LIU Brooklyn TV Writer’s Studio and Unattended Baggage are partnering to bring the OBIE Award-winning cult classic musical A Very Merry Unauthorized Children’s Scientology Pageant to audiences around the world! Taped live in front of a studio audience in the style of the live, musical broadcasts of yesteryear, the production will premiere on NomadTV on Roku for free November 10, before being made available to stream on other platforms.
Kyle Jarrow’s cult classic (with material by Tony winner Alex Timbers) reimagines a traditional children's Christmas pageant to feature E-Meters, Xenu, and L. Ron Hubbard’s Dianetics.
A Very Merry Unauthorized Children’s Scientology Pageant LIVE! is a graduate student production, consisting of current students and recent college graduates from LIU Brooklyn and other colleges across the city. The broadcast will be partially funded by LIU Brooklyn, under the guidance of Ken LaZebnik, the chair of the TV Writer’s Studio.
The original production in 2004 earned Kyle Jarrow and the production’s original director and co-author, Alex Timbers, an OBIE Award, making them two of the youngest OBIE Award winners of the time. Current LIU Brooklyn MFA student Sean Pollock will direct, design, and adapt the production for television, in addition to serving as the executive producer. The production will be a collaboration between LIU Brooklyn and Pollock’s production company, Unattended Baggage, with Roshan Singh Sambi, Angel Edme, and Darcy Cadman serving as producers. The special will be produced in association with Melanie Alice Ward.
Additional creative team members, taping dates, and casting will be announced in the coming weeks.