PlayGround Company in the News Feb-16

Read on to learn more about PlayGround Company Member and Alumni recent news, current happenings, and upcoming events.

Lauren Yee has won the 2015 Will Glickman Award for her play, In a Word, an imaginative missing-child drama that opened in April in San Francisco Playhouse’s Sandbox Series as a National New Play Network rolling world premiere. It’s been produced subsequently in Cleveland and San Diego, and opens this month in Chicago. This is SF Playhouse’s second Glickman-winning production, having previously been honored for Aaron Loeb’s IDEATION, now heading to New York’s 59E59 Theaters.

Patricia Cotter and Victoria Chong Der have been named 2016 Resident Playwrights with the Playwrights Foundation.

Joy Carlin is about to start rehearsals at the Aurora Theatre Company for Sarah Treem's THE HOW AND THE WHY. Immediately after that, she will be directing Arje Shaw's THE GATHERING, a revival of his Broadway play about family and forgiveness (but with a twist) to be presented at the Royce Studio Theatre in SF. Then in June, the production will move to Berkeley's Theatre First.  She’ll also direct a reading of a new play by Robert Reich at A.C.T. in April. In the midst of all this, she looks forward to greeting the PlayGround community for the 2016 PlayGround Benefit & Awards Night on April 11th.

Robert Sicular and Rosie Hallett appear in Word for Word's Stories by Emma Donoghue and Colm Tóibín, February 24th - April 3^rd at Z Space, followed by a tour to France. http://zspace.org/w4w

Rinabeth Apostol and Jomar Tagatac are performing in dogeaters at the Magic for the month of February.

Cindy Goldfield is directing MOST HAPPY FELLA for 42nd Street Moon.

Director Eric Fraisher Hayes just opened Good People by David Lindsay-Abaire at Role Players Ensemble.

Roberta D’Alois is one of the newest panelists for the San Francisco Arts Commission. Her 5-minute play, Oh! You Pretty Things, will be featured as one of the 6 plays for Some like It Shotz! at PianoFIght on February 10th. Tickets at http://tinyurl.com/Febshotz

Louis Parnell is currently appearing in THE NETHER at the SF Playhouse through March 5 (get tickets soon as it is playing to full houses). After that he will be workshopping a new play, ENTANGLEMENT, by AJ Baker which will open in a 3Girls Theatre production in Nov at Z Below.

Gwen Loeb is in workshops for the new musical CAN YOU HEAR ME BABY (by Lisa Rafel & Gary Malkin, directed by Jayne Atkinson-Gill) in preparation for the Houston, LA, and SF backers auditions.

Karen Macklin's one-act play I [Love] You will be staged as part of the Origins of Love festival at University of San Francisco, April 7-April 10.

Misner & Smith (Sam Misner and Megan Smith) will be playing a special concert on February 5th in Berkeley at one of the Bay Area's finest music venues, The Freight & Salvage (directly across the street from Berkeley Rep). They will be playing this show as a trio, adding acclaimed pedal steel and electric guitar player, Josh Yenne, who has played with the likes of Mazzy Star, Boz Skaggs and The Easy Leaves. If there's one venue to catch the band in it's the Freight & Salvage, so don't miss this show! They'll be playing all of the songs that were featured in November's Monday Night PlayGround Musical Night! http://thefreight.org/misner-smith-2

Molly Noble just directed Bad Dates by Theresa Rebeck (featuring Jen King) at Cinnabar Theatre and is in rehearsals (with Bethanie Baeyen) for Nina Wise's the Kepler Project at UC Boulder's Fiske Planetarium in March/April.

Maury Zeff’s short play, Can You Hear the Ocean? (originally written for this past October's Monday Night PlayGround), is a finalist in the Parish Players Tenth Annual 10 Minute Play Festival in Thetford, VT.

Elena Wright will be performing next in THE LITTLE MERMAID by Hans Christian Andersen, adapted by Mike Kenny, at Marin Theatre Company, Feb 27-March 6. http://www.marintheatre.org

Carolyn Doyle will be performing in One For All: A Solo Arts Festival at Douglas Morrison Theatre, Apr 8 -17, alongside Josh Kornbluth, Marga Gomez and Ann Randolph.

Brian Herndon and Danielle Levin will be playing Louis and his wife Fanny in Central Works' production of ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON: JEKYLL & HYDE this spring at the Berkeley City Club.

Ron Campbell will be finishing a five-month run as Cecil B. DeGrille in Teatro ZinZanni in Seattle and then heading off to San Diego to play R. Buckminster Fuller in The History (and Mystery) of the Universe for the 40th season of the San Diego Repertory Theatre.

Charley Lerrigo, Madeline Puccioni, Christine Keating and Pat Morin are among the playwrights chosen for SF Theater Pub's new "On the Spot" festival in March at the Piano Fight, four performances (Mar. 21-22-28-29) of ten-minute plays written in 24 hours to a prompt. Sara Judge is producing.

Alumnus Dave Garrett just finished teaching an Each One Reach One playwriting workshop at San Mateo County's juvenile hall in January. He will be teaching workshops in San Francisco's juvenile hall in February and May. Dave will also be teaching a Playwriting summer camp for ages 9-12 at the Children's Creativity Museum in late June.

Alex Moggridge’s play Simon Dawes Becomes a Planet was a semi-finalist for the American Blues Theater's Blue Ink Playwriting Award. It's also set for a production in New York this fall.

Michael Barrett Austin will be appearing in Boeing Boeing at San Jose Stage, April 6-May 1. www.thestage.org

Rachel Bublitz will head to Denver this month for the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival Region 7 Conference where her ten-minute play, Lean In With Liz! (originally developed at Monday Night PlayGround), is a semi-finalist.