Festival of New Plays Focuses on Local and Global Diversity
February 13, 2008
The second annual Cultural Conversations new play festival, which features works focusing on local and global diversity, will kick off February 15–16 with writer/performer Heather Raffo’s highly acclaimed play 9 Parts of Desire, which she will perform in concert with musician Amir Elsaffar, at 8 p.m. at the Pavilion Theatre on the University Park campus. The festival continues February 27–March 5, with premieres of Damon Chua’s Aziza (February 27 and March 1), Christopher Lewis’s The Aperture (February 28 and March 2), and Irma Mayorga and Virginia Grise’s STICK! (February 29 and March 3). Cultural Conversations will also feature visiting dance artists, student one-acts and visual art. All performances begin at 8 p.m. at the Pavilion Theatre and are free and open to the public (except for the dance performance “Dancer with a Message” on February 29, which starts at 5 p.m.). For a complete performance schedule, visit www.culturalconversations.org.
Penn State theatre faculty members Susan Russell and Raymond Sage launched Cultural Conversations and another new works festival, the New Musical Theatre Festival, in spring 2007. Both festivals were established to foster new plays and musicals by progressive playwrights and composers. Professional artists from across the country are invited to submit works for consideration, and three new plays and two new musicals are performed by Penn State students as part of each festival (Cultural Conversations is held annually during the spring semester and the New Musical Theatre festival is held twice a year, in March and December).
On April 5–6, 2008, Penn State theatre students will perform one production from each festival at the York Theatre Company in New York City. The productions are part of a newly formed partnership between Penn State and the well-known off-Broadway theatre.
Cultural Conversations is the only new works festival of its kind in the country, offering opportunities to see new plays by national and international playwrights. Each work is based on themes of local and global diversity. In keeping with that theme, 9 Parts of Desire examines the impact of war and peace on the lives of Iraqi women.
Cultural Conversations is funded by the School of Theatre, the College of Arts and Architecture Diversity Committee, the Institute for the Arts and Humanities, and the Josephine Berry Weiss Chair in the Humanities Endowment.
For more information, go to www.culturalconversations.org.
Contact: Susan Russell, artistic director of Cultural Conversations, sbr13@psu.edu