Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
What Else Is New?
National spotlight shines on T2’s annual festival
Now in its ninth year of production, Theatre-Squared’s New Play Festival has reached a level of national recognition that T2 artistic director Robert Ford had only dreamed of in the beginning. The festival lineup of five plays includes Pulitzer Prize finalist Lisa D’Amour and prominent Lebanese-American playwright Mona Mansour, as well as a workshop production of University of Arkansas’ playwriting program head John Walch’s “Transatlantic.”
“Because of the support we receive, the enthusiasm locally for hatching new plays and the support we’re receiving from foundations and individuals, we are able to attract some pretty prominent playwrights,” says Ford. “Our playwrights this year are very much out there on the national scene. This is what we set out to do years ago, and we’re kind of pinching ourselves — it’s really happening.
We have a nationally recognized new play festival that is drawing the best playwrights in the country and supporting our regional artists and playwrights.”
The festival receives funding from the Fayetteville Area Community Foundation’s Happy Hollow Fund, a grant from the National Endowment of the Arts and a gift from Barbara B. Shadden in memory of Harry S. Shadden.
Producing a festival of this magnitude is no easy feat, says Morgan Hicks, T2 co-founder and festival co-producer and company manager. The full company for the festival numbers 65, with 18 people coming from out of town.
“It takes a bit of wrangling,” Hicks says. “We have five shows in rehearsal and only three rehearsal spaces, so that makes it a little tricky too.” As company manager, Hicks’ responsibilities are numerous. “Helping with casting and staffing, and then organizing the schedule and all of the logistics — booking all of the flights, finding housing, trips to the airport, all of that incredibly glamorous stuff.”
When the playwrights, directors, stage managers, dramaturgs and actors gather on Tuesday to begin the workshops that will help shape the plays, they’ll be starting a two-week process that is completely playwright-centered, says Ford.
“As a playwright, you are totally able to focus on your work,” he says. “There are over 50 people involved who are all working on your show and all supporting you. You’re the star. It’s your chance to be the center of the process and feel that support, because all we want is for you to be able to play — we built this big sandbox for you to be able to play.” Playwrights will workshop their scripts for four to six hours a day, then watch a staged reading of their work at Crystal Bridges Museum in Bentonville the first weekend. “Playwrights will have a chance to hear back from the audience and watch and feel how the audience receives the play — When are they leaning forward? When are they sitting back? — and then go back into the workshop for another week to keep working and see it in front of another audience.”
The New Play Festival is not the only event keeping T2 on the national stage this summer. On June 24, editors and staff from the Dramatists Guild, a national association of professional playwrights, who will be presenting a live version of their monthly magazine The Dramatist at T2. A documentary crew from the American Theatre Wing, founder of the Tony Awards, will be in attendance to include T2 in a documentary about notable regional theaters. And the theater announced that the groundbreaking for the new 50,000-square-foot building on the corner of Spring Street and West Avenue in Fayetteville is scheduled for June 23 at 4 p.m.
“We do groundbreaking work at the play festival, and now we’re doing actual groundbreaking,” jokes Ford.
All signs point to T2’s already high profile continuing to rise, which is fine with Ford.
“We want to be able to connect our region to the national conversation,” he says. “That’s something we’re always looking for.”