| Red Bull Theater announces selections for Short New Play Festival 2024, including world premiere commissions from Madeleine George and Robert O’Hara | |
| Last Edit: Official_Press_Release 04:35 pm EDT 05/23/24 | |
| Posted by: Official_Press_Release 04:30 pm EDT 05/23/24 | |
|
|
|
| RED BULL THEATER Announces the Selections for the SHORT NEW PLAY FESTIVAL 2024 - RENEWAL Six Winning Submissions Will Premiere With Commissioned World Premieres from MADELEINE GEORGE ("Only Murders in the Building") and ROBERT O'HARA (Bootycandy) ONE NIGHT ONLY: Monday, June 24th at Classic Stage Company's Lynn F. Angelson Theater Red Bull Theater (Jesse Berger, Founder and Artistic Director; Martin Giannini, Executive Director) today announced the winning selections for Red Bull's ANNUAL SHORT NEW PLAY FESTIVAL. Six brand new 10-minute plays of heightened language and classic themes inspired by this year's theme, "Renewal," have been selected through an open submission process. These selections will premiere alongside commissions from Madeleine George ("Only Murders in the Building," The (Curious Case of the) Watson Intelligence, Hurricane Diane) and Robert O'Hara (Bootycandy, Insurrection: Holding History, Barbecue). The Short New Play Festival will be held on Monday June 24th (7:30pm) at Classic Stage Company's Lynn F. Angelson Theater, 136 East 13th Street. Red Bull Theater's 14th annual Short New Play Festival is made possible by the leadership support of The Noël Coward Foundation. This year's winning playwrights, selected from hundreds of open submissions from playwrights across the country, are Luke Brett, Amy Jo Jackson, Fleurette Modica, Paloma Nozicka, Emma Schillage, and Madison Stranahan. The premieres will be directed by Evan Yiounoulis and this year's Drama League Directing Fellow, Irvin Mason Jr. Casting will be announced shortly. "It is a thrill to announce the six winning entries for our annual Short New Play Festival! This year's theme of 'Renewal' inspired nearly 300 playwrights to pen brand-new surprising and delightful plays with a wonderful range. The six selected plays were hard to choose from so many great submissions! Together with our two established playwright commissions, they offer a terrific panoply of romance, drama, tragedy, and satire - all in conversation with the classics - enriching the boundaries of what that word can encompass. The eight plays brim with theatricality, passion, heightened language, epic themes, classical silliness, and fun. Mark your calendars now - this special event only comes round once a year!" said Artistic Director Jesse Berger. This year's selected plays are: The Skull of Elizabeth Bathory by Luke Brett Whispering to her keeper, the long dead skull of Elizabeth Bathory convinces a Restoration era actress in 1664 to lure trusting colleagues back to her home where they will be sacrificed in a ritual to eventually reanimate the horrifying Hungarian countess. In exchange, the actress has been promised the secret to eternal beauty. This dark legend plays with the conventions of Jacobean villainy while also examining why and how people find themselves willing to trade pain for beauty. You Know What They Say About Scorned Women by Amy Jo Jackson A modern-day Helen of Sparta has fled captivity and come home to Menelaus...but after a decade of being reviled and misunderstood, how can she return to the life she thought she knew? After Menelaus decides they should renew their marriage vows, Helen takes an unconventional path towards reclaiming renewal for herself. daphne and laurel by Fleurette Modica The campers at Diana's Camp for Wholesome Teenage Girls have been told that if they explore their sexuality in any way, they will turn into a tree. When Daphne returns from a late-night encounter with a boy, she and her roommate Laurel must confront whether everything they have been told is a lie. Semillas by Paloma Nozicka Antigone meets "Fleabag." With Mexicans. Or something. A short play about honoring our dead, no matter what. The Purgatory for Women Who Commit Suicide by Emma Schillage Ophelia has lost someone. Everyone has in The Purgatory for Women Who Commit Suicide. But before they can move on to whatever is next, the women must find closure. And how do they do this? By casting spells of course! The Purgatory for Women Who Commit Suicide forces you to rethink what it means to be a hysterical woman. Lady Macbeth's Hand Soap by Madison Stanahan Lady