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NYCPlaywrights October 26, 2024
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NYCPlaywrights
Oct 26, 2024, 6:22:44 PM10/26/24
to NYCPlaywrights
Greetings NYCPlaywrights
*** FREE THEATER IN NYC ***
Staged Reading of Short Plays and “Snapshots of a Wedding”
By David Schmitt
"Snapshots Of A Wedding" is a gripping, emotional drama that explores the complexities of love, lust, loss, and redemption. At its heart is Robert Coleman, a man torn between his devotion to his love, and the struggle for acceptance from his family. As their world begins to unravel, the play confronts themes of identity, family, and the devastating impact of rejection. With raw performances and poignant storytelling, "Snapshots Of A Wedding" promises to captivate audiences and leave a lasting impression on the soul.
Monday, November 25
7 - 9:30pm EST
Free Event
7:00pm Shorts
7:30pm Full Length
Wine & Cheese to follow
AMT Theater
354 WEST 45TH STREET,
New York, NY, 10036
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/staged-reading-of-short-plays-and-snapshots-of-a-wedding-tickets-1057554767779?aff=ebdssbdestsearch
*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***
Catskill Public Theater “Beyond Woodstock”
As the Catskill Public Theater (CPT) approaches our Summer 2025 season, we plan to present a series of skits that expand on the themes and messages that still resonate with the Woodstock phenomena. We are sponsoring a “Call for Submissions” for original ideas that could be part of the short scenes, sketches, and mini-plays, amplifying the Woodstock Festival message. We invite the public to share their direct experience or even their imaginative experiences for inclusion in this play. Any length will work.
***
The Carlo Annoni International Playwriting Prize is now open for submissions with topics concerning the LGBTQ+ community, including love, diversity, and identity in a time of gender fluidity.
We accept full-length or short plays even if already represented.
1000 € awarded to two best plays (one in English and one in Italian)
Award ceremony in Milan, September 2025.
***
Script submissions for the nationwide 2025 SheNYC Theater Festivals are now open.
Full-lengths only (running time greater than 1 hour. Note that there will be a 2-hour run time limit on all shows in the Festival. If your show runs longer than 2 hours you can absolutely still submit it; you’ll just have to make appropriate cuts to fit into your 2-hour run time slot before the Festival).
The writing team must be at least 50% marginalized genders (cis women, trans men and women, and non-binary people)
*** FOR MORE INFORMATION about these and other opportunities see the web site at https://www.nycplaywrights.org ***
*** HAUNTED THEATERS ***
There are several levels of haunting, ranging from the odd unaccountable noise to actual knocking ("poltergeist" means "knocking ghost"), to the mysterious opening of doors and cabinets, or the flickering of lights. Sometimes there is a strange cold spot in a room, a colored mist, a floating orb in a photograph, an inanimate object that moves without anyone touching it (like the furniture in the video above) or the echo of a disembodied voice. Sometimes you may see a wispy manifestation, a contorted face in a mirror or window. More rarely you see a full human figure, sometimes ectoplasmically white or sometimes in full natural color. Even more rarely, the figures speak. Or touch.
The actors and crew at the New Amsterdam Theatre have experienced nearly all the above at various times, and the alleged culprit is well known to them all: Olive Thomas, a onetime Ziegfeld Follies chorus girl. She is by far the most active ghost on Broadway, manifesting so frequently that Dana Amendola, Vice President of Operations for Disney Theatrical Group, has placed photographs of her at every entrance to the theatre so workers can greet her when they arrive for work each day (which is believed to keep her mischief to a minimum).
More...
https://playbill.com/article/the-real-life-ghost-stories-behind-broadways-9-haunted-theatres
***
The oldest theater in L.A., the Palace has a "third balcony" that was once closed off from the rest of the theater for racial segregation and became legendary as the site of ghost sightings, with onstage performers seeing mysterious figures in the balcony when locked doors should have prevented anyone from appearing up there. The Palace, known until 1926 as the Orpheum, was once one of the premier theaters on the famed "Orpheum circuit" of vaudeville houses and saw its share of live performances before transforming itself into a silent-movie venue. Over the years, audience members and theater staff reported the figure of a woman dressed in white lace crossing the stage during performances, then disappearing into the wings, never to be seen again.
More...
https://www.budgettravel.com/article/budget-travel-halloween-ideas-haunted-theaters_12566
***
Daniel Breaker (most recently Aaron Burr in Hamilton on Broadway) was in the 2008 musical Passing Strange at the Belasco and was said to have had an encounter that unnerved him, describing how while putting on his makeup in his dressing room mirror he saw a white haired gentleman sitting behind him, watching. When Breaker spun around, the man was no longer there. Later when he told the theatre’s house manager about it, he was informed that he’d just seen David Belasco.
