We’re delighted and proud to announce the two co-winners of the 2021 Essential Theatre Playwriting Award! They are: CALMING THE MAN by Anthony Lamarr White and RAISING THE DEAD by Erin Considine. Congratulations to the winners! They will each receive a cash prize of $750 and their plays will receive full productions in the 2021 Essential Theatre Play Festival, happening live in person this November at our home since 2014, the West End Performing Arts Center!

We can honestly say that this was the most difficult choice we’ve had to make in the contest’s 21-year history, because of the high quality of this year’s submissions.

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The Essential Theatre’s General Auditions will be via video submission only for 2021. Please submit your video audition (along with resume and headshot) to [email protected] by Thursday July 1, 2021. Auditions should consist of two contrasting monologues with a total length of no more than four minutes.

Please use subject line: [YOUR NAME] GENERAL AUDITION.

PLEASE NOTE:  This year, our two full productions (Anthony Lamarr White’s CALMING THE MAN and Erin Considine’s RAISING THE DEAD) will require a total of six actors: four African-American men and two women of any ethnicity in the 40-60 year old age range.

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This Saturday, April 10, we’re wrapping up our first 10 Minute Playwriting Bootcamp with a virtual showcase of participant’s work read by professional actors.

Our Bootcamp class features new and emerging playwrights that all have an interest in continuing to write for theatre, and our acting ensemble features new and established performers reading their words. The collection of plays is diverse and entertaining, showcasing new voices and perspectives that we know you will enjoy! 

Afternoon Showcase

Grown Folks Business by Zeena Regis
Night of Suspicion by Sherry Jackson
Princesses by Katherine Brokaw
And the Walls Come Tumbling Down…Eventually by Miriam Kulick
Closure by Shashone Lambert Short
You Bet Your Life by Rick Perera
Pink Casket by Virginia Kirby

RSVP for the Afternoon Session

Evening Showcase

Museum Majicc 

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The deadline for the 2022 Essential Theatre Playwriting Award competition is April 23, 2021.

Now in its 23rd year, this is the only contest exclusively dedicated to the work of Georgia playwrights. The winning play will receive both a full production and a $750 cash prize. Playwrights must be current Georgia residents, and the plays must be previously unproduced. There are no restrictions as to style, length or subject matter.

Email your script to [email protected] or submit it here today:

Submit a play

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Monday night’s Bare Essentials Play Reading is Dead Gay Body, written by Abraham Johnson. Read on to learn a little more about the playwright and the play we’ll be seeing Monday night!

Abraham Johnson (all pronouns) is an Atlanta-based playwright who writes Big Messy Queer plays centering around audience communion. Abe has been named a two-time Lambda Literary Playwriting Fellow, a resident artist at the Sundress Academy, and a finalist for the 2020 National Young Playwrights Residency. In 2021 Abe will be a 4x finalist for the Greenhouse Residency at SPACE on Ryder Farms, as well as a playwriting scholar at the Suwanee Writers’ Conference.

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Thursday night’s Bare Essentials Play Reading is Smoked, written by Thomas Brazzle. Read on to learn a little more about the playwright and the play we’ll be seeing on Thursday!

Thomas Brazzle is an actor, writer and director based in Georgia. After spending time studying puppetry and performance abroad in London and Barcelona, Thomas returned to the US to focus on creating new work and working in regional theatre. He has performed at The Guthrie in Minneapolis, Shakespeare and Company (Lenox, MA), Connecticut Rep, The Alley Theatre (Houston, TX), TheatreSquared (Fayetteville, AR) and many other regional theaters. He now writes and directs films with his production company Whet Ink Productions.

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Our first online play reading ever will be happening on Tuesday night! Read on here to learn a little about our playwright and the play we’ll be seeing on Tuesday:

Hannah Manikowski is a Georgia-born, nationally recognized new play artist who holds a BFA in Directing from the School of Drama at Carnegie Mellon University. Hannah loves women in both the lesbian sense and the feminist sense, and she especially loves writing plays by, for, and about them. She is a 2020 O’Neill finalist and the winner of the 2018 – 2019 Judith Barlow Prize. Additionally,

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Recommended by Education Associate Emily McClain:

The Georgia Department of Education has a fantastic collection of Fine Arts resources for all content areas. It’s free and available to teachers and I wanted to share with my teacher-network. We are resilient and creative and endlessly flexible. We will continue to share our love of art and music and theatre and dance with our students in this new medium!

Recommended in a recent email newsletter from the office of Essential’s Congressman, John Lewis:

Educational Tools for Distance Learning: While many schools have temporarily closed their doors, tools are available to assist parents with educating their children from home.

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Essential Theatre announces the winners of the 2020 Essential Theatre Playwriting Award
 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Jennifer Kimball, Managing Director
[email protected]

2020 Essential Theatre Playwriting Award Winners press kit

February 2020 – Essential Theatre is proud to announce the winners of the 2020 Essential Theatre Playwriting Award: The Outrage Machine by Daniel Carter Brown and The Wishing Place by Beverly Trader Austin. The Outrage Machine and The Wishing Place will each receive a full production in the 2020 Essential Theatre Festival this summer as well as a cash prize.

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Thanks to EVERYONE who made a donation to our 2020 Festival power2give campaign. Together, we raised over $8,000 to support the 2020 Essential Theatre Play Festival!

Deepest thanks, from everyone at Essential, and we’ll see you at the theater!

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