-
Thomas Rowen & Caroline Parsons in I HAVE IT
The Lark Play Development Center announced its 2009 Playwrights Week selections, and six out of the eight playwrights are women. I’ve had the privilege to produce short plays by two of them — Bekah Brunstetter and Natalia Naman — as part of the Estrogenius Festival over the past few years. They are both unique, challenging writers and two of the loveliest people in theater today.
Bekah’s quirkly plays Arms, I Have It and Dead Soap were featured in Estrogenius 2006, 2007 and 2008, respectively. Conjoined twins, venereal disease and the dying art form known as the soap opera (How prescient given Guiding Light’s upcoming demise. Don’t get my mother started about how much she’s going to miss Reva, Joshua and Jeffrey). Nothing is safe from Bekah’s twisted worldview. We are richer in both laughter and heartbreak thanks to her fantastic writing. There is truly no one quite like her. Bring on Miss Lily Gets Boned. From the title alone, I cannot wait to hear this play.
CROSSING OVER
In 2007, Natalia’s brutal play Crossing Over left audiences shaken and stirred. FOR DAYS. No one could forget the performances of Meaghan Prahl, Tarantino Smith and chandra thomas under Mary Hodge’s direction. Crossing Over, which Natalia wrote as a Princeton undergrad, will be featured at EST’s Going to the River Festival this fall. Check it out this daring play, but be warned. It is an earth-shattering work with beautiful, haunting language.
Congratulations to Chad Beckim, Jennifer Fawcett, Laurel Haines, Ethan Lipton, Jen Silverman and Stephanie Timm. For full details on Playwrights Week, visit here.
photos: donje’ photography
