Now, a blizzard of short plays: #1MPF is here!

We hope you’re planning to join us this weekend for The 3rd Annual Boston One-Minute Play Festival. Here’s a little information round-up, so that you’re ready for an exciting weekend.

Alumni news, in brief:

Brian Tuttle's August and Autumn begins its second (and final) week tomorrow in Vagabond Theatre's production, right here at BPT...

Back by popular demand: Karen Zacarías' The Book Club Play is slated for a return engagement at Atlanta's Horizon Theatre Company, where the play was a massive hit last season...

"not Jenny" by MJ Halberstadt opens Dec. 6, produced by Bridge Repertory Theater. Read the feature from last week's Boston Globe!

Lots of BPT (and BTM) alums will be represented in next month's Boston One-Minute Play Festival: Steven Barkhimer, Peter M. Floyd, Deirdre Girard, John Greiner-Ferris, MJ Halberstadt, Heather Houston, Colleen Hughes, Dan Hunter, Ginger Lazarus, Emily Kaye Lazzaro, Walt McGough, K. Alexa Mavromatis, Matt Mayerchak, Cliff Odle, Rick Park, Payne Ratner, Karmo Sanders, John Shea, Donna Sorbello and Joyce Van Dyke will all contribute plays to this annual event, now in its third year...

Third annual Boston #1MPF

Time flies -- The 3^rd Annual Boston One-Minute Play Festival will be here before we know it! More on this very soon, but in the meantime here's the official press release:

The One-Minute Play Festival (Dominic D’Andrea, Producing Artistic Director) and Boston Playwrights’ Theatre (Kate Snodgrass, Artistic Director) continue their dynamic partnership with the The 3^rd Annual Boston One-Minute Play Festival, with part of the proceeds to benefit BPT’s artist residency programming.  

The 3^rd Annual Boston One-Minute Play Festival will be presented on Saturday, Jan 4, Sunday, Jan 5, and Monday, Jan 6–all at 8 p.m. at BPT  (949 Commonwealth Ave ). Tickets are $20 and available for purchase at 866-811-4111 and bostonplaywrights.org.

The performance on Sunday Jan 5, at 8 p.m., will be livestreamed on Howlround.com’s HowlroundTV at livestream.com/newplay. 

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…

Tune in: OMPF's Global Watch Party Happening

Couldn’t get enough of Boston’s first-ever One-Minute Play Festival? We didn’t think so.

Good news: The fun’s not over. BPT will host the Festival again in 2013, and in the meantime you can get your one-minute play fix by tuning in to OMPF’s Global Watch Party Happening. Here’s more about it:

On Monday, April 16, 2012, The One-Minute Play Festival (#OMPF) and #NEWPLAY TV join together to launch an experiment we’re calling the Global Watch Party Happening.

This simultaneous, multi-city network of watch parties for viewing the Chicago One-Minute Play Festival is an experiment and a celebration of the possibilities of #NEWPLAY TV’s shared platform and the multiple communities that support the development of local artists and culture through the One-Minute Play Festival.

On Monday April 16th, 2012 at 5:30pm PDT / 7:30pm CDT / 8:30pm EDT, the 2nd Annual Chicago One-Minute Play Festival at Victory Gardens will stream on #NEWPLAY TV at newplaytv.info.

Eighty-five brand new one-minute plays by fifty local Chicago playwrights will be presented by a company of around sixty-five actors, staged by ten directors. Come check out what it being said in the Chicago artistic community at this moment in time by experiencing the work of OMPF, and engaging in a conversation about it.

A look at some of what puts the oomph in OMPF

Demonio Rosa heads inside 

OMPFBOS: All the stuff (and more)

Boston Playwrights' Theatre | Jan. 7-9 | 8 p.m.

We hope you’re planning to join us this weekend for the first-ever Boston One-Minute Play Festival. Here’s a little information round-up, so that you’re ready for an exciting weekend.  

Tickets:

If you don’t have tickets yet, buy them now online or by calling (866) 811-4111.    

Live stream:

Tell your far-flung friends and fans that Monday night’s performance will be live streamed (and archived) on AVNPI/Arena Stage's New Play TV! http://www.livestream.com/newplay 

Part two of our Q&A with OMPF founder Dominic D'Andrea, in which we discuss things he's learned and what's unique about Boston

We're in the final stretch of preparations for the first-ever Boston One-Minute Play Festival, to be held at BPT this weekend -- January 7-9. Rehearsals are well underway, and directors, playwrights, and actors are offering their thoughts in the Twittersphere (feel free to join the conversation with #OMPFBOS). Proceeds from the event will support new plays in our community, and we hope you'll join us!

Today I offer part two of my Q&A with OMPF Founder Dominic D'Andrea. I feel like I've learned a lot as a festival participant, and I love what Dominic shares about the lessons he's learned along the way, in his five+ years working on this project...and the insights he's gained about Boston.  

And in case you missed it, here's part one. 


KAM: As you curate and organize One-Minute Play Festivals throughout the country, what do you learn about the communities involved? What have you learned about Boston? Are there themes, issues, styles, etc., that are unique to us?

DD: Wow, these are HUGE questions. I’ll attempt to frame this.

