The following press release was provided by the Mosesian Center for the Arts

WATERTOWN – This February, NYC-based queer actor and comic Michael John Ciszewski returns to Boston with his third  solo show LOVEFOOL to celebrate Valentine’s Day Weekend with two performances at Watertown’s  Mosesian Center for the Arts after a smash 2023 tour that filled houses from comedy clubs to Pride festivals  across the northeast with big gay joy. The show is co-created and produced with Brian Dudley and directed by  Noah Simes. 

Following packed performances in New York City (Asylum NYC, Pete’s Candy Store, QED Astoria), Jersey  City (Jersey City Theater Center), Provincetown (Redroom), Providence (Fletcher House), Philadelphia  (Yellow Bicycle Theatre), and Boston (Rockwell & New Rep), the LOVEFOOL team is thrilled to bring their  “celebration of queer love” back to the community that raised them for the third year running! 

LOVEFOOL is a dazzling and deliciously silly romp through flings, flirtations, and first loves that brims with  heart and hilarity. You’ve heard of LOVE before… you knew it was kinda gay, but you just WAIT till this big  queer lovefool gets his limp wrists on it! Featuring dazzling and deliciously dumb multimedia outbursts,  LOVEFOOL plays like the queer party playlist of your dreams set to shuffle. The show invites audiences to  laugh and cry, sing and dance, flirt and fall-in-love along with Michael John as he engages a life-long  commitment to unrequited love. A *very* GAY evening that bridges stand-up comedy and confessional,  LOVEFOOL has earned raves from critics and audiences who call it “required queer viewing” and “beautiful,  brave, and bombastically funny!” 

“My mission is to make comedy that embodies the joy and whimsy of the queerness I see in myself and my  communities with full heart,” reflects Michael John, “and in our current sociopolitical climate, I am so proud to  celebrate the healing power of queer love in the city that made me the LOVEFOOL I am! I lived and worked as  an actor in Boston for ten years; Brian and Noah were born and raised right outside of the city. This is the third  consecutive year we’ve brought this show to the area, and we are so proud to share this love letter with our  communities here and keep growing our work after nearly two years of touring! I made my professional  performance debut on the Mosesian stage in 2012, and I am so honored that the incredible team at Mosesian  

Arts Live has invited me to return with two performances of LOVEFOOL on Saturday February 10. Both  performances will feature new material and opening sets from local stand-up comedians. Whether you’re  single, partnered, or something complicated in between, let LOVEFOOL be your Valentine’s Day treat this  year! I guarantee it’s sweeter and more nourishing than a heart-shaped box of chocolates and you don’t even  have to suffer through the guess work of biting into a gross coconut-filled piece.” 

Ciszewski is joined by the creative team of Brian Dudley and Noah Simes. Dudley began working with  Ciszewski to co-create the show after hearing an early developmental reading of the text in 2021. They were  joined by Simes after the work-in-progress performance in June 2022. Both share enthusiasm for the spirit and  immediacy of the show: “LOVEFOOL is quintessential Michael John,” shares Dudley, who helped shape the  show’s writing and design. “It marries deep sincerity and thoughtfulness with off-the-wall gay nonsense and  invites the audience to the reception. Michael John is an unstoppable whirlwind of humor, poignance, and  vulnerability in equal measure.” Simes, whose direction has sharpened the piece with wit and style, echoes  these sentiments: “LOVEFOOL is everything theater should be—fun, gay, honest, and about an hour long. The  show asks the question, ‘if love always breaks something, why bother?’ And it answers with a clear-eyed  conviction, but also with a wink and a nod and a wiggle on the dance floor. It’s an impassioned manifesto on  the importance and beauty of following love through to whatever life has in store for us.” 

About Michael John Ciszewski 

Michael John Ciszewski (he/him) (creator/performer) is a queer actor and writer born, raised, and returned to  New York City after launching his career in Boston and London. He is thrilled to return to the Mosesian Center  for the Arts after making his professional stage debut in New Rep Theatre’s 2012 production of Holiday  Memories and returning last February as a centerpiece performer for Love Weekend. 

