Alumni news, in brief:

Read about Richard Snee's latest project -- Kurt Vonnegut's Make Up Your Mind -- which opens at the Lyric this week...

Lydia Diamond's Stick Fly has settled in for a run (through Dec. 22) at Philadelphia's Arden Theatre Company...

Monica Bauer's My Occasion of Sin opens at Detroit Rep on Jan. 9...

Deirdre Girard is one of three Next Voices Fellows at New Rep this season. In the spring, her play Reconsidering Hanna(h) will receive a staged reading as part of the theatre's Next Rep Festival...

Adventures in publishing: The Compass Rose by Ronan Noone has been published by Indie Theatre Now, and Jinxed by K. Alexa Mavromatis is available from Original Works Publishing...

New Rep's Festival of New Voices kicks off Sunday 5/19

Gabridge | Mavromatis | Girard | Floyd

This season, I've had the great fortune of being a playwriting fellow at New Rep alongside fellow BPT alums Peter Floyd and Deirdre Girard, and my Rhombus pal (and BTM vet) Patrick Gabridge. Together with New Rep Associate Artistic Director Bridget O'Leary, who founded the program, we have met every three weeks to discuss the progress of each others' plays. It's been an amazing journey for all of us and this week we will share our progress with you. Join us if you can!

I asked each of my fellow fellows to share a little bit about their plays (including goals for their readings) with you here...

Alumni news, in brief:

Zayd Dohrn's Long Way Go Down opens this week (May 17) at the Art of Acting Studio in Los Angeles, in a production by its professional company, the Harold Clurman Laboratory Theater...

The Book Club Play by Karen Zacarías opens at Horizon Theatre in Atlanta May 16...

New plays by Peter Floyd, Deirdre Girard, K. Alexa Mavromatis (whose play features fellow alum Steven Barkhimer), and BTM vet Patrick Gabridge -- this season's New Voices @ New Rep Playwriting Fellows -- will be read next week in New Rep's Festival of New Voices...

The Farm by Walt McGough (which was part of our 2011-12 season) will open at Stony Point, NY's Penguin Rep in September...

Read about Werner Trieschmann's recent project with the Fort Wayne Philharmonic...

BTM XV: The Warm-Up Laps Saturday, May 11

Steven Barkhimer

12 p.m.
Windowmen by Steven Barkhimer
Sponsored by SpeakEasy Stage Company
Directed by Brett Marks  

In 1981, Stevie is just out of college with a degree in philosophy and finds himself working – where else? – at the fish market beneath the Brooklyn Bridge with tough streetwise salesmen. He is the junior co-worker to Joe, and they man their stations at a window where they must record sales and handle thousands of dollars in cash at lightning speed. Despite their very different backgrounds, Steve and Joe develop a friendship, but Steve soon finds himself complicit in a scheme that robs the company, a scheme that is coming under intensified scrutiny by Leo, the flinty no-nonsense boss. When push comes to shove and the situation becomes dangerous, possibly even life-threatening, Stevie is treated to some challenging lessons about friendship, loyalty, honesty, and negotiating the complexities of adult life.

Alumni news, in brief:

Demonio at The Hunt

Deirdre Girard’s Direct Line is on the bill at Image Theater’s FemNoire Mar. 29-30; also this week, her thesis play The Christina Experiment will be part of Stony Brook University’s Rogue Reading Series…

Gregory Fletcher’s short play The Moon Alone is being produced in the festival Boxers & Briefs by Off-Off-Broadway's Artistic New Directions at Theatre 54 in the Shelter Studios and Theatre, March 27-31. Directed by Troy Miller, it features Leigh Dunham, Lue McWilliams, and Bridget Ori.

M. Lynda Robinson (and actor and casting director extraordinaire Kevin Fennessy) will offer a workshop on Mar. 30, The Business of Acting: Approaching a Career, at Zero Point Theatre Company…

Rick Park’s short play Men on First and Third (formerly Go to Helen Hunt For It, part of BTM XII) was voted “Best in Snow” at the Snowdance 10-Minute Comedy Festival…

Karen Zacarías reflects on her residency at Arena Stage…

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:

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)…

Alumni news, in brief:

