TrueSelves
Art
The Trueselves artistic body of work consists of multiple full-length plays, documentaries, short films and dance pieces. Many of the works can be viewed or previewed on this website with additional content available via special request to coLAB Arts.
Advocacy
This project began as a collaboration with the community outreach, advocacy, and therapeutic work of The Pride Center of New Jersey. As the transgender and gender diverse community becomes more visible and more willing to be open and honest with their families and communities the need grows for public education around vocabulary, access to care, and allyship for those who are transitioning, as well as those who identify somewhere in the spectrum of gender.
Community
Trueselves iis inspired by the the oral histories of transgender persons, their families, allies, and heathcare professionals. It is the goal of the Trueselves project to create an archive of oral history interviews and academic research that can be accessed by educators, trans individuals, families, and advocates to create safe spaces, transform policy, and combat transphobia.
Oral History Archive
Dr. Jeremy Sinkin is a reconstructive surgeon at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School who is committed to providing excellent care for his patients. Dr. Sinkin discusses growing up in a big family in upstate New York and his experiences in New York City. He explains the surge in publications and advancements in gender affirming healthcare during the early 2010s.
New Brunswick resident Gaby details her life experiences as a transgender woman—including traumatic events in her past and periods of financial insecurity—and describes how these have shaped her approach to helping others.
Founder of Desi Rainbow Parents & Allies, Aruna Rao discusses growing up in India, and moving to the US in the late 1980s. She talks about raising her transgender child, and how she is now able to track the process of her child’s ability to express their identity. She emphasizes how difficult it was for her to notice some of these important expressions in real-time, as she was dealing with family traumas throughout her child’s adolescence. She is a proud LGBTQ+ rights activist, and serves on the national board of PFLAG (Parents, Families, and Friends of Lesbians and Gays).
Ocean Township resident Graeme Davis describes his childhood in Harlem, the NYC gay scene of the 1970s, and coming out as a trans man later in life.
Family law attorney Theresa Lyons discusses her life’s trajectory, as well as the societal pressures that she felt growing up as part of the LGBT community during the height of the AIDS crisis and learning and teaching within Catholic school systems. She not only is a practicing lawyer, but also has her Master’s in Social Work. She has pioneered several activities and organizations, including the Rutgers Journal of Law and Religion, and is the managing partner of Lyons & Associates, P.C.
Metuchen resident Patricia Willard has always understood how gender plays an important role in how people are treated. She details growing up in Somerset, New Jersey in the 1950s, as well as her careers in music education and her time as a deputy attorney general. Patricia has a transgender son, who is the light of her life. She talks about experiencing her son’s transition and how his experiences have helped to shape her.
Nancy Gale recounts her adolescence and describes what it is like to raise a transgender child. She discusses how she has advocated for her child and how hindsight has helped her see key moments in her child’s gender expression.
Therapist Margie Nichols is the founder and was the first executive director of the Institute for Personal Growth. She charts the therapeutic evolution of helping the LGBT community, and discusses the many LGBT and gay-lesbian organizations that she was a part of and founded, including HYACINTH, a social service organization for people with AIDS.
Cory Nichols is the Executive Business Director of the Institute for Personal Growth (IPG). Cory’s mom, Dr. Margaret Nichols, founded IPG in 1983, the same year that he was born. He talks about how, in some way or another, IPG has always been a part of his life. He discusses how IPG has become a safe haven for trans people and how he can continue to support the mission of the organization as well as the LGBTQ+ community.
Connor Johnson, John Hayes, and David Damico describe their experiences in law enforcement as members of the LGBTQ+ community.
Raised in central New Jersey by divorced parents, Wiley Reading recounts his navigating childhood, K-12, and college, while grappling with puberty, sexuality, and gender identity. Wiley came out as a genderqueer trans man at the age of 25 and is now a self-described “Jack of All Trades” living in Vermont.
Erica Cirulli lives in Philadelphia and talks about her experience as a trans woman. She discusses how she has approached the social, legal, and medical components of transitioning.
JP details his life as a trans man and how he has been perceived at home, at school, and at the various jobs that he has held. JP also discusses the joy he feels after his recent top surgery.
Veteran Alison Roth discusses taking control of her life one step at a time, especially since she came out as trans in 2011. She is finding balance in her family life with her children as well as her professional life. While it’s been difficult, she is grateful for how her transition has gone and how those around her have responded.
