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NYCPlaywrights November 9, 2024
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NYCPlaywrights
Nov 9, 2024, 5:06:42 PM11/9/24
to NYCPlaywrights
Greetings NYCPlaywrights
*** FREE THEATER IN NYC ***
A Woman of Colour: adapting a lost classic for the American stage
In Georgian England, a biracial heiress travels from Jamaica to claim her inheritance. Join us for a staged reading of this lost novel.
The celebrated performing arts company Aquila Theatre collaborates with Thinkery & Verse to present a staged-reading of The Woman of Colour, an anonymous 1808 novel. We've been unpacking, rethinking, and reinterpretting this novel, and now we're ready for the next step in our process: YOU! We are offering free tickets to test out our ideas with a live audience. Let's experience this ground-breaking story together!
Monday, December 9 · 7 - 10pm EST
St. Paul & St. Andrew United Methodist Church
263 West 86th Street 1st Floor Chapel New York, NY 10024
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/a-woman-of-colour-adapting-a-lost-classic-for-the-american-stage-tickets-1075148671619
*** RESISTING FASCISM ***
NYCPlaywrights is looking for monologues and 10-minute plays about resisting fascism.
NYCPlaywrights will select as many of the scripts that we like (and which meet the submission guidelines) as semi-finalists. Excerpts of the semi-finalist scripts will be posted on NYCPlaywrights (by permission of author.)
Three finalist scripts will be selected from the semi-finalist scripts. One script will be chosen from the three finalist scripts and the author will receive an award of $25.
For more information:
https://www.nycplaywrights.org/2024/11/nycplaywrights-seeks-monologues-and-10.html
*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***
Go Try PlayWrite November 2024
The prompt is:
A liar’s prompt. Write a 10-page maximum scene about a childhood incident in a politicians life that teaches them to lie to get what they want. This is the opposite of the Washington myth of chopping down the cherry tree. The lie should echo in future lies in the politician’s life without outright stating the future lie. For example, “I didn’t let the dog out of the yard. The new kids stole it. I don’t know why. Maybe those kids…”
***
"Ampersand VI" New Works 10 Minute Play Festival Submission - Stoic Theatre
Please submit your 10 minute play via the submission form in PDF format. Have a cover page with the title, playwright name, contact information (email and/or phone number), and a copyright date. Please have your pages numbered.
The theme of the festival is "New Beginnings".
***
BREAK A LEG PRODUCTIONS is accepting submissions for our 2025 LOVE FEST to be held February 8th and 9th at Polaris North, 245 West 29th Street. The theme of the event is "love with a twist."
*** FOR MORE INFORMATION about these and other opportunities see the web site at https://www.nycplaywrights.org ***
*** JAPANESE PUPPET THEATER ***
The National Bunraku Theatre, in New York recently for the first time in more than thirty years, presented an evening of suicides. The performance, at the Japan Society, consisted of excerpts from two of the company’s most celebrated productions. In the Fire Watchtower scene from “The Greengrocer’s Daughter,” by Suga Sensuke and Matsuda Wakichi, from 1773, the titular character sacrifices herself to save a temple page boy she loves. In a scene from “The Love Suicides at Sonezaki,” by Chikamatsu Monzaemon, from 1703, two lovers are driven to take their own lives. Both plays were inspired by real events, and Chikamatsu’s was followed by a wave of double suicides that led to a ban on further performances. This mirroring of life and art is all the more astonishing given the fact that the actors are not people but puppets.
More...
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/11/04/national-bunraku-theatre-dance-review
***
Bunraku, one of the world’s most highly developed forms of puppet theater, is an unusually complex dramatic form, a collaborative effort between puppeteers, narrators, and musicians. First developed in the seventeenth century, Bunraku was officially recognized as a “masterpiece of the oral and intangible heritage of humanity” by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in November 2003.
