MFA playwrights Dana Formby, Cecilia Copeland, and Reina Hardy are each at the Region 3 Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival in Saginaw, Michigan this week. Cecilia and Reina each had one act plays selected as two of the top six submitted in the region (comprised of Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin), and Dana’s ten minute play “Armed With Peanut Butter” is one of the top six selected for the 10-minute festival there. In the last four years, Ohio Univsersity has had more new plays invited to the regional festival than any other, and more top finishes, including two OU scripts (by Jacqmin & Zorn) tied for first place in the 10-minute competition last year. Additionally, Nick Knittel, a student in Dana Formby’s beginning playwriting class, was also invited to have the one act he wrote under her tutelage read at the festival, making it so that 50% of the one acts at the festival this year come from OU writers.
Category: News
Three OU MFA Playwrights at KC/ACTF in Saginaw:
MFA Alum’s Play at Actor’s Theater of Louisville
2B (Or Not 2B), by 2003 MFA playwriting alum Jacquelyn Reingold, will be featured as part of a bill of one acts at Actor’s Theater of Louisville later this month. From the ATL web site: “[Matchgames is] an evening of short plays about one of the most enduring obsessions: affairs of the heart. Whether love is found, lost, botched or misunderstood, this seductive and funny collection of plays explores the tempestuous territory of attraction. The MATCH GAMES playlist is: Controlling Interest by Wayne S. Rawley, Sure Thing by David Ives, So Tell Me About This Guy by D.W. Gregory, Surprise by Mark Harvey Levine, The Processional by Robert D. Kemnitz and Jennifer McMaster, Mr. and Mrs. by Julie Marie Myatt, 2B (Or Not 2B) by Jacquelyn Reingold, The Blue Room by Courtney Baron, Eros Is Sore Spelled Backwards by Martin Russell, and Après Opéra by Michael Bigelow Dixon and Valerie Smith.” Reingold is currently on the writing staff of HBO’s In Treatment with Gabriel Byrne. For more information on the production, see the ATL web site at:http://www.actorstheatre.org/play_match.htm.
Formby Working with Local 75
Local 75, a playwriting workshop based in Chicago, has selected 3rd year MFA Dana Lynn Formby to participate in a year-long project developing her new play “Inherit the Whole”. From their web site: “Local 75 is about developing working class writers. It is about developing working class stories for the theater. It is about developing a working class audience. Inspired by union’s support of workers, LOCAL 75 is a playwriting workshop for artistic tradesmen and tradeswomen to develop their craft.” See Dana’s interview and more about Local 75:http://local75.wordpress.com/dana-lynn-formbys-deal/
Jacqmin Named P73 Finalist
Recent alum Laura Jacqmin, winner of the 2008 Wasserstein Award, has been named a finalist for the P73 playwriting program in New York. (See post from 10/22 below for more info on P73.)
Schneider to Present at MATC
2nd year MFA playwright Garret Scneider has been invited to present his paper exploring “Midnight Madness”, the weekly OU MFA playwriting production, at the Mid American Theater Conference this coming March in Chicago.
Ramsey play at Stuart’s Opera House:
Playwriting professor Erik Ramsey’s play Smith Unearthed will be featured as a staged reading produced by Brick Monkey Theater Ensemble at Stuart’s Opera House, 8 p.m. Friday, December 5th. Admission is free. For more information, visit: http://www.stuartsoperahouse.org/index.php?item=314 or http://www.athensohio.com/events/index.php?page=14&item=2916.
3rd year MFA Play at Victory Gardens:
Dana Formby’s play “Inherit the Whole” received a staged reading at the Tony Award-Winning Victory Gardens Theater today. The play was featured as a lab production last May as part of the Seabury Quinn MFA Playwright’s Festival here at OU.
Seabury Quinn, Jr. Has Passed:
We sadly note the passing of Seabury Quinn, Jr., the original playwriting professor who taught in the OU MFA playwriting program for decades until his retirement in the early 1990’s. Seabury died on Saturday. He will be fondly remembered for his acerbic wit in responding to new plays, especially in recent years — no matter how ill he had become, he always found a way to visit the new play festival named in his honor and generously give his opinion on the work at hand. Many will fondly remember his laugh, which was often just a single, expolsive “Hah!”
Ramsey play at Frostic Reading Series:
Playwriting professor Erik Ramsey’s play Smith Unearthed will be featured as part of the Frostic Reading Series at Western Michigan University, 8 p.m. Thursday, November 13th. For more information and a feature article on the play, visit:http://www.mlive.com/kalamazoo/stories/index.ssf?/base/features-4/12262080609711.xml&coll=7&thispage=1#continue.
MFA Alum’s Play at Side Project:
2007 MFA graduate Laura Jacqmin’s play “Space” will be featured as part of The Side Project’s “Cut to the Quick — A Festival of Short Works” in Chicago starting November 16. For more information, visit: http://www.theatreinchicago.com/news.php?articleID=429.
OHIO 