More...
https://ronfassler.medium.com/ghosts-of-broadway-861701fbb1df
***
Keen for an explanation that doesn’t involve lavender oil, I call up Aoife Monks, who teaches theatre studies at Queen Mary University of London. She became interested in the topic in 2009, after Patrick Stewart reported glimpsing the spirit of the 19th-century actor John Baldwin Buckstone while performing in Waiting for Godot at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket, in London. Doing so, Stewart became one in a long line of actors, including Judi Dench and Donald Sinden, to have seen the Haymarket’s long-dead manager in the – albeit spectral – flesh. (A Sky Arts documentary failed to capture Buckstone on camera, alas.)
Monks is interested less by the question of whether these ghosts exist and more by the stories that surround them. Actors who claim to have seen an illustrious forebear, she argues, connect themselves with a theatrical heritage that is otherwise intangible. “If you see a ghost, it’s almost like you’re joining the family. It’s hard not to think of all those other actors who have stood where you’re standing, said exactly the same lines. It’s a way of linking to the past.”
More...
https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2015/oct/29/most-haunted-theatre-ghosts-superstitions-theatre-royal-drury-lane
***
When it comes to haunted theatres, you can’t forget this little theatre nestled in Southern California. The Tenth Avenue Arts Center started off as a 24-hour chapel for the First Baptist Church of San Diego in the early 1900’s, fast forward a century and the building was bought and turned into a performing arts facility. As soon as the doors opened as a theatre, whisperings of unexplained activity started including voices from a child running up and down the stairs to orders being barked in a British accent to uneasy feelings in parts of the building. The Tenth Avenue Arts Center, also known as the Tenth Avenue Theater, is known to be haunted by at least four ghosts including a girl named Missy who met her end from falling down the stairs, a pastor who committed suicide, a British lieutenant barking orders, a woman named Carol Laroc with OCD, and a young boy haunting the basement.
More...
https://associationofparanormalstudy.com/2016/10/21/10-haunted-theatres-in-america/
***
According to Rohse, theater legend includes ghosts like Guthrie, who watch over theaters and their occupants making sure everything is safe and good. There are also sprightly spirits who move things around and make it difficult to find props.
When Rohse was working on the the comedy "Noises Off," pebbles kept falling on the people who were rehearsing onstage. He and another climbed 60 feet up to the grid in the fly space to see who was pelting them.
"(We) looked around and couldn't find anything or anyone," Rohse said. "We found a stack of neatly stacked pebbles up there that we thought they were throwing at us. We have no idea of who 'they' were."
"Two of the five or six that I saw I would attribute to Guthrie, just because I felt like it was someone watching over us to make sure we were doing good things and taking care of the theater," Rohse said.
Rick Parks, the Elsinore's house organist, vouched for the ghosts' goodwill. Years ago while descending from the balcony, a lady tripped halfway down the stairs.
"She was falling forward down on her face and something lifted her up and landed her on the landing down below the Romeo and Juliet (painting)," Parks said. He was serving as house manager in the lobby but had his back to the stairway. "So many people saw that. I wish I had."
More...
https://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/life/2014/10/22/telling-ghost-stories-historic-elsinore-theatre/17750601/
***
According to theatre professor Alan Brincks, the “ghost light” tradition is something that is familiar to any theatre worker, but the origin of the tradition is not entirely known.
“It is hard to say where the tradition of leaving the light on originated. Some say it comes from the days when stage lights were gas, and even when turned down there was a small flame,” Brincks said. “Another story claims that a burglar once broke into a theatre and sued the theatre after falling and breaking his leg. Whatever the origin, the use of a ghost light is still widely practiced in theatres across the U.S.”
Brinks said some people simply like the practice because it suggests a spiritual element of always keeping a light burning in a place so many hold in high esteem, or simply because it evokes a sense of calm when exiting or entering the space.
But does the lore have a spookier origin?
“Whether in earnest or jest, every theatre I’ve worked at has always claimed to have one or several ‘resident ghosts’ and often they also have names, descriptions and personalities to boot. The ‘ghost light’ tradition is as follows: at the end of each night of rehearsal or performance, all the lights are turned out on stage except one ‘ghost light.’ This is usually a bare bulb on the end of a pipe that can be wheeled around,” the professor noted. “Some say it is to keep ghosts away, other say it is to keep the ghosts company, and others even claim it is a way to draw the spirits of actors who have passed on back to a safe space.”
