick Starr in Catch Performance Series, dead darlings at Judson Memorial Church, Showgasm at Ars Nova, The Upstart Festival at BAX and the OBIE Award-winning Little Theatre at Dixon Place. She specializes in genre bending theatre. 

The New York Innovative Theatre Awards celebrate the best of Off Off Broadway theatre. This year marked the 15th anniversary of the awards. Nominees included 147 individual artists and 64 productions presented by 73 theatre companies. Over the past 15 years, the New York Innovative Theatre Awards have honored over 2,600 artists, 750 productions and over 725 Indie Theatre companies.

In Dad in a Box, a prestigious improv comedy workshop seems like an ideal career boost for Katzberg, until she finds her fervid imagination hamstrung by generic critiques. ‘…Suicidal girl on a date? I’m not sure it’s a network thing.’ But the real improvisation starts when Katzberg’s emotionally distant father dies, paralyzing her psyche and forcing her to confront her California-cool brother and erratic prodigal sister. Katzberg, playing a plethora of characters, struggles to become more real onstage, be truthful to her father, and express her inexplicable love for him.

Katzberg’s performance in Dad in a Box was praised by critics, including HiLowBrow who wrote, “Katzberg is a phenomenal shapeshifter of attitudes and inner lives, and the multimedia barrage and emotional cacophony is orchestrated well by director Raquel Cion.” Dad in a Box played for three weeks in February at HERE Arts Center in Brooklyn.