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GIRL DOLLS: The American Musical
Created and performed by Jackie Soro & Pax Ressler
Produced by the Bearded Ladies Cabaret and presented in partnership with FringeArts
Join doll enthusiasts and certified 90s kids Jackie Soro and Pax Ressler as they rifle through their confidential childhood toy chests in GIRL DOLLS: The American Musical! Presented in collaboration with The Bearded Ladies Cabaret and FringeArts, GIRL DOLLS is part tea party, part identity crisis—a deep dive into our country’s favorite doll franchise in search of the stories that got left out of the dollhouse. Through original songs, nostalgic PowerPoints, and serious research™ disguised as musical comedy, Jackie, Pax, and an all-star band rip open the seams of American girlhood to ask: What does your favorite doll reveal about your childhood trauma? Is Samantha Parkington a sleeper agent for the American Project? And most importantly: When everything else about America feels awful, why can’t we let go of their tiny doll hands? Bring your doll, and come ready to laugh, cry, and cringe our collective way down memory lane!
Disclaimer: This project is in no way affiliated with Mattel or the American Girl brand. We pinky-promise that it’s all totally legal!
Run Time:
75 minutes, no intermission.
Content Transparency:
This performance contains haze, flashing lights, and loud sound effects.
This performance is recommended for audiences ages 12 and up.
Artistic/Creative Team
Director: MK Tuomanen
Music Director: Pax Ressler
Producer: Carlos Diaz Stoop
Production Manager: Taylor Jedlinski
Production Coordinator: CD Kincade
Sound Designer: Natali Merrill
Lighting Designer: Krista Smith
Scenic and Props Designer: Chris Haig
Set Built by: Philadelphia Scenic Works
Projection Designer: Taj Rauch
Costume Designer: Rebecca Kanach
Video Content Creator: Nia Benjamin
Musical Consultant: Justin Yoder
Additional Projection Design: Jackie Soro
Musicians
Bass: Mel Hsu
Guitar: Corinne Kite-Dean
Percussion: Mel Regn
Bearded Ladies Staff
Rose Jarboe (she/her) Founder and Artistic Director
Sally Ollove (she/her) Associate Artistic Director
Wesley Flash (he/him) Managing Director
Taylor Jedlinski (she/her) Production Manager
Elena Faverio (they/them) Marketing Manager
Carlos Diaz Stoop (he/him) Staff Producer
Nic Bampbelldie (they/them) Beards Administrator
Original music in GIRL DOLLS
Music & Lyrics by Pax Ressler & Jackie Soro
Orchestration by Pax Ressler
Additional arrangements by the band
- When I Was a Kid
- She’s An American Girl…Doll
- Yankee Doodles
- Pleasant Rowland
- Doll Hospital
- Everyone Should Buy a Doll
- Meet Addy
- Tea Party
- Pretty Please
- We Did It!
- She Was 8
- Doll Test
- She’s A Doll
- Your Friend
About the Artists
Performers & Musicians
Pax Ressler
Pax Ressler (she/they) is a non-binary transfemme composer, organizer and cabaret theatre artist who uses music as a participatory tool to invigorate our collective imaginations towards social change. Pax invites the performer-audience collective to rehearse their values and imagine a better world together through political cabaret (The Bearded Ladies’ “Contradict This!”), communal singing with Rise Choir Collective (@risechoircollective), and trans and non-binary advocacy in the Philadelphia theatre sector with Genderfunk Philly (@genderfunkphilly). Pax is an F. Otto Haas Award finalist and Barrymore Award-winning composer whose work has been performed around the world, on the streets in parades and protests, and in elite cultural institutions like The Guggenheim Museum, Woolly Mammoth Theatre, and La Mama ETC (Jarbeaux’s “Rose: You Are Who You Eat”). paxressler.com @paxressler
Jackie Soro
Jackie Soro (she/they) is an artist, singer, and collaborative theater-maker dedicated to creating safer spaces and wider stages for queer stories. Their solo & collaborative works are immersive, musical, and fiercely queer, ranging from improvisational satire to meditations on identity, community, and place. Jackie has appeared on many stages, including Ars Nova, LaMama ETC, FringeArts, Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Wilma Theater and more, including DIY venues across Philadelphia. Her ensemble work has garnered five Barrymore Awards for Excellence in Theater (Poor Judge, Pig Iron Theater; Gay Mis, Jaffe St. Queer; Fun Home, Arden Theater Co.; Contradict This!, Bearded Ladies Cabaret). Her work has been supported by residencies at Subcircle (ME) and Resonant Motion Inc. (NYC), and she is a 2024 recipient of the Independence Foundation Fellowship in the Arts. Jackie’s artistic practice spans from music & performance art to fiber arts & natural dye–learn more at jackiesoro.com.
