(ASBURY PARK, NJ) -- Bailey Dumlao and Matthew Yee have announced the first annual ACT OUT, DIVA! New Play Festival featuring five new plays presented as readings from July 17-20, 2025. Matthew Yee is one of the featured playwrights and Bailey Dumlao directs all five pieces.
ACT OUT, DIVA! New Play Festival is a theatrical new work incubator designed to elevate, foster, and amplify LGBTQIA+ stories and community. As part of their premiere, they are excited to present five (5) new plays as readings held at various community partner spaces in Asbury Park, New Jersey. To be featured are: Sensation by Matthew Yee, Board of Ed by Richard Spitaletta, The Way You Made Me by Lindsay Partain, Strike/Out by Lizz Mangan, and [the inner universe] by Sam Heyman.
“Asbury is already such a vibrant, queer, and artsy place so it only feels right to see original queer theater take center stage here. I’m thrilled to witness bold, authentic stories come alive in our own backyard. This kind of representation isn’t just entertaining, it’s necessary, and long overdue.” - John Wisienski, Asbury Park Local
Bailey Dumlao and Matthew Yee
Thursday, June 17 - Sensation by Matthew Yee. This follows a group of eclectic drag queens as they prepare for the most important (and fabulous) gig of their careers: the Pride Kickoff. Tensions flare and sequins fly as their club’s imminent closure (and shade from one of their own) forces the queens to take an unconventional approach: helping an inexperienced baby queen lip sync for her life. A comedy about the power of a chosen family.
Friday, June 18 - Board of Ed by Richard Spitaletta. Connor and Dana, two depressed millennials, run for board of education in Woodmont, New Jersey against a small town super villain named Claudia Roberts. With just two weeks until election day, these two take on the most powerful woman in Bergen County, her chief of staff with psychic powers, an explosive bagel shop owner/devoted member of Qanon and more, all while reckoning with everything they've lost and the emptiness of life in the 2020s. Which Way to the Stage by Ana Nogueira meets POTUS by Selina Fillinger in this wacky, heartfelt comedy about two people trying to find their place in a messed up world.
Saturday, June 19 - The Way You Made Me by Lindsay Partain. Through love letters and memories, Imogen shares her gift of words with an unseen lover, sharing with them her journey of finding home, herself, and family, despite a life of neglect. A love story told by someone deemed "unloveable.”
Saturday, June 19 - Strike/Out written by Lizz Mangan. Tuesdays are, for the Strike Sisters, a day for bowling, beer, and bickering. When tragedy strikes for a fellow team member, the remaining players are faced with the harsh realization that the place they go to for escaping their outside world problems may be becoming a problem in and of itself.
Sunday, June 20 - [the inner universe] written by Sam Heyman. From a young age, Jackson Pomona was gifted with language. He was curious, inventive, and hungry for knowledge. This was not lost on his literary theory professor mother, Dr. Cheryl Kendall, who encouraged his gifts, and cultivated his growth as a scholar. Together, mother and son, they developed writings surrounding a theory that stood to change everything about the way the world saw their connections to others, their souls, themselves... but one day, that partnership tragically came to an end.
Years later, Jackson has entered college, and like many of his classmates, he is searching for answers to big questions. He is wary of what may lie beyond the boundaries his father has set for him, and also deathly curious. Can Jackson find the answers he seeks without succumbing to the dangers of his own mind?
Tickets for any of the readings are $20 and are available for purchase online There is an option to subscribe for $85 and see all five (5) plays.
Venues to host the readings, so far, include Paradise Nightclub, Gerogie’s Bar, Asbury Book Cooperative, and Chris Turk Swim (located on the Asbury Park Boardwalk).
About the Founders
Bailey Dumlao (he/they) is a Tennessee native. Their work has been seen locally at Two River Theater and Middletown Arts Center, and nationally with Asolo Repertory Theatre, Red Mountain Theatre, the Alabama Ballet, the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and Birmingham Children’s Theatre. Their body of work highlights intersectionality, especially the overlap between race, gender, sexuality, and identity.
Matthew Yee (they/them) is an Asbury Park and New Jersey local. They have been writing stories since they were a kid and have been playwriting since college. Two of their plays have had the fortune of making it to the stage: Don’t Let Me Go (Project REAL) and Proverbs 11:29 (NY Theater Festival’s Summerfest). When they’re not writing, they can be seen at Two River Theater working as a member of their Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility (IDEA) Collective or as the top-hatted diva, Lady Celestina.