Macbeth (from Shakspeare's Macbeth) finds herself in the middle of a commercial for handsoap. Details for this year's commissioned plays by Madeleine George and Robert O'Hara will be announced shortly. Over the Short New Play Festival's fourteen-year history, Red Bull Theater has cultivated over 4,000 new short plays of classic themes and heightened language, presenting 95 of them in a one-night-only Festival performance with some of New York's finest actors and directors. The commissioned playwrights have included Larissa FastHorse, Marcus Gardley, John Guare, Stephen Adly Guirgis, Jeremy O. Harris, David Ives, Craig Lucas, Ellen McLaughlin, Dael Orlandersmith, Heather Raffo, Theresa Rebeck, José Rivera, Anne Washburn, Doug Wright, and winning entries by writers such as Anchuli Felicia King, Patricia Ione Lloyd, Lynn Rosen, and Jen Silverman. Stage Rights has published a 5-volume collection of the plays from the first 10 years of Red Bull Theater's annual Short New Play Festival as Red Bull Shorts. ABOUT THIS YEAR'S PLAYWRIGHTS: Luke Brett is a Cleveland based playwright and actor with a talent for pop-up performances that create wonder from the ground up. He has performed his own work in unconventional spaces across Cleveland, whether that meant reciting original fabulist pulp stories at a bookstore or doing a handcuffed waltz on top of a hill in Public Square for the BorderLight Fringe Festival. He's also acted on the mainstages of Great Lakes Theater, Dobama Theatre, The Cleveland Shakespeare Festival, The Ohio Shakespeare Festival, and Cleveland Public Theatre. His plays have been produced at Playwrights Local, Hunger Theatre, Radio on the Lake Theatre, the Ohio Shakespeare Festival and the BorderLight Festival. In 2019, his first full length play Unletter'd, Rude and Shallow was a finalist in the Shakespeare's New Contemporaries project at the American Shakespeare Center. He adores Cleveland and life. Madeleine George's plays include The Sore Loser, Hurricane Diane (Obie Award), The (Curious Case of the) Watson Intelligence (Pulitzer Prize finalist), Seven Homeless Mammoths Wander New England, Precious Little, and The Zero Hour. Honors include a Lilly Award, the Hermitage Major Theater Award, the Princess Grace Award, and a Whiting Award. Madeleine's translation of Chekhov's Three Sisters premiered at Two River Theater in 2022, and her audio adaptation of Alison Bechdel's Dykes to Watch Out For was released by Audible Originals in 2023. Madeleine has written on shows for FX and HBO, and she's been a writer/producer on all four seasons of the Emmy- and Golden Globe-nominated mystery-comedy "Only Murders in the Building." Since 2006, she has worked with the Bard Prison Initiative at Bard College, where she currently serves as Director of Admissions. Amy Jo Jackson (they/she) is a performer, playwright, composer/lyricist and glitter alien based in New York City. They are the recipient of a 2023 EST/Sloan Commission for Grace/Bliss, and were a 2022 finalist for the Jonathan Larson Grant. AJJ's original musical Hatchetation was one of two musicals selected for the National Music Theater Conference at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in 2021, and has also been developed through She-Collective, Untitled Musical Project, and Fresh Ground Pepper's PAL program. Her acclaimed solo cabaret The Brass Menagerie was commissioned in 2019 by the Denovan Fellowship in Cabaret and was the recipient of a 2022 Bistro Award. As an actor, Amy Jo has performed with Company XIV, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Exit Pursued by a Bear, Prospect, Syracuse Stage, Arkansas Rep, Theatre Works Hartford, and many more. Their work as a kabarettist and nightlife artist has found them on just about every cabaret and comedy stage in NYC: Company XIV, 54 Below, Joe's Pub, Green Room 42, (le) Poisson Rouge, Little Island, the Cutting Room, the Slipper Room, the Bell House, Club Cumming, Caveat, and others. As a dialect coach, they've worked extensively in NYC and regionally, most notably on Broadway's Kinky Boots. BFA Boston Conservatory. Fleurette Modica is an NYC-based playwright, composer, and Shakespeare nerd. Her work offers comedic perspectives on the world and often focuses on the female coming-of-age experience. Most recently, her short play Full Moon was performed at the International Human Rights Art Festival. She is a two-time semifinalist in the Comedy/Novelty