Corinne Kite-Dean
Corinne Kite-Dean (she/her) plays guitar well enough that everybody says, “wow, she must have graduated from UArts before it exploded,” and they’re right! She has been a part of the Philly theater scene for almost 10 years, most recently serving as the guitarist at People’s Light’s summer-long production of Little Shop of Horrors. She has also performed and recorded with some of the best young jazz and improvisational musicians in the Philadelphia area over the years, which solidified her place in the scene as a guitarist who brings to the table equal parts honed knowledge, technical ability and a lust for modernity and innovation. She has two cats named Huxley and Orwell, and in her free time she likes to lay on a hammock with seltzer or play especially frustrating video games. crouton.net @corinne.exe
Mel Hsu
Mel Hsu (she/they) regretfully missed out on American Girls as a child but was deeply obsessed with all of the My Little Pony ponies and “accidentally” giving them hair cuts on playdates. Mel was raised as a classical cellist who tried to weasel their way into the high school jazz band and was told multiple times by the high school band director that there was no room for Mel or their instrument. Mel eventually snuck her way into the college jazz orchestra by plugging the cello into an amp and learning all of the trombone parts. When the orchestra’s bass player quit, Mel started taking upright lessons and pounced on the open seat. To this day, Mel’s fingers still need a few thrilling seconds to figure out if we’re tuned in fourths or fifths when switching between instruments. Mel is a spreadsheet nerd, a slow reader, and a shameless instigator of kitchen dance parties. www.melhsu.com
Mel Regn
Mel Regn (she/he/they) loves to be behind the kit and behind the scenes in spaces that hold queer and trans joy as sacred and build solidarity in service of collective liberation. Mel would love to talk to you about your root (e.g., your mom got married in pants), your favorite conspiracy theory, or what right relationship looks like under oppressive economic and social conditions. Mel can sometimes be found at @mel.drums.yeah or in real life playing out in the streets and with nearly every gay band in Philadelphia.
Artistic & Creative Team
Nia Benjamin
Nia Benjamin (they/them) is PUMPED to be making their Bearded Ladies design debut to support the visionary work of their dear friends Jackie and Pax. Nia is a multidisciplinary artist, set designer, video artist and director of experimental theatre; who uses the synthesis of dance, poetry, live music, theatre and video arts to create performance works about the sovereignty, liberation and interiority of Black and Brown, queer and trans* people. Nia is the Co-Artistic Director of Ninth Planet, a Philadelphia based dance-theatre company making original works of performance that centers people of color, women, queer and trans* people. Recent credits include: Fallawayinto (2025, Director) On Buried Ground (2024, Director/Co-Creator), Esto No Tiene Nombre by Denice Frohman (2023, Projection and Production Designer), high noon (2024, Director, Co-Creator). Nia is the proud graduate of the University of the Arts, a recipient of an Independence Fellowship and a Leeway Transformation Award.
