Normally, GW’s department of theatre and dance stages works are penned by the likes of Neil Simon, Shakespeare and other playwrights. This year, the department is trying something a little bit different.
The “New Plays Festival,” the first production of the 2007-2008 season, features six original plays by GW students. In its first year, the festival is essentially an experiment, conducted by the department to see what would happen when student playwrights and actors are given their own creative platforms.
Selecting which performances to include proved to be a long and arduous process. The director, Elizabeth Kitsos-Kang, and the producer, Alan Wade, pored over promising plays submitted by professors on behalf of their students. Eventually, the pair settled on six.
“I was looking for the most interesting, most complete plays,” Kitsos-Kang said. “There needed to be a clear journey for each of the characters.”
The festival was originally conceived as six staged readings, with the actors reciting the dialogue to the audience. Once rehearsals began, both the cast and the director felt the plays deserved more time and effort.
“It’s more important for playwrights to see their plays move and come to life,” Kitsos-Kang said. “The students were disappointed we couldn’t do more as well.” An adjunct professor at the University since 1996, she has also directed the situational skits in the Colonial Inauguration since 1994.
Senior Jimmy Morgan agreed. “We wanted to put on a serious show, in the most professional way possible.”
As a result, the cast worked on a tight schedule, having only one month to prepare the plays.
“It was really ambitious, trying to stage six plays in four weeks,” Kitsos-Kang said. “It got tough because of the short time period, but everyone worked really hard.”
The six one-act plays are separated into two shows, plainly labeled “Program A” and “Program B.” The two programs, each consisting of three shows, were not consciously linked together by any overlying theme.
“All the plays are about really different things,” Kitsos-Kang said. “The grouping is relatively random.”
Looking closely, it’s possible to discern certain similarities within the programs. Program A, for instance, deals mainly with relationships, ranging from comedic to dark. “Johnny Highroller,” the first play in the show, is equal parts Real World episode and classic detective novel; our hero sips his whiskey from a red solo cup as he attempts to solve the Mystery of His Cheating Girlfriend. “Nighthawks,” inspired by the Edward Hopper painting of the same name, is significantly less lighthearted. Set in a Chicago diner at 4 a.m., the play shows how secrets can bring people together, and tear them apart.
Program B is more haphazardly arranged, yet the plays all deal with “pretty heavy” subject matter. “Static” is about a drug addict aiming to make amends, and “Soldiers of Circumstance” concerns young soldiers at war.
“These plays all have funny moments,” Kitsos-Kang said. “Yet they are all very dark.”
The one-acts feature onstage narration; a cast member introduces each scene and reads the stage directions aloud to the audience. Sophomore Emily Anderson said that the director added the narration in order to preserve the playwrights’ visions.
“We wanted to make sure the stage directions were read,” the actress said.
Many of the actors played parts in more than one show; most were enthusiastic about the double casting.
“I was very excited to get cast in two different shows,” Morgan said. The actor played Billy in “Johnny Highroller” and Charlie in “Nighthawks.” “It allowed me to create two very different characters.”
The playwrights did not have a very active role in the festival’s production.
“I took a pretty minimal part,” writer Timothy Guillot said. The author of “Soldiers of Circumstance” attended only one rehearsal, but he said that he “had a lot of confidence” in everyone involved.
“I know Elizabeth, and I know most of the cast, and I knew that they would all do a great job,” he said.
All involved felt that the “New Plays Festival” has been a success thus far and expressed hope that the festival would become a tradition.
“It’s exciting for the writers to have something staged, and it’s exciting for the audience to see something new,” Guillot said. “It’s a great opportunity.”
“New Plays Festival” will continue to run this weekend starting Oct 11 through Sunday, Oct 14. Evening shows begin at 7:30 p.m.; the Sunday matinee plays at 2 p.m. The play runs in the Betts Theatre located at the Marvin Center. Tickets can be purchased at the door.
