Now through May 25, your dollars will go twice as far when you make a donation through our power2give campaign.

All donations are 100% tax-deductible, so give today!

About the Project

Essential Theatre has been supporting Georgia playwrights and presenting new plays to Atlanta audiences since 1987. This summer, we are proud to be presenting the fifth all-Georgia Essential Theatre Play Festival from July 29 to August 28 at the West End Performing Arts Center (945 Ralph David Abernathy Blvd, Atlanta, GA 30310).

In 2011, five years ago this summer, we presented our first festival exclusively dedicated to Georgia playwrights.

Continue reading →

Join the Essential Theatre at Red Brick Brewery on February 29 to celebrate 18 years of the Essential Theatre Festival, the fifth festival of all-Georgia-written plays. Be first in line to get your Festival Passes and meet this year’s Essential Theatre Playwriting Award co-winners, Karen Wurl and Derek Dixon!

2016 Festival Announcement Event PR

This year, Essential Theatre is celebrating our Playwriting Award Winners in style on February 29 at Red Brick Brewery. Partygoers will have the chance to mix and mingle with this year’s award-winners, have fun and win prizes with Trivial Matters,

Continue reading →

JOIN ESSENTIAL THEATRE AND FRIENDS ON FEBRUARY 29 AT RED BRICK BREWERY FOR OUR 2016 FESTIVAL ANNOUNCEMENT EVENT!

Meet the co-winners of the 2016 Essential Theatre Playwriting Award and the directors of their WORLD PREMIERE PRODUCTIONS.

Mix and mingle with past Essential playwrights and company members.

Win prizes and just plain have fun with Essential Trivia by Trivial Matters!

Sample great beer from Georgia’s oldest operating craft brewery, Red Brick Brewing.
Brewery Tours at 7 and 8pm! Gluten-free beverage options (ie, wine) generously provided by Ansley Wine Merchants.

Continue reading →

by Jennifer Kimball
2015 Festival Highlights.pdf 

Our seventeenth Festival, the fourth all-Georgia Festival, our second year partnering with the West End Performing Arts Center and with Eyedrum Art & Music to showcase a local visual artist and further support Georgia artists of all kinds.

Two great and well-received world premieres by two talented and gracious Georgia Playwrights,

Our best-attended Bare Essentials Play Reading Series ever — despite a power outage during one reading as the result of an afternoon thunderstorm.

Continue reading →

OLD SHIP OF ZION play opening press release

Atlanta, July 2015 – Join us for the professional world premiere of The Old Ship of Zion, by Columbus, GA playwright Natalia Naman, opening July 24.

A warm, touching play about the members of a small African-American church, struggling to keep its doors open and adapt to changing times. Mama Gwen is a beloved elder who feels the burden of others who depend on the strength of her faith, and Quincy is a young man who loves his church but is beginning to realize that he’s gay.

Continue reading →

Festival Passes are now on sale!

The performance schedule is still under development, but you can get your Festival Pass today to be sure you don’t miss out!

Festival Passes are your best deal, offering significant savings over regularly priced tickets, so get yours today!

 Eight Ticket Pass: $140
Four Ticket Pass: $70
Two Ticket Pass: $35

Continue reading →

We’re proud to announce that, in our first year of participating in the Suzi Bass Awards, Essential Theatre has its first nomination: Karla Jennings’ Ravens & Seagulls for Best World Premiere Production! Congrats and thanks to director David Crowe, dramaturg Michael Evenden, and our incredible cast: Sam Traquina, Gina Rickicki, Teresa DeBerry, Jill Perry, Suzanne Roush, Patti French and Sarah Wallis!

And here’s something else that’s cool: Of the eleven plays up for the Suzi’s Gene-Gabriel Moore Playwriting Award, three of them were produced by the Essential Theatre — more than any other company! To wit: That Uganda Play by Theroun Patterson,

Continue reading →

by Jennifer Kimball

What a summer it has been! This was our sixteenth Festival, and our third all-Georgia Festival. A revamped Festival layout featuring two world premieres and six readings. All Georgia writers, all Georgia artists. Our first year in West End, our first year in the Suzi Bass competition. Two Suzi recommendations and one nomination. New community partnerships with the West End Performing Arts Center and Eyedrum Art & Music Gallery. Continued relationships with VSA Arts of Georgia and Stagehands sign language interpreters through them, record levels of Festival sponsorships and community support. It has truly been an exciting and inspiring experience!

Continue reading →

Click here to read the full review!

Continue reading →

Gerry Bartholomai, of Chamblee, GA, is the author of tonight’s Bare Essentials offering, Miss Adelia’s Garden. Miss Adelia’s Garden is a poignant drama about the friendship between a young gay man and two elderly southern women.

Tell us a little bit about your play.
Miss Adelia’s Garden is the story of Adelia and Martha – two lifelong friends who live a rather secluded life in a small town in Georgia.

What inspired you to write this play?
It started with a dream I had. In it, I was back in my grandmother’s house in the mountains of Cordoba.

Continue reading →