More...
https://bunraku.library.columbia.edu
***
Bunraku developed from several genres of accompanied narrative music collectively called jōruri, after the popular epic Jōruri-hime monogatari (Tale of Princess Jōruri). As the genre developed, performers added puppets, or ningyō, to illustrate the action. The musical component of this new ningyō-jōruri became increasingly sophisticated and eventually separated into specialized roles: the tayū, or chanter, who described the settings, narrated the action, and provided voices for the characters; and the shamisen player, who supplied all the accompanying music. This music came to consist of a collection of standard melodic formulas that could be either structural, indicating the beginning and ending of sections, or characteristic, evoking particular moods and images. Broadly known as senritsukei, these melodic formulas were used consistently across a broad repertoire of narratives, and frequently named.
More...
https://www.asianstudies.org/publications/eaa/archives/history-and-sustainability-of-bunraku-the-japanese-puppet-theater/
***
Ranking with Nô and Kabuki as one of Japan’s foremost stage arts, the Ningyo Johruri Bunraku puppet theatre is a blend of sung narrative, instrumental accompaniment and puppet drama. This theatrical form emerged during the early Edo period (ca. 1600) when puppetry was coupled with Johruri, a popular fifteenth-century narrative genre. The plots related in this new form of puppet theatre derived from two principal sources: historical plays set in feudal times (Jidaimono) and contemporary dramas exploring the conflict between affairs of the heart and social obligation (Sewamono).
Ningyo Johruri had adopted its characteristic staging style by the mid eighteenth century. Three puppeteers, visible to the audience, manipulate large articulated puppets on the stage behind a waist high screen. From a projecting elevated platform (yuka), the narrator (tayu) recounts the action while a musician provides musical accompaniment on the three-stringed spike lute (shamisen). The tayu plays all the characters, both male and female, and uses different voices and intonations to suit each role and situation. Although the tayu “reads” from a scripted text, there is ample room for improvisation.
More...
https://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/ningyo-johruri-bunraku-puppet-theatre-00064
***
Bunraku Backstage
October 4, 2024—January 19, 2025
Alongside the live bunraku performances held at Japan Society this fall, Bunraku Backstage offers a rare glimpse behind the scenes of the theater. Bunraku, a dramatic art integrating performances of skilled puppetry, shamisen music, and narration, has evolved since the early 17th century in Japan and is recognized by UNESCO as a “masterpiece of the oral and intangible heritage of humanity.” Showcasing actual working puppets, costumes, props, and instruments on loan from the National Bunraku Theatre, Osaka, in celebration of their 40th anniversary, this exhibition unveils the collaboration that goes into staging a bunraku production. Unexpected multimedia installations by contemporary artists—Sugimoto Hiroshi, Tamura Yuichiro, and Basil Twist—all of which re-interpret and revive the artistic language of bunraku, explore the theater’s ongoing inspiration and influence.
More...
https://japansociety.org/gallery/bunraku-backstage/
***
--There was a comment from the audience in the post-performance survey that said, "The harmonious collaboration of the puppets, the shamisen players and tayu (the chanters) redefined the concept of theater."
SUGIMOTO: There are puppet theaters everywhere around the world, but most are primarily for children. Japanese Bunraku, on the other hand, is for adults and it surprised the Europeans with the high level of theatrical sophistication as well as the quality of the artistry of the puppets and other stage presentations.
--What were the reactions of some of the discerning cultural figures with whom you are friends, such as artist Sophie Calle and actress Isabelle Huppert?
SUGIMOTO: Isabelle usually stays straight-faced and rarely shows her true feelings, but she told me our show made her cry. You are just looking at the man who made Isabelle Huppert, of all people, cry! Sophie was reportedly out partying all night the night before to celebrate her birthday, but still made it to the show. She is also a tough critic, but I'm pleased to say she gave our show a thumbs-up.
More...
https://www.wochikochi.jp/english/topstory/2014/01/sugimotobunraku.php
***
Japan, Kabuki, and Bunraku: Crash Course Theater #23
We're headed back to Japan, this time in the Edo period to follow up on Noh theater, which had gone out of style last time we checked in. Now, under the Shoguns, there's couple of really interesting types of drama on the scene. Kabuki is a sort of successor to Noh, with wilder stories and more action. And Bunraku is straight up high intensity puppet theater. Mike tells you all about how the Samurais got themselves into trouble watching bawdy theater shows in Edo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oc3dWwbctw4
*** FREE THEATER IN NYC ***
A Woman of Colour: adapting a lost classic for the American stage
In Georgian England, a biracial heiress travels from Jamaica to claim her inheritance. Join us for a staged reading of this lost novel.