More...
https://www.lamar.edu/news-and-events/news/2022/10/lamar-university-lore-why-the-theatre-leaves-the-light-on.html
*** FREE THEATER IN NYC ***
Staged Reading of Short Plays and “Snapshots of a Wedding”
By David Schmitt
"Snapshots Of A Wedding" is a gripping, emotional drama that explores the complexities of love, lust, loss, and redemption. At its heart is Robert Coleman, a man torn between his devotion to his love, and the struggle for acceptance from his family. As their world begins to unravel, the play confronts themes of identity, family, and the devastating impact of rejection. With raw performances and poignant storytelling, "Snapshots Of A Wedding" promises to captivate audiences and leave a lasting impression on the soul.
Monday, November 25
7 - 9:30pm EST
Free Event
7:00pm Shorts
7:30pm Full Length
Wine & Cheese to follow
AMT Theater
354 WEST 45TH STREET,
New York, NY, 10036
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/staged-reading-of-short-plays-and-snapshots-of-a-wedding-tickets-1057554767779?aff=ebdssbdestsearch
*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***
Catskill Public Theater “Beyond Woodstock”
As the Catskill Public Theater (CPT) approaches our Summer 2025 season, we plan to present a series of skits that expand on the themes and messages that still resonate with the Woodstock phenomena. We are sponsoring a “Call for Submissions” for original ideas that could be part of the short scenes, sketches, and mini-plays, amplifying the Woodstock Festival message. We invite the public to share their direct experience or even their imaginative experiences for inclusion in this play. Any length will work.
***
The Carlo Annoni International Playwriting Prize is now open for submissions with topics concerning the LGBTQ+ community, including love, diversity, and identity in a time of gender fluidity.
We accept full-length or short plays even if already represented.
1000 € awarded to two best plays (one in English and one in Italian)
Award ceremony in Milan, September 2025.
***
Script submissions for the nationwide 2025 SheNYC Theater Festivals are now open.
Full-lengths only (running time greater than 1 hour. Note that there will be a 2-hour run time limit on all shows in the Festival. If your show runs longer than 2 hours you can absolutely still submit it; you’ll just have to make appropriate cuts to fit into your 2-hour run time slot before the Festival).
The writing team must be at least 50% marginalized genders (cis women, trans men and women, and non-binary people)
*** FOR MORE INFORMATION about these and other opportunities see the web site at https://www.nycplaywrights.org ***
*** HAUNTED THEATERS ***
There are several levels of haunting, ranging from the odd unaccountable noise to actual knocking ("poltergeist" means "knocking ghost"), to the mysterious opening of doors and cabinets, or the flickering of lights. Sometimes there is a strange cold spot in a room, a colored mist, a floating orb in a photograph, an inanimate object that moves without anyone touching it (like the furniture in the video above) or the echo of a disembodied voice. Sometimes you may see a wispy manifestation, a contorted face in a mirror or window. More rarely you see a full human figure, sometimes ectoplasmically white or sometimes in full natural color. Even more rarely, the figures speak. Or touch.
The actors and crew at the New Amsterdam Theatre have experienced nearly all the above at various times, and the alleged culprit is well known to them all: Olive Thomas, a onetime Ziegfeld Follies chorus girl. She is by far the most active ghost on Broadway, manifesting so frequently that Dana Amendola, Vice President of Operations for Disney Theatrical Group, has placed photographs of her at every entrance to the theatre so workers can greet her when they arrive for work each day (which is believed to keep her mischief to a minimum).
More...
https://playbill.com/article/the-real-life-ghost-stories-behind-broadways-9-haunted-theatres
***
The oldest theater in L.A., the Palace has a "third balcony" that was once closed off from the rest of the theater for racial segregation and became legendary as the site of ghost sightings, with onstage performers seeing mysterious figures in the balcony when locked doors should have prevented anyone from appearing up there. The Palace, known until 1926 as the Orpheum, was once one of the premier theaters on the famed "Orpheum circuit" of vaudeville houses and saw its share of live performances before transforming itself into a silent-movie venue. Over the years, audience members and theater staff reported the figure of a woman dressed in white lace crossing the stage during performances, then disappearing into the wings, never to be seen again.
More...
https://www.budgettravel.com/article/budget-travel-halloween-ideas-haunted-theaters_12566
***
Daniel Breaker (most recently Aaron Burr in Hamilton on Broadway) was in the 2008 musical Passing Strange at the Belasco and was said to have had an encounter that unnerved him, describing how while putting on his makeup in his dressing room mirror he saw a white haired gentleman sitting behind him, watching. When Breaker spun around, the man was no longer there. Later when he told the theatre’s house manager about it, he was informed that he’d just seen David Belasco.