Carlos Diaz Stoop
Carlos Diaz Stoop (he/him) is an Artist Advocate and Creative Producer who brings projects to life across theatre, music, dance, opera, community engagement, and social justice projects. Projects Carlos has supported include: Be Holding (World Premiere; Tyshawn Sorey, Brooke O’Harra, and Yarn/Wire, 2023), Nichos (World Premiere & Winner of Barrymore Award for Outstanding Social Justice; Tanaquil Marquez, Ximena Violante, and Calo Rosa, 2024), Convalescence (World Premiere; Pepón Osorio and Robert Blackson, 2024), The Garden (Nichole Canuso Dance Company, 2025), Scott Joplin’s Treemonisha: a musical reimagining (US Premiere; Volcano Theatre, 2025), Adoration (Grammy Nominated, World Premiere; Beth Morrison Projects, 2024) Trade/Mary Motorhead (Grammy Nominated, World Premiere; Beth Morrison Projects, 2023) and various projects with The Bearded Ladies Cabaret. www.cdscreativeproductions.com | @cdscreativeproductions
Chris Haig
Chris Haig (he/him) Chris is thrilled to be making his Bearded Ladies design debut with this amazing team of old friends and new collaborators! A proud University of the Arts alum and former professor, Chris has designed sets and props throughout Philadelphia for 25 years, earning five Barrymore nominations for Best Scenic Design including one win for Playboy of the Western World with Inis Nua Theatre Company. He has also designed sets and/or props for 11th Hour Theatre Company, 1812 Productions, Arcadia University, Arden Theatre Company, Bristol Riverside Theatre, Constellation Stage & Screen, Delaware Shakespeare Festival, Delaware Theatre Company, EgoPo Classic Theatre, FringeArts, Gunnar Montana Productions, Haiger Productions, InterAct Theatre Company, La Familia, Milwaukee Rep, People’s Light, Philadelphia Theatre Company, Plays & Players, Power Street Theatre Company, Relic Theatre Company, Shakespeare in Clark Park, Simpatico Theatre, Spiegelworld, Theatre Exile, Theatre Horizon, Tribe of Fools, University of the Arts, and Villanova University. Chris is a proud member of the Society of Prop Managers and serves on the Executive Board of Philadelphia Scenic Works. Special thanks to his sister Alison and her friends who generously shared their American Girl Dolls with us for this production! www.chrishaigdesigns.com
Taylor Jedlinski
Taylor Jedlinski (she/her) has been the on-staff Production Manager of The Bearded Ladies Cabaret since 2023. She is also a sound designer and audio engineer in and around Philadelphia. Some favorite design credits include Blythely Ever After with Boston Lyric Opera, Rose: You Are Who You Eat with The Bearded Ladies, and Little Shop of Horrors with Theatre Horizon. Taylor has a BFA in Technical Theatre/Design from Lindenwood University. She is thrilled to be a part of the GIRL DOLLS team, and sends love to her little one, Ella, and partner, Matthew.
Rebecca Kanach
Rebecca Kanach is a Barrymore Award-winning costume designer. In New York, her work has been seen at the Lincoln Center, Ars Nova’s ANT Fest, La MaMa, The New Ohio, and Joe’s Pub. Regionally, her work has been seen at companies including The Arden Theatre Company, Walnut Street Theatre, The Wilma Theater, Opera Philadelphia, and Bristol Riverside Theatre. Academic work includes designs with Swarthmore University, Rutgers-Camden Campus, and Temple University. Rebecca is the co-founder and resident costume designer of The Bearded Ladies Cabaret, and a company member of Lightning Rod Special, whose performance of The Appointment was listed as one of the New York Times’ Best Theater of 2019.
CD Kincade
CD Kincade (they/them) is a freelance stage manager in the greater Philadelphia area. Their favorite credits include Small Ball (Philadelphia Theatre Company, assistant stage manager), POTUS… (Arden Theatre, assistant stage manager), and Emily Bate’s Wig Wag (FringeArts, stage manager). CD’s American Girl Doll of choice is Kit Kitteredge, and their Kit doll can be seen making her onstage debut in this performance. @chloe.l.k
Natali Merrill
Natali Merrill is a sound and technology designer and engineer. Based in Philadelphia, she has been the sound designer for productions including Walden (InterAct), Young Americans (Theatre Horizon), Ghost Ride (Agile Rascal Bike Theatre), Siluetas (Power Street Theatre), Broads (1812 Productions), Spring Awakening (Bryn Mawr College), High Noon (Ninth Planet), Shakespeare’s R&J (New Light Theatre Company), Fucking A (Swarthmore College), Riot Antigone, and Cabaret (Haverford and Bryn Mawr Colleges). She has worked with Theatre Exile, 11th Hour Theatre Company, the Bearded Ladies Cabaret, New Century Theatre Company in Seattle, and the Williamstown Theatre Festival. A graduate of Haverford College with a major in physics, she researched and wrote a thesis on acoustics in performance halls with RWTH Aachen University in Aachen, Germany. She is also a singer and composer. www.nmerrill.com @ndmerrill
Taj Rauch
Taj Rauch is an immersive game designer, theater maker, and filmmaker. His multidisciplinary practice centers the audience as the protagonist, merging interactive design, narrative systems, and performance to ask: in a myriad of worlds, would you still find yourself to be you? Taj is the winner of the 2025 Black Immersive Creators Grant, an awardee of the Niantic Developer Accelerator Fund, and a recipient of a 2024 Residency with the Wilma Theater. His work has been exhibited in the IceBox Project Space, featured in the PAFA Museum, and played at the VGTVG Conference. Currently, Taj is a part of the 2026 ARx Cohort, where he will be working with researchers to turn scientific research into multiple art exhibitions.
