The Wheel of Nouns comes to The Bread & Roses Theatre on June 1st and 2nd - a chaotic comedy-cabaret where gender gets the game show treatment. Created by Hook, this sharp, silly, and totally unhinged hour blends audience interaction and big questions like “What even is gender?” We had a chat with Hook about cabaret, queerness, and what it’s like letting the Gender Fairy run wild on stage.
What is The Wheel of Nouns about and what can audiences expect when they come to see it?
The Wheel of Nouns invites you to come play in a world where The Gender Fairy has gone rogue and every noun could be a gender. The show is light-hearted, bonkers, and pointedly relevant take on gender and identity. We’ve got The Gender Fairy who is mischievous, well-meaning, and a bit of a mess and they’re going around to as many venues as they can trying to turn everyone in the world trans. To do that they need people to play their game “The Wheel of Nouns”, where they encourage people to volunteer to get their gender transed (or double, triple, quadruple transed!). Expect games, jokes, optional audience participation, and maybe even a bribe!
What is The Wheel of Nouns about and what can audiences expect when they come to see it?
The Wheel of Nouns invites you to come play in a world where The Gender Fairy has gone rogue and every noun could be a gender. The show is light-hearted, bonkers, and pointedly relevant take on gender and identity. We’ve got The Gender Fairy who is mischievous, well-meaning, and a bit of a mess and they’re going around to as many venues as they can trying to turn everyone in the world trans. To do that they need people to play their game “The Wheel of Nouns”, where they encourage people to volunteer to get their gender transed (or double, triple, quadruple transed!). Expect games, jokes, optional audience participation, and maybe even a bribe!
You describe the show as a mix of cabaret, comedy and game show. What inspired you to blend these styles when exploring gender?
I really wanted to make a show that said, hey, look how exciting and interesting and silly gender can be. But I think being trans can feel very isolating, and talking about gender can quickly become exhausting when all the pressure is on you to articulate it correctly and do all the thinking and talking. So the big thing for me when writing a solo-show exploring gender was figuring out, okay how do I make this fun, and how do I get people to join in and have fun with me. I also needed to find a format that helped me illustrate that gender and identity are not easily explained or defined within a set structure. With that in mind the game-show format felt perfect, because games can be a low-stakes way of getting people involved and invested. The rules of the game also provide enough structure for people to feel secure and know what’s going on, but allow for enough variety to keep things interesting.
The show plays with themes like queerness and identity in a light-hearted way. What made you want to tackle these subjects through theatre?
Theatre is a beautiful container to talk about gender because a stage is a place where people have already been taught to suspend disbelief. Whether we believe something or not, if we’re watching a show and are told that someone is a king, then we accept that they are a king, if we are shown a piece of painted cardboard and are told it's a tree, then it’s a tree. To be clear, transness is a reality not a suspension of disbelief, but using a medium that has imagination built into its structure is great for encouraging people to think about gender and identity in a potentially new and unusual way.
I really wanted to make a show that said, hey, look how exciting and interesting and silly gender can be. But I think being trans can feel very isolating, and talking about gender can quickly become exhausting when all the pressure is on you to articulate it correctly and do all the thinking and talking. So the big thing for me when writing a solo-show exploring gender was figuring out, okay how do I make this fun, and how do I get people to join in and have fun with me. I also needed to find a format that helped me illustrate that gender and identity are not easily explained or defined within a set structure. With that in mind the game-show format felt perfect, because games can be a low-stakes way of getting people involved and invested. The rules of the game also provide enough structure for people to feel secure and know what’s going on, but allow for enough variety to keep things interesting.
The show plays with themes like queerness and identity in a light-hearted way. What made you want to tackle these subjects through theatre?
Theatre is a beautiful container to talk about gender because a stage is a place where people have already been taught to suspend disbelief. Whether we believe something or not, if we’re watching a show and are told that someone is a king, then we accept that they are a king, if we are shown a piece of painted cardboard and are told it's a tree, then it’s a tree. To be clear, transness is a reality not a suspension of disbelief, but using a medium that has imagination built into its structure is great for encouraging people to think about gender and identity in a potentially new and unusual way.
The title The Wheelof Nouns is so intriguing. Can you talk a bit about where it comes from and how it relates to gender?
So one time I was meeting a new therapist, and I told her I was trans. She then got really serious and asked if I was “comfortable sharing my nouns”, instead of pronouns. And I was like stop, I'm obsessed with that. I didn’t even correct her because like, what ARE my nouns?
I think nouns help us talk about gender because nouns are quite expansive, and so is gender. There are a LOT of nouns. And there are a lot of ways that people can express and define themselves. So in the show I ask people to imagine that any noun could be a gender. This gives me a lot more freedom to bring new exciting genders to the table, show how expansive our identities are, and have a little extra fun with it. Every night the audience picks new nouns, and then those are the nouns that they could potentially get transed into. People have been transed into teapots, prawn-toast, teeth, and all kinds of things. Nouns are also useful because they’re quite accessible. Trans people can definitely have a lot of fun with them, but if you’re not trans and are not entirely sure what’s going on, you can still have a lot of fun with your nouns. The desire to express ourselves is not unique to trans people, it's a fairly universal human trait.