Celebrated as “one of the most promising young actors on the Boston theatre scene” by digBoston, he has  performed for all of Boston’s theaters including The Huntington, Lyric Stage Company of Boston, SpeakEasy  Stage, the Umbrella Theatre, and Hub Theatre Company of Boston. 

Ciszewski’s solo work, cited as “required queer viewing” by comedy duo BAPHTA, is rooted in queerness and  healing and gleefully journeys across genres from stand-up and storytelling to collective ritual. His debut  Everyone is Dying and So Am I premiered in July 2019 and has since enjoyed sold-out performances with  Boston’s Open Theatre Project and Manhattan’s Theatre Row and United Solo Theatre Festival—spotlighting  the best in international solo performance. It was subsequently nominated for the festival’s audience award.  His second effort The Sun is Sleeping, a full-length film composed at the start of the pandemic era, was  screened in virtual theatrical events from late 2020 into 2021 and is now available to stream online. His hit third  solo show Lovefool premiered in 2022 and has since played to over 800 people in venues ranging from  proscenium and black box theatres to comedy clubs and festival stages in New York City, Boston, Philadelphia,  Providence, Provincetown, Jersey City, and beyond. Lovefool will continue to tour through 2024. 

In the meantime, Ciszewski has launched his fourth solo show Michael John Remembers Everything—an hour  of stand-up comedy on sobriety, sex, and profound stupidity that critics say “delivers vulnerability and  authenticity along with absolute gay nonsense”—with a return to Brooklyn’s Pete’s Candy Store set for  February 29. 

Michael is a member of the staff of ArtsEmerson at Emerson College’s Office of the Arts. He trained at the  London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art and is a proud graduate of Boston University’s B.F.A. Theatre Arts  program.  

About Brian Dudley 

Brian Dudley (he/him) (co-creator/producer) is a creative educator and theatre artist, specializing in student  success, youth development, and theatre education.  

In addition to his work as an academic and student success advisor at The New School and Boston University  College of Fine Arts, Brian has directed, taught, or facilitated programs with the Boston University Summer  Theatre Institute, where he also served as co-program head, Arlington Children’s Theatre, the Massachusetts  Youth Leadership Foundation, the Lyric Stage Company of Boston, and others.  

Brian holds an M.Ed in Arts, Community, and Education with a specialization in Theatre Studies from Lesley  University, and a B.F.A in Writing, Literature, and Publishing from Emerson College. 

About Noah Simes 

Noah Simes (he/him) (director/script consultant) is a director, performer, and theatrical polymath from  Boston, now based in New York City. Noah has collaborated with a number of Boston-based institutions and  artists, but is maybe best known as the homme fatale Peter Nureyev in the hit queer sci-fi audio drama The  Penumbra Podcast.  

About Mosesian Center for the Arts 

The Mosesian Center for the Arts is a performing and visual arts venue on the Charles River in Watertown,  Massachusetts. The 30,000 square foot center, located in an historic 1894 manufacturing shop on a former  U.S. Army arsenal, houses a 339-seat main stage theater, a flexible black box theater, exhibition galleries, art  classrooms, and a rehearsal studio. Mosesian Arts is located six miles from downtown Boston, borders  Brighton and the Charles, and is easily accessible from surrounding suburbs and MetroWest.    

Programming includes professional theater and musical performances, comedy, gallery exhibitions, literary  and art discussions, and performing and visual arts classes and workshops for all ages. Watertown Children’s  Theatre, Mosesian Arts’ performing arts education program, provides exceptional classes and performances  for youth and families. The venue also hosts celebrated and cutting-edge performing arts companies from  throughout the Greater Boston region and New England.  

Performance Dates & Times 

Mosesian Arts Live presents Michael John Ciszewski: LOVEFOOL on Saturday, February 10 at 6:00 PM and  9:00 PM, with special guests to be announced!  

All tickets are $25 general admission.  

Mosesian Center for the Arts is located at 321 Arsenal Street in Watertown, MA.  More information and tickets are available via mosesianarts.org or xomichaeljohn.com.