Community theatre is often treated by theatre professionals the same way the Hell’s Angels disdain those who trade in their suits for a weekend on the ole’ Harley. But guess what, while we were all busy sending our precious work to the “real” theatres, there was some change taking place beneath our delicately raised nostrils. One deserving example is right here in River City (read Atlanta) in a suburb that in January 2009, officially became the City of Dunwoody. Stage Door Players was founded in 1974 as a Community Improvement Project of the Dunwoody Woman’s Club. Stage Door got its first paid staff member and a permanent home in 1988, when it moved to the North Dekalb Cultural Center. As the current, full-time (read paid) Producing Artistic Director Robert Egizio characterizes it, they have moved gradually from a theatre group performing with volunteer artists to a fully professional company that he still calls “Community,” but in a different sense. That is because the theatre is fully supported and grounded by both residents and business owners in Dunwoody who consider it their own crown jewel. They give money and they attend the shows. (The new mayor just donated his first-year salary—I’m not kidding.) Since Egizio came on board five years ago from a dual life in the corporate world and as a director/choreographer/actor for several local professional theatres, he has made Stage Door Players an organization that pays all its artists, employs full production values, has three paid staff members, and has a full season of plays including several regional premieres. One that is coming up is Mitch Albom’s latest play, And the Winner Is. A recent world premiere, Spreading It Around by well-known Canadian writer Londos D’Arrigo, came about after the playwright contacted the theatre and also agreed to a short residency with the performance team. To sweeten the pot, Egizio has also initiated a program titled “Work in Progress Wednesdays” that presents staged readings of six new plays with the intention of producing one of them each season starting next year. Since this last program began, he has received at least a script a week from playwrights and agents around the nation. Now Egizio is trying to cultivate more local playwrights to submit work. It would seem that some attitudes die hard, but Atlanta writers better get on the stick or they’re only going to see the glow of Stage Door’s distant tailpipe.
Atlanta
BY PAMELA TURNER
Community theatre is often treated by theatre professionals the same way the Hell’s Angels disdain those who trade in their suits for a weekend on the ole’ Harley. But guess what, while we were all busy sending our precious work to the “real” theatres, there was some change taking place beneath our delicately raised nostrils. One deserving example is right here in River City (read Atlanta) in a suburb that in January 2009, officially became the City of Dunwoody. Stage Door Players was founded in 1974 as a Community Improvement Project of the Dunwoody Woman’s Club. Stage Door got its first paid staff member and a permanent home in 1988, when it moved to the North Dekalb Cultural Center. As the current, full-time (read paid) Producing Artistic Director Robert Egizio characterizes it, they have moved gradually from a theatre group performing with volunteer artists to a fully professional company that he still calls “Community,” but in a different sense. That is because the theatre is fully supported and grounded by both residents and business owners in Dunwoody who consider it their own crown jewel. They give money and they attend the shows. (The new mayor just donated his first-year salary—I’m not kidding.) Since Egizio came on board five years ago from a dual life in the corporate world and as a director/choreographer/actor for several local professional theatres, he has made Stage Door Players an organization that pays all its artists, employs full production values, has three paid staff members, and has a full season of plays including several regional premieres. One that is coming up is Mitch Albom’s latest play, And the Winner Is. A recent world premiere, Spreading It Around by well-known Canadian writer Londos D’Arrigo, came about after the playwright contacted the theatre and also agreed to a short residency with the performance team. To sweeten the pot, Egizio has also initiated a program titled “Work in Progress Wednesdays” that presents staged readings of six new plays with the intention of producing one of them each season starting next year. Since this last program began, he has received at least a script a week from playwrights and agents around the nation. Now Egizio is trying to cultivate more local playwrights to submit work. It would seem that some attitudes die hard, but Atlanta writers better get on the stick or they’re only going to see the glow of Stage Door’s distant tailpipe.
pturner@dramatistsguild.com