The celebrated performing arts company Aquila Theatre collaborates with Thinkery & Verse to present a staged-reading of The Woman of Colour, an anonymous 1808 novel. We've been unpacking, rethinking, and reinterpretting this novel, and now we're ready for the next step in our process: YOU! We are offering free tickets to test out our ideas with a live audience. Let's experience this ground-breaking story together!
Monday, December 9 · 7 - 10pm EST
St. Paul & St. Andrew United Methodist Church
263 West 86th Street 1st Floor Chapel New York, NY 10024
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/a-woman-of-colour-adapting-a-lost-classic-for-the-american-stage-tickets-1075148671619
*** RESISTING FASCISM ***
NYCPlaywrights is looking for monologues and 10-minute plays about resisting fascism.
NYCPlaywrights will select as many of the scripts that we like (and which meet the submission guidelines) as semi-finalists. Excerpts of the semi-finalist scripts will be posted on NYCPlaywrights (by permission of author.)
Three finalist scripts will be selected from the semi-finalist scripts. One script will be chosen from the three finalist scripts and the author will receive an award of $25.
For more information:
https://www.nycplaywrights.org/2024/11/nycplaywrights-seeks-monologues-and-10.html
*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***
Go Try PlayWrite November 2024
The prompt is:
A liar’s prompt. Write a 10-page maximum scene about a childhood incident in a politicians life that teaches them to lie to get what they want. This is the opposite of the Washington myth of chopping down the cherry tree. The lie should echo in future lies in the politician’s life without outright stating the future lie. For example, “I didn’t let the dog out of the yard. The new kids stole it. I don’t know why. Maybe those kids…”
***
"Ampersand VI" New Works 10 Minute Play Festival Submission - Stoic Theatre
Please submit your 10 minute play via the submission form in PDF format. Have a cover page with the title, playwright name, contact information (email and/or phone number), and a copyright date. Please have your pages numbered.
The theme of the festival is "New Beginnings".
***
BREAK A LEG PRODUCTIONS is accepting submissions for our 2025 LOVE FEST to be held February 8th and 9th at Polaris North, 245 West 29th Street. The theme of the event is "love with a twist."
*** FOR MORE INFORMATION about these and other opportunities see the web site at https://www.nycplaywrights.org ***
*** JAPANESE PUPPET THEATER ***
The National Bunraku Theatre, in New York recently for the first time in more than thirty years, presented an evening of suicides. The performance, at the Japan Society, consisted of excerpts from two of the company’s most celebrated productions. In the Fire Watchtower scene from “The Greengrocer’s Daughter,” by Suga Sensuke and Matsuda Wakichi, from 1773, the titular character sacrifices herself to save a temple page boy she loves. In a scene from “The Love Suicides at Sonezaki,” by Chikamatsu Monzaemon, from 1703, two lovers are driven to take their own lives. Both plays were inspired by real events, and Chikamatsu’s was followed by a wave of double suicides that led to a ban on further performances. This mirroring of life and art is all the more astonishing given the fact that the actors are not people but puppets.
More...
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/11/04/national-bunraku-theatre-dance-review
***
Bunraku, one of the world’s most highly developed forms of puppet theater, is an unusually complex dramatic form, a collaborative effort between puppeteers, narrators, and musicians. First developed in the seventeenth century, Bunraku was officially recognized as a “masterpiece of the oral and intangible heritage of humanity” by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in November 2003.
