Derek Denckla
“Anything worth doing is worth doing badly.” — G.K. Chesterton
Artist + Musician + Curator
Current Gig: Professor, English, Los Angeles Film School
Practice Areas: Poetry, Dramatic Writing, Performance Art, Songwriting, Event Curation
Works in Progress: On Animal Bondage (Experimental Novel in Progress)
Collaborations: Corona Crazy: The Musical with Benjamin Hey!
Tropical Gothic, Screenplay with Isabel Sandoval
Upcoming & Recent Musical Releases: (1) herasure EP by gEEk (Numero Group 2025); (2) Hammer LP by gEEk (Numero Group 2026); (3) “Hotel of Woe” (single) (Gatoland Records 2026); (4) Trust Little to Tomorrow LP by Carpe Diem (Numero Group 2025); (5) Sequoia (Numero Group 2025) 3-song 7” vinyl record in box set of 12 early “emocore” punk bands.
Upcoming Production: Corona Crazy: The Musical, presented at the NY Theater Festival, January 29, 31, and February 2, 2026 at LATEA Teatro, NYC.
Publication and Production: Praxinoscope PerformX Platform
Podcast: Inspiration Practice
Past Projects: Farming the City | Book | Community Lawyering Book & Video + Slow Money NYC - Local Foods & Farms Events + LEED Gold Greenbelt | Center for Performance Research + Urban Farm Blog thegreenest.net (now offline)
Locations: Historic Angelino Heights | Los Angeles > Shandaken > New York City > Brooklyn
Work in Progress
Corona Crazy: The ZOOMusical
CORONA CRAZY is an hour-long, 12-song original musical. I wrote the Book and Benjamin Hey! wrote the lyrics and the music. The show addresses the emotional effects of the early stages of the COVID 19 pandemic — telling the stories of 10 diverse characters who reside in the same NYC apartment building. Written in isolation during the pandemic, the show will be performed online on the Zoom platform. Proceeds will benefit The Actor’s Fund to address the current and severe challenges facing those whose livelihoods are derived from live performance. SPECIAL NOTE! As of February 2021, we are actively seeking Producers and Talent who are interesting in collaborating with us to present this exciting and very topical musical. Contact me!
Tropical Gothic: Screenplay
I am a Script Consultant providing research support and content for Tropical Gothic, written by Isabel Sandoval, in the pipeline to be produced in late 2021. The screenplay explores the earliest confrontations between the Spanish Catholic colonists and indigenous inhabits of the Phillippines in the 1500s through the lens of an improbable love affair that arises between a dispossessed native medicine woman and a heart-broken Historian. My dear friend, Isabel Sandoval, is having her “moment” right now. She is the acclaimed writer, director and producer of the feature, Lingua Franca, released on Netflix, August 26, 2020, and the winner of many awards including, most recently, the 2021 John Cassavates Award at the Independent Spirit Awards.
