Salt Lake City

Editor — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 18:04:00 +0000

Theatres have committed to new plays in a big way in Salt Lake City. In the months ahead, I’ll visit various theatres in the area to give you an overview of the work being done. Recently, I visited Pioneer Theatre Company (PTC), the professional, LORT B theatre at the University of Utah, to discuss their New Plays Initiative with Elizabeth Williamson, hired a year ago as the Literary Manager and Assistant to the Artistic Director at PTC. A 2007 NEA Fellow in Literary Translation, Elizabeth has worked around the country at theatres including Theatre de la Jeune Lune, Steppenwolf, and Court Theatre.

PTC will produce the world premiere of Bess Wohl’s Touch(ed), directed by Charles Morey, January 8-23, 2010, as the first in a series supported by the New Plays Initiative. It’s a story of a sister’s attempt to re-connect with a beloved older sister, who has been hospitalized with mental illness and suicidal tendencies over the years, on a 30th birthday celebration in a cabin in the woods. Elizabeth suggests that it’s a serious play of ideas, and yet it’s witty. It raises questions about what it means to live your own life and explores the idea of “functioning” in society. “Bess has such skill with language,” says Elizabeth. “I felt this play was ready to go when I read it. It had had workshops and readings, but no production. This is the first of other productions that will follow.”

The New Plays Initiative reflects PTC’s commitment to new plays. There’s no quota of new plays per season, but the company supports readings, workshops, and commissions. Elizabeth describes the way the company works with a new play they’re interested in: “We ask, ‘Where is it?’ and ‘What does it need?’” The end goal of the project is to produce new work. Elizabeth receives submissions from agents only. She continues, “We’re here to read plays, to build the new play program, to make new relationships with playwrights, and to produce good work.” In January, Elizabeth will also direct Brooke Berman’s Out of the Water, the first in a series of new play readings that the Initiative will host this season.

Because I’m particularly interested in connecting students with new work, I asked about the challenge of ticket prices. A student can see a movie for around ten dollars here, but tickets at a professional theatre are well beyond what most students can afford. As a student in England one summer, I remember seeing 98 plays because of the affordable student ticket prices. PTC addresses this issue through a variety of programs. Following a ten dollar annual activation fee, University of Utah students can receive up to two tickets for: 1) a free Thursday preview, 2) fifty percent off tickets Monday-Thursday, or 3) five-dollar student-rush tickets on the night of the performance. Students from other area colleges are eligible for ten dollar rush tickets. In addition, PTC provides up to 2,000 free tickets to Salt Lake County high schools and middle schools for each production. High school students may purchase half-price tickets on Monday and Tuesday nights. The theatre also plans to include University of Utah students in discussions of plays and new play readings.

Char Nelson
cnelson@dramatistsguild.com

Salt Lake City

Editor — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 14:48:54 +0000

It took me 50 years to become a playwright, but I’ve worked with new plays in some way most of my adult life. Trained as an actress at the University of Utah, I played a role in one of David Kranes’s new plays–a highlight in my acting career. Leaving the university setting, I nurtured young playwrights, teaching in elementary level fine arts and gifted programs. I learned that everyone has a story inside, just waiting to be shared. I captured pre-school children’s plays as they spoke them, and then brought them to life. I taught playwriting to elementary, middle and upper school students at Waterford School, Sandy, Utah. I received a Utah Humanities Council Grant to create a story-telling curriculum at a high-security youth facility, which evolved later into a playwriting course. I spent years in the BYU Playwrights, Directors, Actors Workshops as a director, dramaturg and actor, collaborating on other playwright’s plays.

A National Endowment for the Humanities grant to study at Middlebury College’s Bread Loaf School of English one summer changed my life. In the creative hot bed of Bread Loaf, Dare Clubb’s playwriting class ignited my passion for playwriting. Of course, it helped that people like Tony Kushner visited Bread Loaf almost every summer to lecture or have new work read by the professional company. I read a role in the opera libretto he was working on. I watched rehearsal after rehearsal as David Henry Hwang developed Golden Child. I knew I had to write. A short play I wrote for Dare’s class won a Utah Arts Council playwriting contest. Judith Royer encouraged me through involvement in KCACTF in our region as a student director, dramaturg, and playwright.

Currently, I teach playwriting online for Brigham Young University, using Gary Garrison’s Perfect 10 as our text. BYU supports my administrative work as KCACTF NPP Chair, Region VIII, and as New Play Development Workshop Co-Coordinator for ATHE. Sometimes it feels as if I do more teaching and administrating than writing, but getting short plays produced–e.g., at the Manhattan Theatre Source and the Westcliffe Colorado Center for the Performing Arts–has motivated me to set aside time to write.

I’m excited about serving as Dramatists Guild Rep for Salt Lake City, meeting members, hearing about new plays being produced, and making plans for events in our area. Please feel free to e-mail me with ideas or questions.

cnelson@dramatistsguild.com

Smith & Kraus Publishers » Salt Lake City

Salt Lake City

Salt Lake City