...[T]ragedy does not sit well with commerce: Rothko enjoys his fame and commissions but despises the capitalists who pay him as well as the privileged bourgeoisie who dine at the Four Seasons. He rationalizes putting his paintings in the Four Seasons as an attack on consumerist values. Simultaneously, while Ken enthuses about the new generation of pop-artists...
As 2011 was coming to a close, the big news on the Boston theatre scene was that David Dower and Polly Carl of the American Voices New Play Institute would be moving from their base of operations at Washington, D.C.'s Arena Stage to Emerson College. In the midst of this excitement, The real question was what this means beyond Rob Orchard's aim to make ArtsEmerson a major regional player in the performing arts.
As outlined by Dower on the Arena Stage blog, this is essentially means that efforts that had previously been grouped under the hashtag of "#newplay" are branching in two directions under the auspices of two separate organizations. The first, staying at Arena Stage and retaining the American Voices New Play Institute name, will, amongst other things, focus on the much lauded resident playwright program and on Arena's own developmental work.
The second branch, now using the name "Center For the Theater Commons at Emerson College" will focus on the tools and initiatives designed to advance the national infrastructure for new work and the people who make it. So, where the AVNPI will house Arena's activities, this new entity, The Center for the Theater Commons, will develop and maintain the tools of the #newplay commons and act as staff to the nationwide effort. The map, the live stream channel, the journal, the research projects, and the activities of Howlround will be housed at the new Center, situated in the Office of the Arts at Emerson College. The web portal for this platform becomes Howlround.com.
Polly Carl and Vijay Matthew, writing at Shareable while explaining the needs that brought the New Play Institute into being, outline the projects that the Commons will continue to develop at Emerson. Most of these involve using technology both to both build and document the "new play infrastructure." The two most visible of these initiatives that the Commons will be bringing to Emerson, are the online journal Howlround and the New Play Map, of which I've written about twice before.
Given my position in the industry: entering the field of playwriting without the connections that comes with an MFA, not having a salaried position at a regional theatre, I have had little use for the Howlround. The contents had sadly struck me as being more about omphalloskepticism than about theatre featuring often cryptic essays by more connected figures than myself wondering if they were reaching an audience or not.
The New Play Map, on the other hand, was a project I have supported enthusiastically since it went online last year. It is a crowd sourced map, documenting the new play infrastructure, presenting the artists, collaboratives, conferences, venues, and companies writing, developing, and presenting new plays. I even explored the possible uses that could be explored since the source code was released (New Dance Map anyone? New Opera Map? New Performance Art Map?)
The question, for the Boston theatre scene returns to "how do we use this?" Theater Commons, despite being local, is under no obligation to show Boston playwrights or Boston theatre companies any special favor, especially when the new staff understandably come with any number of professional obligations to past collaborators, however it does become incumbent on the Boston theatre scene to become aware of what is going on in its own neighborhood.
I have already suggested to the newly elected board of the Small Theatre Alliance of Boston to strongly urge that member companies, and individual artists working in new play development document their efforts on the New Play Map. Some already have started to do just that, some already had. This longer essay is for those who have not responded to the Alliance's urgings. Placing our work on the map is not just to advertise our presence to the larger national scene, but to document how we operate, so that organizations like the Theater Commons have a better grasp on what tools we (both nationally and locally) need.
What this means for the local theatre community is what we are willing to make it mean.
Pictured: Ron Pullins as Capitano Spavento, John Geoffrion as Shylock, and Corianna Hunt Swartz of Flat Earth Theatre as Gessica. Not pictured: Diana Durham who read stage directions. Both Diana and Ron also presented work that night.
November 21, 2011. The Small Theatre Alliance of Boston's Open Mic Night, this time hosted by Fort Point Theatre Channel presented a scene and talk back for my work-in-progress, The Conversos of Venice.
I had presented an earlier scene at the inaugural Open Mic Night and the misgivings I had afterwards did not manifest this time around. Indeed, of the times I have heard actors read my words since I began, this was the time where what I heard was exactly what I had hoped to hear and we had some lively discussion before we moved on to the next playwright's work.
Still there's the rest of the play to write, and ever more research to be done!
It was a very strange gig for this unicorn, who was led around the town of Brookline one November evening to appear at one boutique, three banks, and a crêperie. Let me tell you: three hours of wearing a unicorn head is a lot of stress on one's shoulders, but little girls and middle-aged women just love the beast.
Mask and costume by Eric Bornstein of Behind the Mask. Unicorn wrangling by Ashley Yarnell, who provides vocals.
[...]Liebrecht does not address Arendt’s rationalizations or the reasons for her dedication to Heidegger, though the dramatist’s title suggests that it is the banal truth of the irrationality of love. This neglects both Arendt the theorist and Arendt the public intellectual. Is her portrait of an innocently banal Heidegger merely the flip side of her portrait of Adolf Eichmann as a ghostly bureaucrat?[...]Read the rest on The Arts Fuse.
Monday, November 21st, The Small Theatre Alliance of Boston once again presents Playwright's Open Mic Night, a bimonthly presentation of works-in-progress by Boston-area playwrights. This edition, I will be presenting a scene from my play The Conversos of Venice (a response play to Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice (another scene had been presented at the inaugural Open Mic Night.)
Also presenting new work will be:
Monica Raymond: Four Riffs for a Sailor: Calypso
Diana Durham: Perceval and the Grail
Ron Pullins : Ice Dancing
Adam Baratz: Two songs from a musical.
This time around, Fort Point Theatre Channel plays host at 10 Channel Center Street, Boston, MA
Actors interested in reading scripts are invited to show up at 7pm. The event begins at 7:30pm.
Facebook users may RSVP here
