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Texas Young Playwrights Festival '99 |
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by Shilanda Woolridge
In June, six aspiring playwrights will descend upon Austin to participate in the Dougherty Art Center's Texas Young Playwrights Festival. Actually, the Texas Young Playwrights Festival is already in full swing. George Ramirez, the coordinator of the Texas Young Playwrights Festival, started the ball rolling during fall semester last year. He sent out 3,000 posters to different schools and school districts in the state of Texas calling for submissions of original one act plays. The students are allowed to collaborate, but there can only be up to three writers per piece. The plays were due January 29, 1999, and all entrants must have been under the age of 19 on that day to qualify. There is no age minimum, however, and the youngest entrant this year was 9 years old.
When all the pieces were in, Ramirez hired readers and playwrights to look through the pieces and give him suggestions. One would assume that Ramirez was looking for young prodigies, but he was actually digging for diamonds in the rough. "I tell the readers to look for plays that are well-written or developed to the point that they can still be worked on and made better. Some of the plays that don't move forward are the ones that are too advanced or polished. We go for those who might need a little more help. We are also interested in diversity and different voices."
Ramirez and his readers started with 90 plays and cut them down to 24. He then enlisted the help of Susan Deter and her students. Deter is a Dramaturgy instructor from the University of Texas at Austin. A dramaturg is someone who assists in playwriting and helps the playwright think outside the book. Her class of 12 students tackled two plays apiece, and chose 12 plays for participation in the Day of Dramaturgy. This took place on a Saturday in April and was an eight-hour commitment for everyone. The 12 playwrights came to Austin to meet their dramaturg and talk about their play. A coordinator cast each of the plays and recruited volunteers to read from them. After the reading, there was a critique session of the plays. The Day of Dramaturgy is exciting, but it's the beginning for some and the end for others, because there are two more stages and more cuts to be made. Ramirez sees it a little differently: "If the playwrights make it to the Day of Dramaturgy, then they should consider themselves a winner at that point."
The next stage takes place this month. Six of the young playwrights were chosen to come to Austin, and five will be in attendance. They will be here from June 13-19 and will live and board in the Jester Dormitory at the UT Austin campus. A male and female mentor are hired to chaperone them, and they will have supervision 24 hours a day. Throughout the week the playwrights will participate in workshops and will have the chance to do re-writes on their plays. In the evenings, the students will be taken to programs at Esther's Follies, Hyde Park Theatre, Zachary Scott Theatre, and other local venues. The tickets are donated in support of the festival. "We try to bring the students to a different performance every night," says Ramirez. The students' final day in Austin will be capped off with a polished rehearsed reading of their work.
The last stage involves a collaboration with the Austin Circle of Theatres (ACOT). "They assist us in having three of the plays produced," explains Ramirez. This will take place in August on a Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. This time it's a complete production with lighting, costumes, and rehearsals." The playwrights don't have much to do with the bare-bones production of their plays.
"As soon as they are done [in June] they are kinda out of the loop. When I receive their play, they receive an itinerary with all the dates. I let them know that there's a possibility they'll make it all the way through, so please make sure they'll be available to be in town for these dates," says Ramirez.
Three of the following playwrights will have their one act plays come to life in August. Please look to ACOT and this magazine for more information this August.
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