Theatre Starts calls for scripts – June 15 deadline

Writers!  If you have a script in development, here’s an opportunity for you.

Theatre Starts Inc. is requesting the submission of new scripts for the Writers’ Springboard.  This project will provide professional dramaturges to selected writers of scripts under development.  Dramaturges will work with the playwrights in three month cycles.  Dramaturge and writers will engage in an intensive dialogue with particular reference to strengthening dialogue in the scripts, character development, theatre effectiveness, story arc, tempo and overall structure.  Detailed, written evaluations will be provided.

Each cycle will culminate in staged readings by experienced actors rehearsed by experienced directors.  There will be performances over three days in November, February and May of each year for each set of selected scripts.  These performances will include an opportunity for audience feedback.  Selected writers will receive a fee of $150 in addition to the services of the dramaturge and two staged readings of their script.

 Selected writers must be prepared to engage with the dramaturge.

Guidelines:

• Playwrights must be a resident of Ontario.
• Musicals are not eligible but a play with music will be considered.
• Full length and One-Act plays are eligible.
• Submitted scripts must not have been published or professionally produced.
• More than one submission per playwright is allowed.
• All plays must be submitted in English.

• A separate cover page should include all contact information but no information that identifies the playwright should be located elsewhere in the script.  The Jurists will have no information regarding the playwrights.
• Please submit scripts electronically if possible.  Electronic submissions may be submitted to scripts@theatrestarts.com

• Hard copy submissions should not be bound in any way. Please send hard copy submissions to: Theatre Starts Inc., 315 Reading Place, Newmarket, ON L3Y 6H6
• Hard copy scripts will not be returned unless requested and a prepaid, addressed envelope is included.

 SUBMISSIONS MUST BE POSTMARKED BY June 15^th, 2012.

Submitted scripts will be randomly assigned to jurists who are experienced theatre professionals With international reputations.

Selected playwrights will be notified by August 7, 2012

 Please see www.theatrestarts.com for more information including bios of the dramaturges.

New Ideas Festival 2012 – the script selection process

Ever sit in the theatre watching a festival like New Ideas and wonder about the process?  Such as – how did the producers select the scripts?  How were the directors chosen?  I asked one of the co-producers of New Ideas 2012, Carolyn Zapf, and this here’s what she told me.  By the way, the call for scripts went out on August 2, with a submission deadline of September 15.  The scripts – with nothing to identify the playwrights – were then read “blind” by a committee that did not learn the writers’ identities until final selection was made.

Q:  How many scripts were received this year?    How did it compare to previous years’ submissions?

A:   We received 122 submissions this year. It was about the same as last year.

Q:   This is the first year that scripts were accepted via e-mail – did that increase the number of submissions?

A:   No, email did not increase the number of submissions, but it was much easier to organize the work of the reading committee and we had more time for discussion of the scripts. We were also able to share scripts with the chosen directors using google docs before the Creative Exchange*, which facilitated the process.

Q: This is the first year that a reading fee ($10) has been charged – do you think that made a difference in the quantity and/or quality of the plays submitted?

A:  It did not make a difference in the quantity of the plays, but I think that we had a higher quality of submissions this year. I don’t think we can draw the conclusion that the quality of submissions was caused by the fee. But the fee will allow us to increase the NIF budget. We have expenses such as insurance for any Equity members, food budget for workshops, readings, and opening nights, etc.

Q:        Where did the submissions come from this year?

A:        In total, we received about 30 plays [out of a total 122] from the US — from New York and area, Boston and Cambridge area, Pittsburg, and various cities in California. We received 1 play from the UK. We received several plays from Quebec (Montreal area), from Alberta (Lethbridge and Calgary) and B.C. (Kamloops).   Of the 15 chosen scripts, (12  productions; 3 staged readings) we have chosen for NIF 2012, several are by out-of-town writers:

     Our Eliza by Megan Coles (St. John’s, Nfld).

      Lovers’ Flight by Joel Fishbane (Montreal, Quebec)

      Less Than a Second by Gerry MacBride (Peterborough, Ont.)

      In Their Glory [Reading] by Eugenie Carabastsos (New York)

      It All Leads To The Lemon Scene by Pam Winfrey (California)

     Everything Blows Away by Kelly DuMar (Massachussetts).

 

NOTE:  Another play by Kelly DuMar, ENVIA! was imaginatively staged in Alumnae Theatre’s lobby during NIF 2010.  Joel Fishbane previously wrote In The Yichud Room, produced in NIF 2004.

 

* “Creative Exchange” = the director/writer meet & greet – think Speed Dating!  I’ll cover this in a later post.