Why playwrights love Dayton
FutureFest will showcase 6 new plays.
It takes a village to produce FutureFest, the annual festival of new plays that’s put Dayton on the international theatrical map. In this case, all the “villagers” are wild about live theater.
This year’s weekend event, slated for July 19-21, attracted 353 script submissions from around the globe, 100 more than last year.
The six winning plays and the men and women who penned them will be introduced to Miami Valley audiences at the 27th annual festival hosted by the Dayton Playhouse. After each production, playwrights take the stage to share the inspiration for their dramas and a panel of national adjudicators offers feedback. A grand-prize winner is selected by judges on the final evening.
Audience members are also invited to voice their reactions and are encouraged to interact with both playwrights and judges between plays. The idea is to aid playwrights in taking their previously unproduced plays to the next level.
About 70 percent of those who attend come for the entire weekend. In addition to the six plays, their weekend pass also includes an opening reception and champagne toast, coffee and sweets each morning and a Sunday night picnic supper in the gardens.
Focus on Playwrights
As Rich Orloff of New York City will attest, the focus of the weekend is always the playwrights. He first came to Dayton as a FutureFest finalist 26 years ago and will be returning this month with his play, “Men Overboard.”
“When FutureFest presented my comedy, ‘Veronica’s Position’, in 1993 it was one of the first times I got to show my work and connect with audiences,” Orloff says. “Although I’ve written many plays since then — and they’ve had hundreds of productions — there’s still a place inside me where I feel like an emerging playwright, and I’m as eager as ever to see how the Dayton audience will respond to my latest play. One of the joys of being a playwright is that the process of developing plays never gets old.”
Playwright Linda RamsayDetherage is also a returning author who says that although playwrights submit to festivals all over the country FutureFest will always be on her list. Last here in 2014 when her play, “Sugarhill” took top prize, she says the care and concern everyone in Dayton lavished on her play helped lead to a
professional production the following year.
Ramsay-Detherage, who works for a professional theater in the Detroit area, says when she tells her colleagues that 200 people are willing to sit for three days and watch new works, she is greeted by unabashed skepticism. “The lessons that FutureFest teaches about the relationship between a theater and its audience is truly amazing,” she adds. “The folks at the Dayton Playhouse — the casts, crew, directors, administrators and their participating panels — make the whole experience memorable.”
Adjudicators make it special
The FutureFest judges — always insightful as well as entertaining — are a weekend bonus. While many have been coming for years, fresh faces and opinions are always being added.
One of the returning favorites is Eleanore Speert, a New York playwright and publisher who says being an adjudicator at FutureFest helps her see theater in its “glorious regional light.”
“Working in the theater world, in my case behind the spotlight, I want to take in the different ways that theater is created, received, worked on, fought over,” she says. “Going to other cities and seeing how theaters work and reach out keeps me constantly aware of the ways that stories are told and who they reach.”
Behind the scenes
For the past 26 years, the mammoth undertaking has been accomplished by a dedicated group of more than 150 volunteers who do everything from reading scripts to rehearsing and staging the productions.
Margaret Baird, longtime script reader for the festival, first fell in love with theater as a teenager when she and her family lived in London. A retired high school English teacher, Baird says she’s able to throw herself into reading each play and often produces it in her head. “I can hear the various voices, visualize the action, argue with the author’s choice of plot development or choice of language, wonder about the tech possibilities,” she says. ” When I read it it becomes alive.”
She limits herself to one play a day. “Immediately after reading I write down my critique, give a score, and then a summary of the plot on a note card,” she says. “I also enjoy when our committee gets together and discusses each one. “
Chuck Knickerbocker of Dayton loves his role as a driver. He picks playwrights and adjudicators up at the airport, takes them to their hotel, to the Playhouse, to meals. He enjoys being an ambassador for Dayton.
“I assure them when I first meet them that they are going to have an unforgettable experience,” Knickerbocker says. “They quickly bond and I enjoy learning about their experiences, their aspirations, their writing process. And I’ve learned to carry at least four umbrellas in my car.”
First time FutureFest actor Samuel Hamilton says the weekend is extremely helpful for a young actor at the beginning of his career.
Costume designer for this year’s fully staged presentations is Theresa Kahle, who says she’s passionate about theater as an art form. “My opportunities to be the original costumer of a work are some of my greatest experiences,” she says. “But it has been almost 20 years since I have done an original show and FutureFest is bringing that joy back to me. I feel lucky to get to read these scripts ahead of time and be part of making them come to life.”
Peggy Mangan has a demanding job as house manager. She’s responsible for finding ushers for all of the plays and also oversees food for weekend receptions and meals. “It’s a lot of ‘hurry and set up’ and then ‘hurry and take down,’ ” Mangan says. “I greet all of the patrons and if someone has a problem, I try to solve it. One year, for example, an adjudicator left her purse at the hotel so I went to her room to retrieve it. Another time a lady lost her hearing aid at Marion’s Piazza so I went there to get it. I try to be a Girl Friday!”
John Riley, originator of FutureFest, owns the Burger Master restaurant in Dayton. Each summer, he and his wife, Marty, donate fried-chicken dinners for the Sunday evening picnic-in-the-park.
“One of the things we’ve enjoyed most about FutureFest is our audiences and how much their participation and input brings to the weekend,” Riley says. “The meals are our way of saying thanks to them and to all of the volunteers and participants who make FutureFest such a wonderful event.”
The couple is in the process of selling their restaurant to their longtime manager, Carrie Johnson, who plans to continue the tradition of donating meals. “She’s met a lot of people from the theater, some of whom are now regular customers,” says Riley.
Thursday night add-on
In collaboration with the Dayton Playhouse, a one-woman show is being presented on Thursday evening, July 18. It’s free for FutureFest weekend pass holders; others can make a donation to FutureFest.
Written by 2017 FutureFest finalist Desiree York, “Fractured” explores one woman’s journey through the grieving process in the digital age: “finding truth, reconnecting with the outside world, and moving forward. ” York, who lives in California, will come to Dayton to direct the staged reading.
It’s fitting that the play stars actor Annie Pesch, who has been involved with FutureFest for the past 20 years. Audiences have watched Annie grow up; adjudicators have encouraged her to pursue her acting career.
This project is made possible in part by funding from an Artist Opportunity Grant from the Montgomery County Arts & Cultural District distributed by Culture Works.