More...
https://bunraku.library.columbia.edu
***
Bunraku developed from several genres of accompanied narrative music collectively called jōruri, after the popular epic Jōruri-hime monogatari (Tale of Princess Jōruri). As the genre developed, performers added puppets, or ningyō, to illustrate the action. The musical component of this new ningyō-jōruri became increasingly sophisticated and eventually separated into specialized roles: the tayū, or chanter, who described the settings, narrated the action, and provided voices for the characters; and the shamisen player, who supplied all the accompanying music. This music came to consist of a collection of standard melodic formulas that could be either structural, indicating the beginning and ending of sections, or characteristic, evoking particular moods and images. Broadly known as senritsukei, these melodic formulas were used consistently across a broad repertoire of narratives, and frequently named.
More...
https://www.asianstudies.org/publications/eaa/archives/history-and-sustainability-of-bunraku-the-japanese-puppet-theater/
***
Ranking with Nô and Kabuki as one of Japan’s foremost stage arts, the Ningyo Johruri Bunraku puppet theatre is a blend of sung narrative, instrumental accompaniment and puppet drama. This theatrical form emerged during the early Edo period (ca. 1600) when puppetry was coupled with Johruri, a popular fifteenth-century narrative genre. The plots related in this new form of puppet theatre derived from two principal sources: historical plays set in feudal times (Jidaimono) and contemporary dramas exploring the conflict between affairs of the heart and social obligation (Sewamono).
Ningyo Johruri had adopted its characteristic staging style by the mid eighteenth century. Three puppeteers, visible to the audience, manipulate large articulated puppets on the stage behind a waist high screen. From a projecting elevated platform (yuka), the narrator (tayu) recounts the action while a musician provides musical accompaniment on the three-stringed spike lute (shamisen). The tayu plays all the characters, both male and female, and uses different voices and intonations to suit each role and situation. Although the tayu “reads” from a scripted text, there is ample room for improvisation.
More...
https://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/ningyo-johruri-bunraku-puppet-theatre-00064
***
Bunraku Backstage
October 4, 2024—January 19, 2025
Alongside the live bunraku performances held at Japan Society this fall, Bunraku Backstage offers a rare glimpse behind the scenes of the theater. Bunraku, a dramatic art integrating performances of skilled puppetry, shamisen music, and narration, has evolved since the early 17th century in Japan and is recognized by UNESCO as a “masterpiece of the oral and intangible heritage of humanity.” Showcasing actual working puppets, costumes, props, and instruments on loan from the National Bunraku Theatre, Osaka, in celebration of their 40th anniversary, this exhibition unveils the collaboration that goes into staging a bunraku production. Unexpected multimedia installations by contemporary artists—Sugimoto Hiroshi, Tamura Yuichiro, and Basil Twist—all of which re-interpret and revive the artistic language of bunraku, explore the theater’s ongoing inspiration and influence.
More...
https://japansociety.org/gallery/bunraku-backstage/
***
--There was a comment from the audience in the post-performance survey that said, "The harmonious collaboration of the puppets, the shamisen players and tayu (the chanters) redefined the concept of theater."
SUGIMOTO: There are puppet theaters everywhere around the world, but most are primarily for children. Japanese Bunraku, on the other hand, is for adults and it surprised the Europeans with the high level of theatrical sophistication as well as the quality of the artistry of the puppets and other stage presentations.
--What were the reactions of some of the discerning cultural figures with whom you are friends, such as artist Sophie Calle and actress Isabelle Huppert?
SUGIMOTO: Isabelle usually stays straight-faced and rarely shows her true feelings, but she told me our show made her cry. You are just looking at the man who made Isabelle Huppert, of all people, cry! Sophie was reportedly out partying all night the night before to celebrate her birthday, but still made it to the show. She is also a tough critic, but I'm pleased to say she gave our show a thumbs-up.
More...
https://www.wochikochi.jp/english/topstory/2014/01/sugimotobunraku.php
***
Japan, Kabuki, and Bunraku: Crash Course Theater #23
We're headed back to Japan, this time in the Edo period to follow up on Noh theater, which had gone out of style last time we checked in. Now, under the Shoguns, there's couple of really interesting types of drama on the scene. Kabuki is a sort of successor to Noh, with wilder stories and more action. And Bunraku is straight up high intensity puppet theater. Mike tells you all about how the Samurais got themselves into trouble watching bawdy theater shows in Edo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oc3dWwbctw4
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