If you remember, Teen Girl had been selected, just over a year ago, to be on the Coterie Theater's Young Playwrights Roundtable. (reminder of it HERE) They are on it until they graduate. And they get some great feedback & inspiration from each other! It's a pretty awesome & big deal! It is quite an honor to have the opportunity to get your original work read & accepted by the theater to be a part of this group!
This group also uses each other to bounce ideas off of & to be able to hear their work verbally acted out by other playwrights in the room. This is so the playwright of the piece can hear how it sounds out loud, as well as get feedback from the room.
Along with this is a goal to have an original piece done on the Coterie stage! This opportunity can come during the Young Playwrights Festival at the end of the season. Even though there are around 20-ish on the roundtable, only 8 or so pieces of submitted material are selected to be performed at the festival. And, it is done on the Coterie stage.
big-Big-BIG deal! BIG!
Here's kind of what goes down:
If the playwright's piece is selected, there is a casting director that actually casts the play from the Coterie master acting classes & some of the playwrights (who are familiar with the pieces anyway). There is a director appointed to the piece. The playwright gets to be in the 1st rehearsal for the read-thru so they can give their notes to the actors of their vision. There is a bit of blocking that can take place. There is not much for memorization, so it becomes a glorified readers theater...with some props & costuming. Some of the stage directions are read aloud from another voice.
This basically becomes a rough draft for an audience to get a feel of what the piece might be like on stage. And, yes...there is an audience. The Coterie sells tickets for the festival.
Did I mention that this is a BIG deal? Just checking.
OK...I told you all of that to tell you this:
Teen Girl had a material submission accepted into this year's festival!!!
There were stacks & stacks of material submitted, and only 8 pieces accepted to be performed on the Coterie stage!!!
So, she got to sit in on the read-thru of her piece, with the cast & director, got to give her vision on parts of her piece, and was in tears of overwhelment (yes...I just created that word) witnessing a cast & director at work of her original piece.
She is a playwright. She will have a piece done ON the Coterie stage. It's a big deal, yo.
A big-Big-BIG deal! BIG!
Even more exciting? She will also get to perform on the Coterie stage! That's right...the casting director placed her in 3 of the 8 pieces being done! And she is not in her own work. So...she is involved in half of what is happening on the stage!
We've known about her piece being accepted for about 2 or 3 weeks now. We've had time to process it. But word is now getting out quickly, and the newness of all of this has kicked up all over again...
This past week, Teen Girl's theater teacher told the theater class/group that there was a big announcement that needed to be made. The whole class was making guesses about what it could be. The were asking him if it was good news or bad news. He did let them know it was good news. Then the guesses started up again...and they came to the conclusion that he was probably adopting a kid. Instead of telling the group the big announcement, he told them to, "...just read this." He, then, put the official email he received from the artistic director & head of the roundtable of Coterie about Teen Girl! She wasn't expecting it. The group freaked out & started congratulating her! She got very emotional. She wasn't prepared for it. And now her ITS (International Thespian Society) troupe is getting a group together to see it as one of the official shows they take in for the year!
It's funny...her piece is called "Anxiety." I don't want to give too much away about it right now, but the title says it all. Basically it's how anxiety can mess with an individual's head. It would be considered a drama, but there's no tissues needed. It's more intense & thought-provoking. It left her fellow playwrights mesmerized. But it's a subject she has dealt with in her own head...and it will be out there for all to see. And now, several of her fellow actors from school, whom she does look up to &/or sees their talents (which she compares herself to, sometimes), are now speaking to her by name. Ones that haven't willingly spoken to her in the past. And, even though she keeps her guard up about it, she is really blown away by these others who are coming out of the woodwork to express their congratulatory greetings & expressing their excitement to come see her & her piece.
Interestingly enough...this is causing her...uh...anxiety.
She is suddenly more accepted into a group by these great efforts than for who she is. Even after her large rolls in the dramas the last couple of years. (lead role posting HERE from last year, plus a large role this year, too) It's nice. She's thrilled...but she finds it weird that she has been such a wallflower & now she has an overwhelming amount of people vying for her attention. But she knows her true friends...and she is grateful for the support she's received to get to this point. She is a bit weirded out by her new semi-celebrity-type status.
This week is going to be crazy! Rehearsals are running rampant & we have a lot of driving to Crown Center & back...
...but it means she will get to put on a resume' that she has had original work performed on the Coterie stage, as well as performing on the Coterie stage.
(information about the festival HERE)
It's a big deal, yo. A big-Big-BIG deal! BIG!
And we are so proud of our abundantly talented playwright-actress-singer-performer. So proud! And she is learning to be proud of herself, too. Can't wait til it hits the stage!
Stay tuned...
God Bless, AM~Erica