More...
https://ronfassler.medium.com/ghosts-of-broadway-861701fbb1df
***
Keen for an explanation that doesn’t involve lavender oil, I call up Aoife Monks, who teaches theatre studies at Queen Mary University of London. She became interested in the topic in 2009, after Patrick Stewart reported glimpsing the spirit of the 19th-century actor John Baldwin Buckstone while performing in Waiting for Godot at the Theatre Royal, Haymarket, in London. Doing so, Stewart became one in a long line of actors, including Judi Dench and Donald Sinden, to have seen the Haymarket’s long-dead manager in the – albeit spectral – flesh. (A Sky Arts documentary failed to capture Buckstone on camera, alas.)
Monks is interested less by the question of whether these ghosts exist and more by the stories that surround them. Actors who claim to have seen an illustrious forebear, she argues, connect themselves with a theatrical heritage that is otherwise intangible. “If you see a ghost, it’s almost like you’re joining the family. It’s hard not to think of all those other actors who have stood where you’re standing, said exactly the same lines. It’s a way of linking to the past.”
More...
https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2015/oct/29/most-haunted-theatre-ghosts-superstitions-theatre-royal-drury-lane
***
When it comes to haunted theatres, you can’t forget this little theatre nestled in Southern California. The Tenth Avenue Arts Center started off as a 24-hour chapel for the First Baptist Church of San Diego in the early 1900’s, fast forward a century and the building was bought and turned into a performing arts facility. As soon as the doors opened as a theatre, whisperings of unexplained activity started including voices from a child running up and down the stairs to orders being barked in a British accent to uneasy feelings in parts of the building. The Tenth Avenue Arts Center, also known as the Tenth Avenue Theater, is known to be haunted by at least four ghosts including a girl named Missy who met her end from falling down the stairs, a pastor who committed suicide, a British lieutenant barking orders, a woman named Carol Laroc with OCD, and a young boy haunting the basement.
More...
https://associationofparanormalstudy.com/2016/10/21/10-haunted-theatres-in-america/
***
According to Rohse, theater legend includes ghosts like Guthrie, who watch over theaters and their occupants making sure everything is safe and good. There are also sprightly spirits who move things around and make it difficult to find props.
When Rohse was working on the the comedy "Noises Off," pebbles kept falling on the people who were rehearsing onstage. He and another climbed 60 feet up to the grid in the fly space to see who was pelting them.
"(We) looked around and couldn't find anything or anyone," Rohse said. "We found a stack of neatly stacked pebbles up there that we thought they were throwing at us. We have no idea of who 'they' were."
"Two of the five or six that I saw I would attribute to Guthrie, just because I felt like it was someone watching over us to make sure we were doing good things and taking care of the theater," Rohse said.
Rick Parks, the Elsinore's house organist, vouched for the ghosts' goodwill. Years ago while descending from the balcony, a lady tripped halfway down the stairs.
"She was falling forward down on her face and something lifted her up and landed her on the landing down below the Romeo and Juliet (painting)," Parks said. He was serving as house manager in the lobby but had his back to the stairway. "So many people saw that. I wish I had."
More...
https://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/life/2014/10/22/telling-ghost-stories-historic-elsinore-theatre/17750601/
***
According to theatre professor Alan Brincks, the “ghost light” tradition is something that is familiar to any theatre worker, but the origin of the tradition is not entirely known.
“It is hard to say where the tradition of leaving the light on originated. Some say it comes from the days when stage lights were gas, and even when turned down there was a small flame,” Brincks said. “Another story claims that a burglar once broke into a theatre and sued the theatre after falling and breaking his leg. Whatever the origin, the use of a ghost light is still widely practiced in theatres across the U.S.”
Brinks said some people simply like the practice because it suggests a spiritual element of always keeping a light burning in a place so many hold in high esteem, or simply because it evokes a sense of calm when exiting or entering the space.
But does the lore have a spookier origin?
“Whether in earnest or jest, every theatre I’ve worked at has always claimed to have one or several ‘resident ghosts’ and often they also have names, descriptions and personalities to boot. The ‘ghost light’ tradition is as follows: at the end of each night of rehearsal or performance, all the lights are turned out on stage except one ‘ghost light.’ This is usually a bare bulb on the end of a pipe that can be wheeled around,” the professor noted. “Some say it is to keep ghosts away, other say it is to keep the ghosts company, and others even claim it is a way to draw the spirits of actors who have passed on back to a safe space.”
More...
https://www.lamar.edu/news-and-events/news/2022/10/lamar-university-lore-why-the-theatre-leaves-the-light-on.html
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