Why did you choose The Bread & Roses Theatre for this show’s June run?
The Bread & Roses is a gem of a theatre. I was particularly drawn in by their interest to program queer, trans - led work, and also by the exciting variety of shows that they program. The Bread and Roses is a venue that’s interested in platforming and finding an audience for new, exciting, multi-genre work, and I think that’s fantastic. I’m thrilled to be bringing my show there!
Cabaret often breaks the fourth wall. How does audience interaction factor into your show and what kind of experience are you hoping to create?
The interaction in The Wheel of Nouns is as much a chance for the audience to have fun as it is for me to do my comedy, and I want to make sure people are leaving the show feeling good. The audience participation is very optional, and no one will be called out who doesn’t want to. I like my audience interaction unhinged but KIND. The main type of audience interaction for The Wheel of
Nouns is having people volunteer to let The Gender Fairy spin the wheel and trans their gender. People can choose to have their moment on stage, or stay safely in their seats..There are also opportunities for people to shout things out, and get involved without having to get their gender transed so you don’t have to be having a brave day to feel part of the show.
I do try to sweeten the pot as well with a magical bribe, as well as oering beautiful, perfectly legitimate, Gender Fairy-signed gender certificates for people who volunteer to take home.
So one time I was meeting a new therapist, and I told her I was trans. She then got really serious and asked if I was “comfortable sharing my nouns”, instead of pronouns. And I was like stop, I'm obsessed with that. I didn’t even correct her because like, what ARE my nouns?
I think nouns help us talk about gender because nouns are quite expansive, and so is gender. There are a LOT of nouns. And there are a lot of ways that people can express and define themselves. So in the show I ask people to imagine that any noun could be a gender. This gives me a lot more freedom to bring new exciting genders to the table, show how expansive our identities are, and have a little extra fun with it. Every night the audience picks new nouns, and then those are the nouns that they could potentially get transed into. People have been transed into teapots, prawn-toast, teeth, and all kinds of things. Nouns are also useful because they’re quite accessible. Trans people can definitely have a lot of fun with them, but if you’re not trans and are not entirely sure what’s going on, you can still have a lot of fun with your nouns. The desire to express ourselves is not unique to trans people, it's a fairly universal human trait.
Why did you choose The Bread & Roses Theatre for this show’s June run?
The Bread & Roses is a gem of a theatre. I was particularly drawn in by their interest to program queer, trans - led work, and also by the exciting variety of shows that they program. The Bread and Roses is a venue that’s interested in platforming and finding an audience for new, exciting, multi-genre work, and I think that’s fantastic. I’m thrilled to be bringing my show there!
Cabaret often breaks the fourth wall. How does audience interaction factor into your show and what kind of experience are you hoping to create?
The interaction in The Wheel of Nouns is as much a chance for the audience to have fun as it is for me to do my comedy, and I want to make sure people are leaving the show feeling good. The audience participation is very optional, and no one will be called out who doesn’t want to. I like my audience interaction unhinged but KIND. The main type of audience interaction for The Wheel of
Nouns is having people volunteer to let The Gender Fairy spin the wheel and trans their gender. People can choose to have their moment on stage, or stay safely in their seats..There are also opportunities for people to shout things out, and get involved without having to get their gender transed so you don’t have to be having a brave day to feel part of the show.
I do try to sweeten the pot as well with a magical bribe, as well as oering beautiful, perfectly legitimate, Gender Fairy-signed gender certificates for people who volunteer to take home.
What do you hope audiences will walk away thinking or feeling after seeing The Wheel of Nouns?
I’m sure the show will hit different people in different ways, but overall I hope people walk away feeling uplifted, excited about gender, and most importantly, I can’t help but hope that people will see the show and feel an additional bit of motivation and inspiration to support and protect trans people.
Finally, for anyone on the fence about booking a ticket, what would you say to them?
Happiness is just a noun away!
Come for a feel-good evening of magic, a game you can’t lose, and did I mention the bribe?
Also, I swear the Gender Fairy is not going to bite you.
Why would they do that?
They really won’t, I promise.
Catch The Wheel of Nouns 1st & 2nd June 2025 at The Bread & Roses Theatre, tickets here: https://app.lineupnow.com/event/the-wheel-of-nouns
I’m sure the show will hit different people in different ways, but overall I hope people walk away feeling uplifted, excited about gender, and most importantly, I can’t help but hope that people will see the show and feel an additional bit of motivation and inspiration to support and protect trans people.
Finally, for anyone on the fence about booking a ticket, what would you say to them?
Happiness is just a noun away!
Come for a feel-good evening of magic, a game you can’t lose, and did I mention the bribe?
Also, I swear the Gender Fairy is not going to bite you.
Why would they do that?
They really won’t, I promise.
Catch The Wheel of Nouns 1st & 2nd June 2025 at The Bread & Roses Theatre, tickets here: https://app.lineupnow.com/event/the-wheel-of-nouns
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