Saturday, October 25 at 3PM 👉 Add to Calendar
Sunday, October 26 at 3PM 👉 Add to Calendar 

📍The Wild Project, 195 E 3rd St, NYC 

Saturday, November 8 at 5PM 👉 Add to Calendar 
Sunday, November 9 at 8PM 👉 Add to Calendar 
Sunday, November 16 at 4PM  👉 Add to Calendar 

This past weekend, my dear friends Charlotte Calvert and David Nando Rodgers, both excellent musical theatre actors, met with me at a rehearsal space (it was—no lie—$69 🥴) to sing through what Liz Davenport called “the song cycle” of EMOJI.

I was doing this for two reasons — 1️⃣ I had rewritten the entire show for NYC Fringe, 2️⃣ I had finished the last song of the show “waves 🌊 (for the new world order)” literally the Thursday before the Saturday it opened. I was editing the videos til early AM the night before opening. So, no, I hadn’t spentenough time developing the staging for the songs (even though they looked pretty good tbh).

I looked it up and holy shit my show is super Brechtian you guys. David and I got coffee at Lincoln Center later that month — he had a lot of thoughts about the stagepiece of the supermoon, and me interacting with the presentation at that point of the show. 🎬

So, we nor’easter’ed it up in the practice rooms at 353 Studios… and I set up my computer, BT speaker, and clacked my brand new clicker.

I didn’t want to start at first because I felt really embarassed. 😳 I suddenly had this shame like someone had read my dream journal. I started singing and after a few notes, got scared and stopped the song.

“Oh my god you guys it’s so weird that I’m about to start singing songs for you that I wrote like they’re real.”

And Charlotte was like “It’s us… and we’ve both seen this before.”

Charlotte’s an incredible improviser, and of all people, knows the freedom of play. And David, is really good at the trapeze. And they had both made time for me to do this with them when they could literally be having like hot sex or doing the trapeze or idk staying in on the day of a storm they specifically named because it was so weird and bad. ☔️

So, I shook it off and started singing, and I’m so glad I did.

Doing the songs for them, and hearing their perfectly-timed laughter, and receiving their notes…

”Is this clear? Can you tell I’m the Supermoon and not me?”

“Oh my god, yes that was so clear, from your body language.”

“And you address yourself immediately… It’s good writing.” 🥰

David is so handsome and the way he just threw away “It’s good writing,” you would think he was in my on-camera acting class. I was like. Okay. Lock in. You’re a good writer, Rushi.

That’s what my ex from 7 years ago said to me when he was breaking my heart _{(but to be so fair, I did break his heart first)...} “Stay in New York. You’re talented. You’re a good writer.”

So much of this whole process makes you feel delusional. There’s all kinds of things in your head, like “I’m not punctual enough to be allowed to do a show like this.”

It’s like word salad that your brain mad-libs with weirdly specific facts about you in the relevant fields. “People who eat sour belts at 11pm while watching RPDR can’t be impactful performers.”

Like, what? I used to get scared when I made out with my high school boo because I would randomly think of my chemistry teacher and get scared. It was like that. I’d be like “I’m never getting into college!”

It makes me remember what is so special about theatre. Everyone already gets that you’re crazy. It’s a shared experience among a community of people who actually like to feel things and don’t shy away from the difficult emotions of life and don’t shame you for letting them take up space on the stage and page and making earworms out of them.

And it’s live and it’s different EVERY night. So, please come, and see for yourself. 👁👄👁

In the end of August, I was camping on Lake Michigan, and my producer Annie Moretto suggested I might apply to Outlaugh - the comedy Survivor competition at UCB. Instead of doing physical challenges (😱) we’ll be doing comedy challenges 😜! My bestie Miho (this one ☺️) suggested I do some funny fake survivalism for my submission video.

So, Outlaugh posted a picture of each of the competitors, and then told us after posting all of them that whoever’s post has the most interactions will start the season with an advantage. So here’s that post, if you want to interact and get me an advantage! There’s some fun stuff happening in the comments.

10/22 The Fourth Space @ the PIT
I can’t wait to do this killer variety show with The Fourth Space sketch team featuring 4D improv from some of my favorite performers (including Oona O’Brien, Jay Reed, Frank Flaherty), puppets (!) and some music from me 🙂 Tickets are here.

Thanks so much for playing along. Hopefully I survive Saturday.

👉🏽Grab your friends, boos, crushes, and community, and buy tickets to my show.🎟 Please let’s make it a success, otherwise I will give up on art. 🙂

👉🏽Donate to my friend Omnia as she tries to recover her life in Gaza, here.

DO NOT LOOK 👁️ DIRECTLY ⚠️ at the CHAOS 💥🌪️💫 unless YOU WANT 💀✨ TO LOSE CONTROL 🫣💦

SEND TO 🔟 MOOD MASTERS 😈📲
GET 🔟 BACK 📲 → YOU’RE A LEGENDARY EMOJI GOD 😍💫
GET 5️⃣ BACK 📲 → SOMEONE’S SENDING YOU VIBES 💌😏
GET NONE0️⃣ 📲 → YOU WILL REMAIN SAD 😭🪦 & MISSED OUT 🫵🏻💀

💌🔥 THE SHOW AWAITS 😈💦💫
ARE YOU READY? 😏⚡️💥

Don’t miss out.. 😩😩 Tix here. 😘

Love you!
❤ Aarushi