Dear Friends,
PlayGround’s been all over the news, stretching from the Bay Area to New York and from Louisville to Australia. Just this month, the company and its writers have a large number of successes, including local awards, magazine features and contest winnings. And while we wind up our sixth and final Monday Night PlayGround, don’t think that the PlayGround season is over—the 12th annual Best of PlayGround Festival is about to get underway, with Festival plays announced at the end of this month! Scroll down and see for yourself!
- THEATRE BAY AREA MAGAZINE Honors PlayGround Writers!
- First Person Shooter Wins CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD!
- Alumni IN THE NEWS!
- PlayGround's Latest PODCAST Release!
- Monday Night PlayGround Season FINALE!
- PlayGround BENEFIT with Amy Freed & Jonathan Moscone!
- SHARE PlayGround with a Friend!
Photo: Tom Hauck. Gabriel Marin in Tim Bauer's I'll Be Home for Christmas from The Best of PlayGround Festival 11 (May 2007).
THEATRE BAY AREA MAGAZINE Honors PlayGround Writers!
Theatre
Bay Area’s March 2008 issue is dubbed “The Playwrights’
Issue,” and of course, we would hope to see a couple of PlayGround
names in the mix. As it turns out, of the thirteen up-and-coming playwrights
honored, eight are PlayGround alumni: Trevor Allen, Garret Jon Groenveld,
Aaron Loeb, Peter Sinn Nachtrieb, Kenn Rabin, Geetha Reddy, Molly Rhodes
and Lauren Yee. Congratulations to all and to the many PlayGround writers
listed under "honorable mentions." Below, for your edification,
we share briefly how we've come to know and love these playwrights and their
work.
Trevor Allen is a two-time PlayGround Emerging Playwright Award winner ('98 & '99) and recipient of the 2003 PlayGround Fellowship, for which he wrote Tenders in the Fog. His short play The Mistaken Variations was showcased in the 10th anniversary Best of the Best of PlayGround. He has had thirteen short works developed through Monday Night PlayGround. Garret Jon Groenveld is a five-time Emerging Playwright Award winner ('97, '98, '99, '01, '02) and three-time recipient of PlayGround commissions, including the inaugural PlayGround Fellowship, for which he wrote the full-length play Missives, scheduled for its New York premiere later this month. Garret recently rejoined the PlayGround Writers Pool and is currently completing work on The Serving Class for the 2008 Best of PlayGround Festival. He has had a record twenty-two short works developed through Monday Night PlayGround and has had two works recorded and released through PlayGround's podcast series with KQED, including the recently-released Missive, featured in PlayGround's 10th anniversary Best of the Best of PlayGround. Aaron Loeb is also a five-time Emerging Playwright Award winner ('02, '03, '04, '05, '07) and has received two PlayGround commissions. His first commission, First Person Shooter, received its world premiere in a PlayGround co-production with SF Playhouse last May and has since been named one of the top 10 theatre events of 2007 by the San Francisco Chronicle and is the recent recipient of a Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Award for best original drama. He is currently developing Abraham Lincoln's Big Gay Dance Party! under a PlayGround commission. He has had eighteen works developed through Monday Night PlayGround and his short play Sever - a 10th anniversary Best of the Best of PlayGround selection - was the inaugural podcast released in collaboration with KQED's The Writers' Block. Peter Sinn Nachtrieb won a 2000 PlayGround Emerging Playwright Award for his short play Self-Help and has had three works developed through the Monday Night PlayGround series. Kenn Rabin is a three-time Emerging Playwright Award winner ('02, '03, '04) and recipient of the 2004 PlayGround Fellowship, for which he wrote the full-length play Reunion, adapted from the short of the same name. The short play will be released through KQED's The Writers' Block in the coming months. Eleven of his short works have been developed through the Monday Night PlayGround series. Geetha Reddy is a three-time Emerging Playwright Award winner ('04, '05, '06), recipient of the June Anne Baker Prize, and is currently completing her third full-length play commission with PlayGround. She has had ten short works developed through the Monday Night PlayGround series and her short work Honey, I'm Home was released through KQED's The Writers' Block in 2007. Molly Rhodes is a two-time Emerging Playwright Award winner ('06, '07) and winner of the 2007 PlayGround Fellowship, for which she is currently developing a full-length play entitled The Singularity of We, based on her award-winning short Man Plus Woman Equals. She has had nine short works developed through the Monday Night PlayGround series. Lauren Yee is the newest member of PlayGround to be recognized, having joined the PlayGround Writers Pool this season. Among her credits, she was a finalist for the Actors' Theatre of Louisville's Heideman Award.
For more information on the Theatre Bay Area Magazine article, click here.
First Person Shooter Wins CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD!
The Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle awards have been announced and the winner is... PlayGround’s first co-production, First Person Shooter at the SF Playhouse, for Best Original Script! The production received four nominations: Best Entire Production, Best Performance (Male: Craig Marker), Best Ensemble, and Best Original Script (Aaron Loeb). Congratulations to Aaron, director Jon Tracy, and the entire gang at SF Playhouse!