category of the International Songwriting Competition. Paloma Nozicka is a Mexican-American playwright, actor and filmmaker. She is currently a writer with the 2023-'24 Geffen Writer's Room. Playwriting credits include Enough to Let the Light In (2022 World Premiere, Teatro Vista) and Both (currently in development with Geffen Playhouse). Directing credits include Each Lovely Thing (currently showing in festivals). Screenwriting credits include Enough to Let the Light In, Horns, Each Lovely Thing, HUGE, and Sam Kelly. She is committed to telling femme-forward stories and promoting the equality of historically marginalized groups, specifically Latinas. Robert O'Hara is the Tony-nominated director of Slave Play and is currently working on several film, television, and Broadway projects. He's a two-time Obie Award winner and two-time NAACP Award winner whose work has been seen around the country. Emma Schillage (they/them) is a Southern Gothic playwright based in New Orleans and New York. They write about resilience, girlhood, and the horror/wonder of growing up in the Deep South. Schillage earned their BA in Theatre Arts from Loyola University New Orleans ('19) and MFA in Playwriting from Columbia University ('23). Their work has been produced by The 24-Hour Plays: Nationals, Breaking and Entering Theatre Co., and Southern Rep Theatre. Their play Cockroaches is also a semi-finalist in the Austin Film Festival Playwriting Competition and the Eugene O'Neill National Playwrights Conference. Madison Stranahan is an actor and a writer from Bozeman, Montana, currently based in New York. After studying History and Theatre Studies at Guilford College, she graduated from the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theatre in 2022. Her hobbies include watching old movies, reading about jazz singers, and walks in the park. ABOUT THE DIRECTORS Irvin Mason Jr. is a director, actor, poet, and teaching artist born and raised in St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands. His work intersects expressive movement, live music, emerging technology, and Afro-Caribbean traditions to breathe new life to physical storytelling. Irvin seeks to direct work that leaves a residue — unapologetic work that dismantles the traditional foundations of theater, and creates space for new voices to tell their own stories. His recent directing credits include: Ain't Misbehavin' (Gallery Players), Stuck (Chain Theatre), and Pipeline (Gallery Players). Assistant Directing: Gospel According to Heather (AMAS, dir. Rachel Klein). In 2023, Irvin served as a directing observer to Schele Williams on the Broadway revival of The Wiz. He was the SDCF directing shadow on Little Shop of Horrors (dir. Maggie Burrows) and Rent (dir. Lili-Anne Brown) at the MUNY. He was also the directing observer on Pup! A Chew Story (NAMT). Evan Yionoulis, an Obie award-winning director and nationally recognized teacher of acting, is Juilliard's Richard Rodgers dean and director of the Drama Division. She came to Juilliard after 20 years on the faculty of Yale School of Drama, where she was a professor in the practice of acting and directing and Lloyd Richards chair of the department of acting from 1998 to 2003. She has directed new plays and classics in New York, across the country, and internationally, including Adrienne Kennedy's He Brought Her Heart Back in a Box (world premiere) and Ohio State Murders (Lortel Award, best revival) for Theatre for a New Audience, Richard Greenberg's The Violet Hour (Broadway), Three Days of Rain (Obie for direction, Manhattan Theatre Club), and Everett Beekin (Lincoln Center Theater), and, during her 20 years as a resident director at Yale Repertory Theatre, productions including Shakespeare's Richard II and Cymbeline, Brecht's Galileo, Ibsen's The Master Builder, and Guillermo Calderón's Kiss. With composer/lyricist Mike Yionoulis, she is developing the multiplatform project Redhand Guitar, about five generations of musicians across an American century, and The Dread Pirate Project, about identity and anonymity across the digital and natural worlds. She is a Princess Grace Award recipient and serves as president of the executive board of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society. Mr. Mason's participation in our annual Short New Play Festival is made possible by the Drama League Directors Project. Red Bull Theater is pleased to continue its ongoing partnership with the Drama