Overview

A co-production with ArtFarm

in residence: june 10 - july 9

readings: july 7-9 at 1pm, 4pm and 7pm

Now in its second year, New Writers. New Plays. is an annual festival of new works by emerging playwrights.  The playwrights, directors, and actors team up for the first time at Vineyard Arts Project to focus on the creation of the new plays.  The month-long residency culminates with a three-day festival of public readings.

New Writers. New Plays. 2011 will feature PYRAMIDICA: Songs of Freedom, a darkly comic rock musical co-created by LPfunk and Deborah C. Smith; APPROPRIATE, a play by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins; and an untitled play by Tanya Saracho, the second play in her Border Trilogy.

This program is supported in part by a grants from the Martha's Vineyard Savings Bank Charitable Fund, a donor advised fund of the Permanent Endowment for Martha's Vineyard, and by the Martha’s Vineyard Cultural Council, a local agency which is supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, a state agency.

Pyramidica: Songs of Freedom

PYRAMIDICA: Songs of Freedom

Written by: LPfunk and Deborah C. Smith

Directed by: Lou Moreno

Cast: Jenni Barber, Damon Daunno, Kevin Mambo, Erica Nadera,  Anne Nathan, Flaco Navaja and Matt Whyte.

Performance Schedule: july 7 at 1pm, july 8 at 4pm, and july 9 at 7pm

About the Play:

PYRAMIDICA: Songs of Freedom is a darkly comic rock musical extravaganza chronicling the exploits of several individuals involved in the various levels of Pyramidica, a pyramid scheme company that has quantified Freedom as a commodity.  These individuals, and the audience, are taken through the inner workings of a free company orientation, where Pyramidica promises abundant Freedom opportunities for its clients and employees by way of the Freedom Return Ratio.  Through catchy tunes and driving riffs, PYRAMIDICA explores the pursuit of the new American Dream:  to achieve success by working “smarter, not harder.”

About the Playwrights:

LPfunK is an actor/guitarist/composer who was nominated for a Drama Desk Award (Best Original Music in a Play) for his work in Adam Rapp's Essential Self-Defense at Playwrights Horizons, in which he also acted.  Most recently, Lucas conceived and composed the original rock opera, ITHACA: A Perpetual Shredfest, the story of a Lower East Side rock band in the early 00's performing their final concert. Read more »

Deborah C. Smith: a  performer since early childhood, Deborah combines twenty years of rhythmic dance and theatre with over a decade of recent experience as a songwriter, poet and instrumentalist to offer unique and heartfelt plays and musical performances written in the language of the soul. She is currently the guitarist and songwriter for the Brooklyn-based music project Medicine Woman, in which she is accompanied by cello, fiddle, flute, drums and voices. Read more » 

Appropriate

Appropriate

Written by: Branden Jacobs-Jenkins

Director: Eric Ting

Cast: Betsy Aidem, Alex Branton, Carla Harting, Chelsea Ryan Melone, Nick Mills, Peter Rini, Charles Semine and Mary Wiseman

Performance Schedule: july 7 at 4pm, july 8 at 7pm, and july 9 at 1pm

About the Play:

Raymond Lafayette has died, and his progeny have returned to the family homestead to settle his financially fraught estate. But a gruesome discovery among Grandpa's belongings threatens to turn an estranged family into a family of strangers, when no one can agree on its origins, or how to get rid of it.

About the Playwright:

Branden Jacobs-Jenkins is a playwright, dramaturg and performer currently living in Berlin. His work has been seen at The Public Theater, New York Theatre Workshop, PS122, Soho Rep, New Dramatists, The Matrix Theatre in Los Angeles, CompanyOne in Boston, Theater Bielefeld in Bielefeld, Germany, and the National Theatre in London. He is currently working on commissions received from Lincoln Center Theater/LCT3 and Yale Repertory Theater. He is a former Dorothy Strelsin fellow and an alum of both the Soho Rep Writers/Directors Lab and The Public Theater Emerging Writers Group. Honors include a Princess Grace Award and fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts and New York Theatre Workshop, where he is currently a Usual Suspect. Branden holds an MA in Performance Studies from NYU. He is a faculty member of the MFA program at Queens University of Charlotte.

New Tanya Saracho Play

About the playwright:

Written by: Tanya Saracho

Directed by: Lisa Portes

Cast: Yadira Correa, Sandra Delgado, Carlo Garcia, Gabi Mayorga, Yunuen Pardo

Performance Schedule: july 7 at 7pm, july 8 at 1pm, and july 9 at 4pm

About the Playwright:

Tanya Saracho was born in Sinaloa, México and moved to Texas in the late 1980s. She is a performer, director and playwright-in-residence at Chicago Dramatists and Teatro Vista.  Founding Artistic Director of Teatro Luna, Chicago's all-Latina theater ensemble, Ms. Saracho's writing has been featured in most of Teatro Luna's ensemble-built works, including Generic Latina, Dejame Contarte, The Maria Chronicles, SOLO Latinas, SOLO Tu, S-E-X-Oh! and Lunatic(a)s.  Productions include an adaptation of The House on Mango Street for Steppenwolf for Young Audiences,  Our Lady of The Underpass with Teatro Vista (2009), Surface Day with Chicago Children's Humanity Festival (2008), and Jarred (A Hoodoo Comedy) with Teatro Luna (2008).  Ms. Saracho's play, Kita y Fernanda, a finalist for the 2003 Nuestras Voces playwriting competition, received productions at Teatro Luna (2003) and 16th Street Theater (2008, directed by Ann Filmer). Other awards include The 3Arts Artists Award, The Ofner Prize given by the Goodman Theatre, and the Khan Award. She was a finalist for the Christopher B. Wolk Award at Abingdon Theatre Company in NYC and a nominee for the Wasserstein Prize. Ms. Saracho's solo play Quita Mitos received a world premier with Teatro Luna in November of 2006 and has toured colleges and festivals, including the International Hispanic Theatre Festival and the Goodman's Latino Theatre Festival.

Read more about Tanya Saracho in The New York Times!

Festival Schedule