Highland Park resident, Austin Morreale talks about his good family life growing up, and living in Atlanta when he worked in advertising. It took him several years to begin exploring his gender identity, and health diagnoses halted his first efforts in transitioning. Not long after finishing his medical treatments related to health concerns, he started the process of transitioning again. He describes his family’s reaction to his transition, as well as his experiences with health care as a transgender person.
Austin works for the non-profit NeighborCorps. This interview was conducted in 2017 when Austin had just begun working for NeighborCorps. Please see his follow-up interview, from September 11, 2020, that is focused on his work at the reentry program.
Despite a challenging childhood and young adulthood of managing family care, health issues, and navigating her own gender identity, Naomi Barry persevered and earned degrees in elementary education and special education. She discusses the challenges and triumphs of navigating her transition within the education system. Naomi’s ultimate goal is for children to learn how to be good people.
Pooya recounts life in Tehran during and after the Revolution of 1978, as well as her time in England and the United States, as she navigated life as a transwoman within these various places.
James Geller describes his life as a trans man and recounts how his relationships with himself, his family, and his friends have evolved over time. James narrates his passion for technical theater as well as the difficulties he has faced in building a community of trans men.
New Brunswick native Mariah Davila describes her time in public school as well as her complex relationship with her family, as she navigates her life as a trans woman.
Jenna Sisolak grew up trying to avoid conflict at all costs. The more that she moved away from those tendencies, the more that she began to express her authentic self. A part of this process was reactive: Jenna went from being a “star” student to a rebellious kid after her parents did not respond well to her coming out that she was gay. This process took lots of time, and included some very low points in her life, but it has also led her to being able to come out as trans.
Kimberly Legregor enlisted in the Air Force after being drafted during her first year of college. She got a job in radio while in the Air Force, and stayed in that career after she left the military, retiring as an electrician and general foreman at Anheuser Busch. Kimberly describes her earliest memories of identifying as transgender and her journey as a transgender woman today. She helps at the PRIDE Center of New Jersey.
Sydney Schakelford moved around a lot as a child, and lived in a strict household, which often led her to seek her father’s approval. In 2010 she began to identify as genderfluid, and ultimately came out as trans in 2013. In this interview, her and her wife, who supported her through her transition, discuss working together to create a loving marriage, the concept of deprogramming from past experiences and expectations, and finding support within the Transgender community.
Morganville resident Nicole Brownstein details the many successes of her happy and complete life. She explains the differences of growing up trans in 1950s America, and charts the process of her transition.
Artist Response Projects
The following pieces represent artistic responses that use differing methods and forms, however all of the projects are directly inspired by oral histories in the Trueselves archive.
TrueSelves: A Play on Gender is an original work based on oral histories of the New Jersey transgender community, created by coLAB Arts in partnership with the Pride Center of New Jersey. Interviews were conducted over a two-year period, culminating in a new devised theater piece directed by John Keller. The piece includes transcripts, original material, movement, and music.
TrueSelves was originally presented in partnership with Who Is My Neighbor?, Inc.
Grant funding for this project has been provided by the Middlesex County Board of Chosen Freeholders through a grant provided by New Jersey State Council on the Arts / Department of State.
Truelove: An Act of Support is a documentary theater piece about the allies and advocates of our gender diverse community. In this sequel to Trueselves, Truelove gives voice to the families, medical professionals, and support systems that help transgendered and gender non-binary loved ones navigate their transitions. The play, set in a support group meeting, takes a look at the journey that families take alongside their gender non-conforming loved ones as they learn to sustain relationships through social, medical, and emotional transitions.
Thanks to RWJ/Barnabas Health System and their Babs Siperstein Proud Center and the Proud Transition Family Support Group for inviting coLAB Arts to share their stories as a means to educate and advocate. Funding and additional outreach support provided by the Pride Center of New Jersey through a generous grant from Middlesex County Board of Chosen Freeholders through a grant award from Middlesex County Cultural and Arts Trust Fund.
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Project Participants
“Maybe I have a cane, because I was born to part seas.”- An excerpt from “Sacred Illness,” a Poem by Osimiri Sprowal
coLAB Arts resident artist Osimiri Sprowal will be working with coLAB Arts to develop a new digital platform to house new creative interventions produced with New Brunswick’s houseless and housing precarious communities. We’ll be working in collaboration with Elijah’s Promise, Mercado Esperanza, and SHELTER (www.shelternj.org), to connect with communities and provide virtual and in person workshops and oral histories, and commission professional artists to develop creative responses in dialogue with that community work.
