Name: PlayGround Solo Fest: The Specimen
Start: 2026-01-18T14:00:00-08:00
Location: Potrero Stage

The Specimen: A Horror Play written and performed by Schaeffer Nelson
Sun, Jan 18 at 2:30pm
Sat, Jan 24 at 4pm
Thurs, Jan 29 at 8:30pm
Mon, Feb 2 at 7pm
Johnny, a gay paleozoologist, is fired under Trump science budget cuts. Outraged, he makes a life-altering decision and is infected by a strange pathogen. Set entirely in an apartment bathroom, what follows is both a darkly comedic look at obsessive, male ambition and a chilling, new urban legend. Content warning: includes bloody imagery and nudity.
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PlayGround has announced the lineup for its ninth annual PlayGround Solo Performance Festival, a curation of the best in solo performance, running January 16-February 8, 2026 (Thurs-Mon), presented live at San Francisco’s Potrero Stage and simulcast online. The festival of new solo work (the largest in PlayGround’s history!) features 18 solo performers and 60 performances, including work by Linda Ayres-Frederick, Blaire Battle, Diana Brown, Annie Laurie Daniel, Carolyn Doyle, Ketsia Duval, Nicole Galland, Emil Amok Guillermo, Caroline Hawthorne, Ric Iverson, Susan Lily Jackson, Emily M. Keyishian, Joshua Klein, Brian Leonard, Schaeffer Nelson, Miyoko Sakatani, Gabe Seplow, RJ Silva, and Puja Tolton.
This year’s festival was competitively selected from open applications, and is a direct extension of PlayGround’s mission and commitment to the discovery of bold new voices for the stage and the development of innovative and timely original content. Tickets are Admission-Free (Suggested Donation: $10-$30). All donations directly support PlayGround and our guest artists. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit playground-sf.org/solofest.