Mark your calendars for Jan. 5-7! Lots of alums have contributed brand new one-minute plays to debut in the second annual Boston One-Minute Play Festival. In fact, most of the playwrights have some sort of connection to BPT -- take a look: Liz Duffy Adams, Rosanna Yamagiwa Alfaro, Barbara Blumenthal-Ehrlich, Steven Bogart, Michael Bradford, Elisabeth Burdick, Elenor Burgess, Bill Doncaster, Thom Dunn, Stephen Faria, Peter Floyd, Patrick Gabridge, Deirdre Girard, Kirsten Greenidge, David Valdes Greenwood, Israel Horovitz, Colleen M. Hughes, Dan Hunter, Obehi Janice, Lila Rose Kaplan, Ginger Lazarus, Emily Kaye Lazzaro, Christopher Lockheardt, K. Alexa Mavromatis, Grant MacDermott, Walt McGough, James McLindon, Tyler Monroe, Nina Louise Morrison, Mwalim *7, Natalia Naman, Jack Neary, Rick Park, Lindsay Soson, Noah Tobin, Ken Urban, Joyce Van Dyke, and Jaclyn Villano. See you there…

Alumni news, in brief:

Whoa – LOTS of love for BPT peeps in the nominations for the 2012 BroadwayWorld Boston Awards, including John Kuntz (Best Actor in a Play, Medium Theater for The Hotel Nepenthe), Emily Kaye Lazzaro (Best Actress in a Play, Small/Fringe for Murph and Priscilla Dreams the Answer), Melinda Lopez (Best Actress in a Play, Medium Theater for The Motherf**cker with the Hat), Rick Park (Best Actor in a Play, Medium Theater for Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo and Best Actor in a Play, Small/Fringe for The Friends of Eddie Coyle), and the entire cast of The Company We Keep (Marianna Bassham, John Kooi, Bill Mootos, and Jessica Webb). The Company We Keep was also nominated for Best Play, Small/Fringe, and director Elena Aroaz for Best Direction of a Play, Small/Fringe…

Alumni news, in brief:

Demonio at The Fakus

Peter Floyd, Deirdre Girard, and K. Alexa Mavromatis are part of New Repertory Theatre's second class of New Voices Playwriting Fellows. BTM vet Patrick Gabridge [who must certainly hold the record for non-alum most frequently featured in Alumni News, btw] rounds out the group. Each Fellow will work on a full-length project over the course of the season; the program will culminate with a series of readings at New Rep in June 2013...

Speaking of New Rep, Cliff Odle will bow in Watertown next month as part the cast of David Mamet's Race...

John Greiner-Ferris has been selected as an Accomplice with Interim Writers...

Episode two of Blood Rose Rising: Heir of Suspicion (co-written by Steve Barkhimer and Ben Evett) hits the stage this weekend...

And Ronan Noone's Brendan opens tomorrow in NYC, part of the annual 1^st Irish Festival, Sept. 26-30, presented by Origin Theatre Company. The play will be produced by Fat Violet Theater, in association with The Drilling Company…

Voices of BTM XIV: Deirdre Girard

Deirdre Girard and Steve Faria

Love and Romance at the BTM…

Sunday, May 20, is my 30^th wedding anniversary and my husband and I will be spending the entire day at The Boston Theater Marathon. It might not sound romantic but I find something kind of quirkily cosmic in the fact that while we have both individually participated in past Marathons, this is the first time we are involved in the same year. My play Frickin’ Woodpecker, about two South Boston bus drivers who contemplate the mysteries of women, Yankees’ fans, and Muslims, will be produced by Underground Railway. I feel like I hit the BTM lottery with the intelligence of director Megan Sandberg-Zakian, and the hilarious but touching performances by actors Steve Barkhimer and Barlow Adamson. 

BTM XIV running order announced!

 

12-1 PM

Preview of Coming Attractions by Andy Dolan, Merrimack Repertory Theatre

Saving Walter Cronkite by Cliff Blake, Simple Machine

Lycanthropy by Danny Sklar, Theatre on Fire

A Game of Chicken by Sean Walsh, Centastage

Nothing Personal by Tom Kee, Actors’ Shakespeare Project

The Comfort Station by Robert Brustein, American Repertory Theater

1-2 PM

Shrapnel by Yavni Bar-Yam, Nextdoor Theater Company

Love, Billy Bunny by Peter M. Floyd, Emerson Stage

The Flying Winter Princess by Mary Conroy, Stoneham Theatre

The Experiment by George Matry Masselam, laulapides Company

Storrow Drive by Jefferson Navicky, Playwrights’ Platform

What’s required

Sunday’s April Fool’s “opportunity” has made me think this week about the more serious side of the submissions game. The requirements in Mark Harvey Levine’s hilarious piece are, of course, deliciously over-the-top…but we’ve all seen that crazy call with a million hoops to jump through, that really does seem to require everything short of cramming a woodland creature in an envelope. What requests are unreasonable?

I've also been thinking about the fact that my submission habits – and views of what is acceptable for theatres to require – have shifted a bit over time. For example, paying fees was once my line in the sand and I never used to pay them. Ever. For any reason, to anyone. Now I will from time to time (though over the course of a year I can count those submissions on one hand), if the theatre gives prizes to writers or someone I know personally recommends the theatre.

