Faceboy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Faceboy (born Francis Hall) is one of the central figures of New York City's Lower East Side underground performance scene. A poet and performer, himself, he is best known as the host of the weekly Faceboyz Open Mic, which at 13 years is considered to be the longest continually running open mic currently in New York.

As with Rev. Jen Miller's Anti-Slam, the open mic is characterized by an atmosphere of mutual respect between performer and audience; heckling is not tolerated, and performers may not single out audience members. As a result, it attracts first-time performers as well as seasoned professionals in addition to a diverse group of regular artists, mostly but not exclusively performers, who call themselves Art Stars. The material is an eclectic mix of stand-up comedy, poetry, monolog, theatrical readings, dance, rants, music, and other experimental performance. The open mic is currently hosted at Mo Pitkins House of Satisfaction, and is produced by Surf Reality [1].

Faceboy also played the lead role in a short film titled Nights Like These [2], 2003.

A lifelong New Yorker, Francis "Faceboy" Hall is a talented actor, producer and activist who has been participating in the New York City arts community for over twenty years. He has appeared in hundreds of original stage productions and several films, including Robert Downey Sr.'s "Too Much Sun." In addition to his performance talents, he has taught at the Judson Memorial Church and spent twelve years developing statewide standards for preventing abuse and neglect of people with mental retardation and developmental disabilities. He strongly believes that the vitality of New York rests on the strength of its arts community and counter culture

His progress has been well documented. In 1996 Cynthia True (Author of American Scream the Bill Hicks story) wrote,

"For the last 100 Sundays, Faceboy has nurtured the liveliest, most open open-mike in New York. In true experimental spirit, tourist housewives and Lower East Side cognoscenti alike walk in off Allen Street and lay down their acts, be they spoken word or dadaesque comedy. But don't let the onstage anarchy fool you: Faceboy rules with a firm hand. 'I'm following the Native American tradition of talking stick,' he says. 'Whoever has the stick is the person talking, and everyone else shuts the fuck up.'"

Ten years later in a full page article in Time Out New York he was described as a performer who, "has persevered through the neighborhood’s gentrification with an almost religious devotion to the art of the open mike."

Faceboy is also an actor in the Electra Elf series created by Rev. Jen Miller and Nick Zedd. As a founding of the Dance Liberation Front he has worked to overturn New York City's archaic, "no dancing" cabaret laws and was selected in 1999 as one of Paper Magazines "most beautiful" people. His work has also been featured on PBS, NBC and BBC television

[edit] Media Coverage

Faceboy's work has been in or included in "Best of" lists of several publications, including

Time Out New York, "Mr. Microphone" [3]
New York magazine [4]
The Village Voice Best of New York: 2001 [5] and 2005 [6]
The New York Times
The New York Press (Best of Manhattan, 1997 and 2003)
Downtown Express newspaper, "Collective: Unconscious regroups in Tribeca theater Anchor shows “Reverend Jen’s Anti-Slam” on Wednesday nights and “Faceboyz Open Mike” on Sunday nights made an easy transition to Tribeca," [7]
Encore magazine online, "Downtown Hip: Mo Pitkin’s House of Satisfaction" [8]
New York Press, "End of the Punchline - A legendary comedy venue is history," [9]
The Village Voice, "Best of 2001," [10]