Krista Smith
Krista Smith (she/they) Proud to be one of the GIRL DOLLS. Krista is a Philadelphia based Lighting Designer and Interdisciplinary Artist with an enthusiasm for new work, adaptations, and storytelling interwoven with music. Krista’s designs have been seen locally at venues including: The Wilma Theater, Arden Theatre Co., The Drake, Fringe Arts, Theatre Horizon, The Icebox, People’s Light Theater, and Theater Exile. Regionally includes: La MaMa, Ars Nova, New York Theater Workshop, The Public Theater, Hartford Stage, Rattlestick Theater, Dorset Theatre, Weston Theater, California Shakespeare Theater, and Yale Repertory Theater. Before the institution sadly shut down, Krista was a member of the devoted design faculty at The University of the Arts. Academic work includes designs with Villanova, Colgate, Auburn, and Rutgers University. BA San Francisco State University, MFA Yale School of Drama. Proud member USA 829 www.KristaSmithLD.com
MK Tuomanen
MK Tuomanen (they/them) is honored to be a part of GIRL DOLLS. Their recent directing credits include Sleuth (Guthrie Theater, assistant director) The Presented by Chris Davis (“ Best Fringe Revival ”, Philly Inquirer) and Rose Jarboe’s Rose: You Are Who You Eat (Woolly Mammoth, Under the Radar LaMama, Guggenheim Museum). A Jerome Fellow, Haas Emerging Artist and 2024 winner of the Terrence McNally Award for their play, Night Science, MK cut their teeth performing as American Girl character Kirsten Larson when they were a pre-teen with bad skin and braces in New Hampshire. They are an Associated Artist with the Bearded Ladies Cabaret and a company member of Applied Mechanics. www.mkplays.com
The Bearded Ladies Cabaret
The Bearded Ladies Cabaret is a queer arts organization that sits on your lap and sings you a story. Whether it’s an opera, a home-made cabaret, a musical walking tour, or a show on a truck, we employ song, spectacle, storytelling, and heart to welcome audiences into moments of joy, healing, and subversion. Through sharing our original pieces and creating bespoke platforms for performance at home in Philadelphia, nationally, and abroad, we nurture artistic connection for a community of misfits, rabble-rousers, chanteuses and the people who love and need them. Their work has been seen all over Philadelphia including the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Eastern State Penitentiary, Opera Philadelphia, the Wilma Theater, FringeArts, and the Delaware River Waterfront and they have brought their cabaret revolution to Miami, Seattle, Paris,
Washington DC, New Zealand, Provincetown, Maryland and Delaware. In New York their work has been seen at Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater, La MaMa Etc, Works & Process at the Guggenheim and Lincoln Center. Their signature programs The Beardmobile and LATE NIGHT SNACKS together have provided a stage for over 500 queer and nightlife artists. Find the Beards at www.beardedladiescabaret.com or on
Facebook/Instagram @beardedladiescabaret.
Bearded Ladies Land Acknowledgment
As we absorb the physical space we are in, we want to take a moment to acknowledge the history of this land and the original people of this land. We share this Land Acknowledgement written by Trinity Norwood, Citizen of The Nanticoke Lenni-Lenape Nation, and ask you to take a moment to breathe, look around, and take in the surroundings. Before Philadelphia was the city we know and love today, this land was known as “Lenapehoking( Lun-nah-pay-hawk-ing)” or Land of the Lenape. The Lenape are the indigenous people of what is modern-day Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and the southern tip of New York. Through genocide, relocations, the Indian Boarding School era, and continued systematic erasure the Lenape people have persevered and live on as modern-day sovereign nations. We recognize their legacy that has been soaked into the very ground we stand on right now. And we acknowledge the intergenerational connection to this legacy that we all share as the descendants to the immigrants of this land. Although this history is heavy, the future is filled with hope. As part of this practice of acknowledgement the Bearded Ladies Cabaret give 10% of all donations made at our events to We Are The Seeds, a local and national organization that celebrates and educates about contemporary Indigenous arts and culture. You can connect to their work at wearetheseeds.org.
Support
GIRL DOLLS was supported by The Bearded Ladies Cabaret with multiple development residencies through their new work initiatives. The show received additional support from Theater Exile’s Studio X-hibition series.
GIRL DOLLS is made possible by the Cushman Foundation, Arthur M. Kaplan & Duane Perry, a Leeway Foundation Window of Opportunity Grant, Colin Likens, Sarah and Brad Marshall, Kate Poole, Mary Alice and Gerald Ressler and the generous support of additional donors.