But enough about me.

Alumni news, in brief:

Cha Cha Picante celebrates Deirdre Girard at her play The Christina Experiment...

A launch party and concert will be held at BPT to celebrate the publication of Dan Hunter's new book Iowa? It's a State...Of Mind on Nov. 22 at 7:30 p.m. The evening will feature delicious food by Sivika Pon Hunter, as well as book excerpts and songs written and performed by Dan Hunter. Please RSVP to attend. Books are also available for purchase online...

Q&A: Deirdre Girard on 'The Christina Experiment'

Deirdre Girard’s The Christina Experiment opens Thursday at Newburyport’s Firehouse Center for the Arts. The event will mark the first production of one of Deirdre’s full-length works, so of course it was fun to chat about it…

KAM: Is this the first production of one of your full-length plays?

DG: Yes!  And I had no idea it was even being considered for a full production.  I had a staged reading of the play at the Actor’s Studio in Newburyport and apparently the President of the Board for The Firehouse Center for the Arts (a 200 seat historic theater) was at the reading.  A couple of months later, the Artistic Director of the Firehouse surprised me by saying that they commit to one new play each year and my play was their first choice for the 2011 production.

Alumni news, in brief:

Deirdre Girard’s The Christina Experiment will be part of the offerings at Newburyport’s Firehouse Center for the Arts this fall... [Actors: Auditions will be held on August 28 (1-3 p.m.) and 29 (7-9 p.m.). Call 978-499-9931 for an audition appointment. No monologue necessary. Headshot and resume requested. Actors will be asked to read from the script. Electronic script available: contact caron@firehouse.org Wed. thru Friday. Sides will be provided upon arrival.]

Melinda Lopez is featured in the reading of Rajiv Joseph’s Animals Out of Paper at Gloucester Stage Company tonight…

Werner Trieschmann’s ‘The Absolute Most Cliched Elevator Play in the History of the Entire Universe’ is included in the new Playscripts anthology Random Acts of Comedy…

Lydia Diamond and the team of the Broadway-bound Stick Fly were honored on Martha’s Vineyard yesterday…

Play by Girard to be featured in SWAN Day Mini-Marathon

Alum Deirdre Girard's 10-minute play ‘Defensive Wounds’ will be featured in this Saturday’s SWAN (Support Women Artists Now) Day March Madness Mini-Marathon, right here at BPT. The celebration will include staged readings of new short work (plays, monologues and poems) by 18 Boston-area women.

March 5, 2:00-6:00 p.m.

Suggested donation is $5.

Proceeds will go to The Fund for Women Artists

Email for additional info and reservations

Deirdre Girard

Tell us a little about ‘Defensive Wounds.’

I’m so excited it was chosen because it is a brand new ten-minute play about psychological abuse—so pretty creepy and not the usual comedy ten minute festivals tend to favor. Catherine Colby is one of the finest young actors on the North Shore and she will be working opposite Tony Moschetto who is a popular Boston Comedian. For Tony, this is especially meaningful because he is often cast in comic roles only, and for me it is meaningful because I’m a supporter of the Women’s Crisis Center here in Newburyport that offers support to abused women and children.

How did you become involved with the SWAN Day event?

I received an e-mail that was sent to several greater Boston area female playwrights asking for a submission for consideration. I had just participated in a festival in Newton at Turtle Lane that was run by one of the Swan Day organizers, Regina Ramsey, so I assume that’s how I got on the list.

Play by Hughes named KCACTF national semi-finalist

BPT alum Colleen Hughes’ ten-minute play The Mouse has been named a national semi-finalist for the Kennedy Center’s American College Theater Festival (KCACTF). 

Playwright Colleen Hughes

If selected as a national finalist, The Mouse will be one of four ten-minute plays presented at the national festival in April. National finalist plays are cast with professional actors from the Washington, D.C., area, and compete for a $1,000 cash prize.

Plays by Deirdre Girard (Delivery) and John Zakrosky, Jr. (Ten Hours of Sleep) were also presented in the ten-minute category at the regional festival last month in Fitchburg; Deirdre’s play The End of the Argument also competed there in the one-act category.

There are numerous KCACTF awards categories for all types of student theatre artists. For the uninitiated, here’s how the ten-minute competition works:

Playwrights submit their work each fall. Plays from each KCACTF region (ours, Region I, covers New England and Eastern New York) are read by at least two readers from a different region. The top six choices are invited to Region I’s festival in January. At the festival, each playwright works with an assigned director to rehearse a public reading of his/her play. Two festival respondents respond to each play. 

From those six plays, two are chosen as national semi-finalists; those plays are then held in consideration for the national festival in Washington D.C, as national finalists.