Back on the Boards

My desk during final preparations for NJYPF 2015

Preparations are just about done and this Sunday we begin rehearsals for the 32nd annual New Jersey Young Playwrights Festival. This is a program I have run for Playwrights Theatre since I started working there in 2002. For the past two months, I've communicated with the high school playwrights via email and phone, and finally had a chance to meet them in person at the NJ Governor's Awards for Arts Education on Wednesday. These four students have done a remarkable job not just crafting engaging stories, but also a pair of significant revisions using feedback from our contest readers and the festival dramaturgs. The first rewrite was a great way to assess the commitment to the process and willingness of the finalists to make changes to their work. The goal of the second rewrite under the guidance of a dramaturg, is to help jump start the playwrights into the rehearsal process.

The high school playwrights have always been directly involved in rehearsals, but this is only the second year implementing a pre-Festival routine (last year introduced the dramaturgs; this year, the finalist rewrites). A year prior, I noticed that only a handful of playwrights were actively participating in the program. There are a variety of reasons for this, of course, but it seemed that much of it had to do with the playwrights being thrown into rehearsals without any significant orientation. Seeing professionals work on your script can be exciting, but it can also be very intimidating. Hopefully we've alleviated some of that this year. I can't wait to begin working on the scripts tomorrow. What I can wait for is my new role in this year's program.

I've been directing portions of the Festival for many years, but this is the first time that I will perform in them. Festival scripts are often populated by youth, or young adult, characters; however, this year we were surprised that of the 13 total characters in the four high school plays, only five characters were young people. The majority of the actors that I typically hire for young playwrights presentations are in their early to mid-20s, so the challenge became finding the actors needed for the adult characters. We did well, but fell short to the point where a colleague and I will need to step into two roles. That's all well for my colleague who is a professional actor. For me, on the other hand, it is not a typical role. I've performed onstage before, but I haven't since the New Plays for Young Audiences Series in 2007. So, this should be interesting, to say the least!

Dulce et Utile, Part 1

On Monday, May 11, I accompanied a few of the students whose plays were selected for the 2015 Madison Young Playwrights Festival to receive a proclamation from Madison Borough Mayor Robert Conley. After reading the document proclaiming April 2015 as Madison Young Playwrights month, Mayor Conley invited the students to introduce themselves and share a little about their plays. I also said a few words about the program's goals and impact:

"At the core of an effective education system are the arts. While it is easy to see art for its immediate entertainment value, we must not overlook the greater impact it has as an educational tool. As the Roman philosopher Horace believed: effective art should be both 'dulce et utile', meaning sweet and useful. Or to put it another way: entertainment and education. By recognizing these young artists tonight, we not only celebrate their achievement, but also encourage their curiosity so that they may continue to learn more about the world and about themselves, and to explore how those two interact.

"We are currently wrapping up the celebration of the 29th annual Madison Young Playwrights program with our final in-school assembly at St. Vincent Martyr School on May 27; however, three plays by Madison students will be further performed in the statewide New Jersey Young Playwrights Festival on June 1st in a production by Playwrights Theatre on the campus of Fairleigh Dickinson University.

"Thank you Mayor Conley and members of the Council for recognizing the creative explorations of these students. And above all, thank you to the students who have shared their imaginations with us, and the teachers, parents, and community who support them. [The students' work] cannot happen without that support. And we encourage our children to continue using their imaginations for many, many years to come.

Young Playwrights Map

A few years ago I noticed through casual Google searching that there were many opportunities for young people to write plays and have them published or performed. It also was exciting to see just how many of these programs existed across the country, with new ones seeming to pop up every year. What appeared to be missing, however, was a central resource that brought together the variety of information about each of these projects. A few organizations have attempted this with varying results because - as some PTNJ interns and I discovered on a first attempt about two years ago - it is difficult to keep up with the pace of change within the field. (And thanks to those interns for their help!) However, as my dissertation has begun to take shape, I had an opportunity to really make this work; a handful of conversations with excited young playwrights and colleagues provided the encouragement; and finally, this past week, I was able to publish a compilation of 68 individual programs into one Google Map. You can see the result on this website using the Young Playwrights tab. 

It is exciting to think of the potential impact this map might have introducing young writers to new and undiscovered opportunities to share their voices. I also view it as a first step in connecting those in the field of young playwrights work. We don't often have the chance to do so.

Early this morning I sent an introductory email to the addresses and contacts associated with each young playwrights program. I hope that these organizations will provide me with any missing details, or program updates. I also plan to follow up with the programs over the summer, so that young writers can have fresh data when the school year begins and their new scripts begin to take shape.

If you know of a program that is not currently listed on the site, please contact me with information including the name and contact for any administrator who can provide me with details to include on the map. Thanks!