Aaron Loeb’s First Person Shooter was originally commissioned and developed by PlayGround at the 2006 Best of PlayGround Festival before receiving its premiere at the SF Playhouse in a PlayGround co-production in the spring of 2007. The play, about a school shooting and the possible culpability of the video game industry, got rave reviews and was included on three critics’ “Top 10” lists of 2007, including that of Rob Hurwitt of the SF Chronicle who awarded the production with the “little man jumping out of the chair,” his highest rating.
Alumni IN THE NEWS!
PlayGround alumni Tim Bauer and Ross Peter Nelson have both won significant achievements at outside festivals. Tim Bauer, whose short “I’ll Be Home For Christmas” was included in the 2007 Best of PlayGround Festival, was a finalist in the Actors' Theatre of Louisville’s National Ten-Minute Play Contest (Heideman Award) for his play "Hot Spot."
Ross Peter Nelson’s short work “Call Me Comrade” was written for the December 2005 Monday Night PlayGround and was selected out of 1500 submissions for the Sydney, Australia “Short and Sweet” Festival to be given a one-week run.The play went on to win “best of its week” and was selected for an encore performance at the gala finale. For more information on the "Short and Sweet" Festival, click here.
Garret Jon Groenveld writes in the latest issue of Theatre Bay Area Magazine about the journey he and the PlayGround-commissioned play Missives took on their way to his upcoming New York premiere (March 20-April 6 at 59E59 Theaters in an Animated Theaterworks, Inc./Theater Resources Unlimited/PlayGround co-production). To learn more, click here.
PlayGround's Latest PODCAST Release!
In celebration of Garret Jon Groenveld's upcoming New York debut, PlayGround and KQED have just released the audio podcast of the short play that started it all! Originally premiered at the 2002 Best of PlayGround Festival and reprised in the 10th anniversary Best of the Best of PlayGround, Missive features PlayGround Company member Eric Fraisher Hayes, directed by PlayGround Artistic Director Jim Kleinmann. In Missive, a letter holds the key to one man’s troubled past and his surprising present. You’ll never think of pen pals in quite the same way!
Previous podcasts distributed through KQED's The Writers' Block include: Aaron Loeb's Sever, Geetha Reddy's Honey, I'm Home, Tom Swift's The Beginning, Garret Jon Groenveld's Ondine, and Brady Lea's Sewermonster Diaries.
To listen to this podcast or check out the other releases, click here. For more information on The Writers' Block, click here.
Monday Night PlayGround Season FINALE!
March 17 is both Saint Patty’s Day and the final Monday Night PlayGround—double the reason to join in on the fun for a night of six all-new plays, inspired by a given topic, written in four days and rehearsed in a whirlwind hour and a half. Also, don’t forget about the free pre-performance discussion with PlayGround Dramaturg Sonia Fernandez and PlayGround Writers at 7pm in the Roda Theatre upper lobby. Also, look out for our festival announcement later this month. We’ll be announcing the seven plays to be included in the 2008 Best of PlayGround Festiva, running May 8-25 at San Francisco's Thick House!
Monday Night PlayGround
Monday, March 17 / 8pm
Berkeley Repertory Theatre
2025 Addison Street
Berkeley
To purchase tickets, click below or visit the online box office.
PlayGround BENEFIT with Amy Freed & Jonathan Moscone!
PlayGround
will host its 12th annual awards night on Monday evening, April 14, celebrating
this year's PlayGround Emerging Playwright Award winners as well as the
full-length play commission honors, the June Anne Baker Prize and PlayGround
Fellowship. Helping us to celebrate are guests-of-honor playwright Amy
Freed and California Shakespeare Theater Artistic Director
Jonathan Moscone, who brought Amy's Restoration Comedy
to Cal Shakes in 2006. A previous play, The Beard of Avon, had
its local premiere at A.C.T. in 2002.
The April 14 limited-seating Benefit to be held for the first time at A.C.T. will feature a "fireside chat" with Amy and Jonathan, a reading of a short work by the late Peter Sloss (to whom PlayGround dedicated the 2007-08 season), as well as a reception and silent auction, and buffet dinner. This year's featured auction package is a Napa getaway, with tickets to the Napa Valley Opera House, dinner for two at Sienna Restaurant and a one-bedroom suite at the Vino Bello Resort!
To purchase a table or ticket for PlayGround's April 14 Benefit, click on the link(s) below or contact us by email or phone for more information. Premium tables and premium individual tickets include priority seating nearest to our guests-of-honor and listing as part of the benefit honorary committee in the program and invitations.
Premium Table of 10 - $1,500
Benefit Table of 10 - $750
Premium Individual Ticket - $150
Benefit Individual Ticket - $75
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I hope to see you at the theatre!
Jim Kleinmann
Artistic Director
PlayGround
(415) 704-3177 (vm/fax)
jim@playground-sf.org