Osimiri Sprowal is an international slam champion poet, author, workshop facilitator, creative director, and budding photographer born and raised in Philadelphia. They are an alumnus of the Philly Youth Poetry Movement (PYPM), Babel Poetry Collective, and the founder of deadname.arts, Philly’s only exclusively trans and gender-expansive art collective. Osimiri was the Philly Youth Grand Slam Champion in 2015, and a 2018 College Union Poetry Slam Invitational (CUPSI) Semi-Finalist, where they received the Best Love Poem Award for their poem “Genesis.”
Carolina hosts the weekly Facebook show Cooking Outside the Box.
She is an activist and community organizer based in New Brunswick. As a collaborator with coLAB Arts, she is one of the co-curators of theVOM story slam and workshop series and organizes much of the Spanish language programming. With a personal mission to bridge the gap between the Spanish and English languages, she mentors many young people in the community and works with the Esperanza Neighborhood Project, Elijah’s Promise, Mercado Esperanza, and other local organizations.
John Keller was born and raised in the City of New Brunswick and works in NYC and internationally as a freelance actor. Through his work at coLAB Arts, John is committed to creating projects that use the arts as a lens to examine complex issues that affect community. While serving as Director of Education for coLAB Arts, John has produced main-stage productions and initiated educational residencies in several central New Jersey schools. John curates and directs coLAB Arts’ Trueselves oral history and theater project in partnership with the Pride Center of New Jersey and Rutgers Oral History Archive. John is also the Board Chair for New Brunswick’s Town Clock Community Development Corporation. John earned his undergraduate degree at Holy Cross and holds a Masters in Fine Arts in Acting from Rutgers University, Mason Gross School of the Arts. He has taught theater at all grade levels in a variety of residency programs as well as at Rider University, Westminster Choir College and is currently teaching Theater for Social Development at Rutgers University, Mason Gross School of the Arts, and Acting at Fairleigh Dickinson University
Chrissy Briskin is a creative artist who has directed, produced, written, and performed in many shows over the last ten years. She has a B.A. in English Literature from Rutgers University and is currently a teacher in South Plainfield. Some of her directing credits include, RENT, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Legally Blonde, Les Miserables, and Hairspray. She has also performed in TrueSelves: A Play on Gender and The Vagina Monologues. As an educator, she is incredibly proud to have built a supportive drama program and community of artists in South Plainfield. Under her direction, the high school performed its first ever public scene study and public presentation of student created twenty minute musicals. Chrissy continues to work on the next evolution of TrueSelves and producing the 48 Hour Musicals. She currently lives in Neshanic Station with her wonderful husband and fur babies. You can reach her at cbriskin@colab-arts.org
Jose Dominguez Magdaleno (He/They/El) is so grateful to bring this story to life and collaborate with an amazing team that brings so much joy and light to the work. Stories are a source of connection and change. They enlight something in us that is unspeakable. My hope is that this story brings to light an underrepresented community that has been historically oppressed in the United States and brings change to our culture and politics. Jose would like to thank John for reaching out to them, his parents and Steven for being by their side. Jose is a third-year student at DePaul University double-majoring in BFA Theatre Arts and BA Latin American and Latino Studies, with a minor in Education & Social Justice.
Benjamin James DeSimone is a 21 year old cinematographer/editor, whose additional interests include directing and set design/art department. Benjamin grew up in central New Jersey and graduated from the East Brunswick Voc-Tech film department. He has since relocated to Florida to earn his Bachelor of Science at Full Sail University, and to get a better understanding of the tools necessary for his success. Benjamin especially values collaborative efforts, and has prior experience with mixed media projects. He hopes to take the film industry by storm- utilizing it as a tool for the greater good, as well as a platform to spread joy throughout all communities.
Luz de Venus Ulloa is humbled and elated to reconnect with their acting roots by the hand of John and Jose. Their performance is dedicated to both of them and femmes of color, in particular those raised in Latin America and Middle Eastern territories, including those near them. We are strong, we are graceful, we are deserving, we belong! Gracias Mariah.
Too often, trans stories are put into a cookie-cutter narrative of acute gender dysphoria followed by transition and family conflict. The trans experience is far more vast, expansive, messy, and surprising than that. Through the TrueSelves project, we are able to break out of the single story of transition to start to show the multitude of trans identity and reality.
Check out Lane’s other work here: www.lanemichaelstanley.com
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