First, it’s important to note that OMPF does NOT tell writers what to write about. OMPF engages writers to create new work specifically for this festival, using a set of offerings: examine and create a relationship to the space of a minute; know what it is for yourself and don’t make an assumption about it; focus on creating a single theatrical moment; start from the smallest possible unit and work up. This unit can be a line, a word, an action, and image, but identifying something and building up to a minute to create meaning/consider the experience the writer is offering. It’s about the navigation of saying something in that space, while making it feel relaxed, considered, and have the opportunity to really land. Working this way as opposed to cramming a bunch of content in, which makes the experience about a clock racing down from 60 seconds. They can approach it any other way too, as long as it can be stages with four chairs lights up/down in under a minute, and provide clear emotional, visceral, or story content. All of this is to say: I give a lot of structural offerings, but never thematic. That’s up to the writer.

Dominic D'Andrea on the origins of OMPF, how 10-minute plays provided a jumping-off point, and what (and who) brought him to BPT

Dominic D'Andrea

I'm looking forward to the first-ever Boston One-Minute Play Festival and since the event is being co-produced by BPT, that gives me an excuse to ask questions...lots of 'em. I was eager to know more about one-minute plays, the genesis -- and growth -- of the Festival (which has grown from a single event in NYC to a nationwide movement in a half dozen years), OMPF's mission, and, well, keep reading.

OMPF Founder Dominic D'Andrea gamely and graciously (and thoroughly!) answered my queries, and I can't bear to cut a single word. What follows is the first of two parts of our Q&A [part two is here], so get ready to be inspired.

Tickets can be purchased online; proceeds from the event will support new plays in our community, so be sure to come check it out on January 7-9 right here at BPT.

KAM: How did the first One-Minute Play Festival (in NYC) come about?

DD: The One-Minute Play Festival actually started over half a decade ago when a theatre company I am a member of and I participated in a large national short form festival sponsored by a major NYC institution that was supposed to be about inclusion, bringing the community together, and deep conversation/collaboration with people who wouldn’t normally work together. I really bought into the whole culture of this festival, and deeply wanted it to be a transformative experience. I spent a lot of time crafting the work for it with no resources, as did my colleagues. Some of the work assigned to us was really tough to connect to our work and personal missions, as it was about a singular writer, but we tried to “go big” and “make it our own.”

Long story short: After going through it, I was really disappointed by the reality. I didn’t meet anybody, and didn’t have any meaningful conversations, I didn’t learn anything, and I was neither transformed nor transported. It felt like we simply participated in a massive PR stunt, or some bizarre ongoing flash mob and not much like the community theatre event it said it was. I felt duped. I felt like I had just participated in a system that had nothing to do with me or my community, or the communities around me. It felt about as personal as taking the SATs.

Kate on the One-Minute Play Festival Fight Club

Dominic, Dominic, Dominic.  That's who I think of when I hear One-Minute Plays (or OMPF). Dominic D'Andrea -- he's the OMPF GUY who called me about this strange and wondrous adventure we're all of us on now.  I said, "Uh...Dominic, is it a lot of work?  Because if I have to work...FORGETABOUTIT!"  (Okay, I'm overworked.  I know it, and now you know it.  I keep saying "Yes" -- this is my problem.) Dominic promised me no work.  No work, he said!  Okay, so there's ALMOST no work (he's doing most of it), and...I love him still.  Most of all, I love his passion about this whole process. You can't slow him down or pull him away from the goal of seeing these bite-sized morsels come alive.  Or maybe the metaphor is more like a slap.  Yes, I love it!  We're in a Fight Club!  And all of our proceeds, every single bit of what Boston Playwrights' Theatre earns, will go back to where it belongs -- to the entire playwriting community around Boston.

Bloggy cheer

Where's Demonio?

As things begin to get holiday-quiet, it’s fun to check in on some of the other blogs on our blogroll (to the right) and see what folks are doing. What have people been posting about lately?

Emily Kaye Lazzaro shared a little of what’s on her cutting room floor. John Kuntz posted some gorgeous photos from the photo call from The Balcony, which he directed recently at The Boston Conservatory. John Greiner-Ferris just turned three (as a playwright), and reflects on his advancing age. And Colleen Hughes is celebrating the season with her roundup of Bad Santas.

And speaking of other blogs, don’t forget to watch the One-Minute Play Festival blog for posts from some familiar faces (including this one by Israel Horovitz and this one by Natalia Naman) and more about this exciting event...coming to Boston on Jan. 7, 8, and 9.

Alumni news, in brief:

El Demonio Rosa pauses to wave on his way in to catch part two of Tarell Alvin McCraney's The Brother/Sister Plays at Company One...

A gaggle of alums was commissioned to write one-minute plays for the first-ever Boston One-Minute Play Festival (a co-production of the NYC-based One-Minute Play Festival and BPT) including William Fancher, Peter M. Floyd, Deirdre Girard, Anna Renée Hansen, Heather Houston, Colleen Hughes, Dan Hunter, Emily Kaye Lazarro, K. Alexa Mavromatis, Matt Mayerchak, Walt McGough, Ronan Noone, Rick Park, John Shea, Donna Sorbello, and John Zakrosky, Jr. All told, the January event will feature 70 plays by alums and other favorite Boston-area playwrights. Watch this space for much more on this exciting event...