Gambatte

This year I am mentoring students at the Academy of the Pacific Rim in Hyde Park, as part of the Massachusetts Young Playwrights’ Project. The poster above hangs in the school’s lobby; its community's guiding philosophy sets high standards for discipline, creativity, and diversity, and rewards effort and perseverance. What a terrific (the only?!) mindset for playwrights. Can’t wait to see the work that results from this group!

Alumni news, in brief:

Donna Sorbello was one in a cast of very familiar faces in ABC's The Makeover, which was filmed in Boston last summer. If you didn't catch it, look for it in re-runs on the Hallmark Channel...

M. Lynda Robinson – and members of her 10-minute play workshop at the Gloucester Writers Center – will present staged readings of new work on Feb 10…

Emily Kaye Lazzaro will next appear onstage in Heart & Dagger’s production of A Dream Play, opening on Feb. 22…

'Deported' heads to London

Excerpts from Joyce Van Dyke’s Deported/a dream play will be presented as part of Salon Mashup: Perspectives of Armenian Displacement and Regeneration, a collaborative arts + performance festival, in London Jan. 31-Feb. 3. The event is organized by The Armenian Institute, and will take place at Shoreditch Town Hall. Deported will be directed by Bill Barclay (Director of Music, Shakespeare's Globe), and will feature Agni Scott.

Alumni news, in brief:

Peter Floyd’s award-winning play Absence – one of the finalists in the 2013 Kendeda National Graduate Playwriting Competition – will be read at the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta on Feb. 5, part of the annual festival celebrating the competition’s top plays…

The next play in the Munroe Saturday Nights reading series is Widow’s Walk by Deirdre Girard (directed by Melinda Lopez), at Lexington’s Munroe Center for the Arts on Feb. 2…

Steve Barkhimer will next hit the stage in Actors’ Shakespeare Project’s production of Will Eno’s Middletown…

Karen Zacarías talks about her new adaptation of Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence…

Alumni news, in brief:

Plays by Walt McGough (Paper City Phoenix) and Masha Obolensky (Marvelous Fruit) are finalists for this summer’s Source Festival in Washington, D.C….

John Kuntz was voted Broadway World Boston's Best Actor (Medium Theatre) for Actors’ Shakespeare Project’s production of The Hotel Nepenthe (which he also wrote)…

New play development's secret weapon (not)

(For the record, Cleo – on the left – was acting. Stella, on the other hand...)

Alumni news, in brief:

Melinda Lopez

Melinda Lopez is one of 14 playwrights nationwide selected to receive a three-year playwriting residency, part of a new initiative of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Melinda will begin her residency at The Huntington this summer; check out the article from yesterday’s Boston Globe for details, including a complete list of playwrights – Masha Obolensky’s sister Kira is also on the list…

Opening this weekend: Acme Theater’s New Works Winter Festival, featuring plays by Peter Floyd (Love, Billy Bunny), Rick Park (Santer Baby), and BTM vets galore…

Deirdre Girard’s play Dance for Fiona will be read as part of The North Shore Readers Theatre Collaborative’s monthly reading series at the Actors Studio of Newburyport on Jan. 12…

MJ Halberstadt’s The Da Vinci Commission opens Jan. 12 at Cambridge’s Gallery 263…

K. Alexa Mavromatis’ play Bone China is included in the new edition of the college textbook Creative Writing: Four Genres in Brief (David Starkey, Bedford/St. Martin’s)…

New Year's Resolutions