League Directors Project ABOUT THE NOËL COWARD FOUNDATION The Noël Coward Foundation was set up as a charitable trust in 2000 by Graham Payn and Dany Dasto. Its aim is to award grants to educational and development projects across the Arts and to continue the keen interest Coward himself took in charitable work during his lifetime. The Foundation is proud to support a diverse range of outstanding organizations working in theatre, music, playwriting, technical training, academic research and many other areas. ABOUT THE DRAMA LEAGUE DIRECTORS PROJECT The Drama League Stage Directing Fellowships provide a wide range of opportunities for emerging and rising directors, creating multiple avenues for future success in the theater industry. Providing significant financial support and health insurance reimbursement, creative retreats, network development, and residencies at multiple theater companies, The Drama League Stage Directing Fellowships also offer opportunities to direct readings and productions throughout the two-year experience. The Drama League is a creative and career development home for directors, and a platform for dialogue with, and between, the audiences they inspire in theater, television, film, opera, online, and anywhere live performance is found. Launched in 1916, the organization is one of the longest continuously-operating arts service organizations in the United States. ABOUT RED BULL THEATER Red Bull Theater, hailed as "the city's gutsiest classical theater" by Time Out New York, brings rarely seen classic plays to dynamic new life for contemporary audiences, uniting a respect for tradition with a modern sensibility. Named for the rowdy Jacobean playhouse that illegally performed plays in England during the years of Puritan rule, Red Bull Theater is New York City's home for dynamic performances of great plays that stand the test of time. With the Jacobean plays of Shakespeare and his contemporaries as its cornerstone, the company also produces new works that are in conversation with the classics. A home for artists, scholars, and students, Red Bull Theater delights and engages the intellect and imagination of audiences, and strives to make its work accessible, diverse, and welcoming to all. We value and practice inclusiveness, equity, and diversity in all of our activities, and are committed to antiracist action. Red Bull Theater believes in the power of great classic stories and plays of heightened language to deepen our understanding of the human condition, in the special ability of live theater to create unique, collective experiences, and in the timeless capacity of classical theater to illuminate the events of our times. Variety agreed, hailing Red Bull's work as: "Proof that classical theater can still be surprising after hundreds of years." Since its debut in 2003 with a production of Shakespeare's Pericles starring Daniel Breaker, Red Bull Theater has served adventurous theatergoers with Off-Broadway productions, Revelation Readings, and the annual Short New Play Festival. The company also offers outreach programs including Shakespeare in Schools bringing professional actors and teaching artists into public school classrooms; Bull Sessions, free post-play discussions with top scholars; and Classical Acting Intensives led by veteran theater professionals. During the pandemic, Red Bull created several new and ongoing programs to serve audiences and artists with our mission: the Red Bull Theater Podcast, Online Readings, Seminars, and more. "The classics-shaking Red Bull Theater," as Time Out NY has called it, has produced 24 Off-Broadway productions and over 200 Revelation Readings of rarely seen classics, serving a community of more than 5,000 artists and providing quality artistic programming to an audience of over 65,000. The company's unique programming has received ongoing critical acclaim and has been recognized with Lortel, Drama Desk, Drama League, Callaway, Off-Broadway Alliance, and OBIE nominations and Awards. For more information about the Short New Play Festival, or any of Red Bull Theater's programs, visit www.redbulltheater.com. |
|
| reply | |
|
|
|
| Previous: | Free Bilingual Musical THE COMEDY OF ERRORS Begins NYC Tour 5/28 - Official_Press_Release 04:31 pm EDT 05/23/24 |
| Next: | Sutton Foster and Aaron Tveit to host the 2024 Drama Desk Awards - Official_Press_Release 04:29 pm EDT 05/23/24 |
| Thread: | |
Time to render: 0.029127 seconds.