• Smith and Kraus is pleased to offer regional theater reports in
    partnership with the Dramatists Guild of America. Posted bi-monthly to keep playwrights up to speed on what's happening within their region and
    across the United States.

Boston

By Amy Merrill                                       How do we get better at what we do?  This was the unspoken premise behind “Writing in Three Dimensions,” a seminar organized by member Pat Gabridge,  Four designers (two lighting, two sound), and about thirty playwrights gathered in the Central Square Theater on a beautiful spring afternoon.  First, the designers showed [More...]
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Atlanta

By Pamela Turner A very nice thing happened on the way to the forum (did I mention you have to be a gladiator to survive Atlanta traffic?). A local DG member wrote to ask that I mention a recent event (March 17) in this column, one, he said, “…that many felt was the premier single theatre [More...]
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Miami

BY ANDIE ARTHUR According to their website, Florida Stage is “the southeast’s largest theatre devoted to producing exclusively new and developing work.” Their 2008-2009 season includes four world premeries, including three plays workshopped at their 1st Stage New Play Festival: William Mastrosimone’s Dirty Business, Catherine Trieschmann’s The Bridegroom of Blowing Rock, and Steven Dietz’s Yankee Tavern. I [More...]
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Washington, D.C

BY RICH AMADA “The market is changing, and we’d better change with it.” Those were the words of Gary Garrison, the Dramatists Guild’s executive director for creative affairs, who also cautioned that things are probably going to get worse for playwrights before they get better. Garrison made his comments before about 50 D.C. area playwrights gathered at [More...]
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Seattle

BY DENNIS SCHEBETTA If we don’t support each other, who will? Recently, I asked a handful of playwrights in this region about this idea of “community.” Some of the responses were illuminating and others were downright depressing. Someone bluntly said, “I don’t feel there’s a strong community of playwrights at all, despite there being quite a lot [More...]
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Twin Cities

BY JAYME MCGHAN Elissa Adams has been the Literary Manager of Minnesota’s famed Children’s Theatre Company for the last ten years.  And the last ten years have certainly been successful as far as new work is concerned, with 25 commissioned plays seeing the end game of full production on one of CTC’s two stages. And the [More...]
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Portland – The Fertile Ground Festival & Dramatists Guild Meetings

BY ANDREA STOLOWITZ Well it happened. This January’s inaugural Fertile Ground Festival presented 37 world-premiere events from fully produced plays, to rehearsed concert readings, to late night and lunch time readings. But more than the apparent success of the festival and the fulfillment of the artists involved, the event seems to have started a buzz of [More...]
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Los Angeles

BY DAN BERKOWITZ To self-produce or not to self-produce: that used to be the question. These days, it’s more often the answer. With the economy in the toilet, and theatres struggling to stay open by presenting only proven hits, self-producing is increasingly the way to go for a writer with a new, untried play. But how to [More...]
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Chicago

BY DOUGLAS POST “What does it means to be an American?” This is the pivotal question that PJ Paparelli wants playwrights, lyricists and composers to contemplate as they work on their new plays and musicals under the auspices of American Theater Company, an ensemble of theatre artists committed to producing new and classic American stories for [More...]
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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 [More...]
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