Tag Archives: Little Black Dress INK

After SWAN Day…

LAFPI, Women, , ,

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The SWAN Day Action Fest was a success!

 

We will post highlights in the coming week or so.  The room in Samuel French Theatre & Film Bookshop was packed, the plays were well written, entertaining, thought provoking, etc., etc., etc., the actors were talented and the audience was great!

Thanks to Little Black Dress INK, The Vagrancy Actors, Samuel French Theatre & Film Bookshop for partnering with LAFPI and to everyone who pitched in and participated.   And, a very special thanks to our fearless, faithful, get-it-done leader — Jennie Webb!

 

SWAN Day Action Fest – this Saturday, 29 March!!

Female Artists, Performance, Women, , ,
The SWAN Day Action Fest is a FREE day of play readings and connections open to all, featuring the work of women playwrights and directors in celebration of Support Women Artists Day. Presented by LA FPI and Little Black Dress INK with the support of Samuel French Bookshop. Special thanks to The Vagrancy.
 
Join us this Saturday, March 29, 2014 from  10:30 a.m – 4:30 p.m. at Samuel French Theatre & Film Bookshop,7623 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles , CA 90046  (at Stanley, east of Fairfax in Hollywood).
 
There is street parking for the event; there is also limited parking in back of the bookstore (off of Stanley).
 
EVENT SCHEDULE:
  • 10:30 a.m: Refreshments + Connections / Deadline to Submit Micro-Reads Pages
  • 11:00 a.m.: Playreadings –
Civilization by Velina Hasu Houston, Directed by Laura Steinroeder
Douds, Iowa by Debbie Bolsky, Directed by Katherine Murphy
The Stiff by Kathryn Graf, Directed by McKerrin Kelly
  • 12:00 p.m.: Micro-Reads – Directed by Lynne Moses
  • 1:00 p.m.: Refreshments + Connections / Deadline to Submit Micro-Reads Pages
  • 1:30 p.m.: Playreadings –
Over Ripe by Becca Anderson, Directed by Gloria Iseli
Awesome Big Somebody by Sarah Tuft, Directed by Holly L. Derr
  • 3:00 p.m.: Micro-Reads – Directed by Laurel Wetzork
 
For more information, visit lafpi.com/events
Follow us on Twitter @theLAFPI

 

SWAN Day Action Fest Plays Selected!

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Plays Chosen for the SWAN Day Action Fest are:

 

Civilization by Velina Hasu Houston, Directed by Laura Steinroeder

 

Douds, Iowa by Debbie Bolsky, Directed by Katherine Murphy

 

The Stiff  by Kathryn Graf, Directed by McKerrin Kelly

 

Over Ripe by Becca Anderson, Directed by Gloria Iseli

 

Awesome Big Somebody by Sarah Tuft, Directed by Holly L. Derr

 

And

Micro-Reads  by “your name here“, Directed by Lynne Moses

 

And more

 Micro-Reads by “your name here“, Directed by Laurel Wetzork

 

(for the SWAN Day Action Fest Schedule go to the LA FPI Events page, for information on how to submit for Micro-Reads see the Micro-Reads Guidelines.)

 

WHEN is the SWAN Day Action Fest:

Saturday, March 29, 2014 10:30 a.m – 4:30 p.m.

 

WHERE will the SWAN Day Action Fest be held:

Samuel French Theatre & Film Bookshop

7623 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90046

(at Stanley, east of Fairfax in Hollywood)

 

PARKING:  Limited parking in back of the bookstore (off of Stanley) or street parking.

 

TICKETS:  FREE; donations graciously accepted.

 

HOW do you find out more about the SWAN Day Action Fest:

Visit lafpi.com/events

Connect with us on Facebook/LAFPI

Follow us on Twitter @theLAFPI

. little black dress INK logoPresented by Little Black Dress INK with Los Angeles Female Playwrights Initiative and Samuel French Theatre & Film Bookshop

Little Black Dress INK and YOU

playwriting,

I’ll be writing more this week, but wanted to take some time up front to talk about Little Black Dress INK’s Female Playwrights ONSTAGE Project.  There is still time left for playwrights to share work with us in anticipation of selection for this year’s festival, Planting the Seed.

Check out the details below – deadline is this Saturday.

Download (PDF, 175KB)

~Tiffany

www.LittleBlackDressINK.org

Landed! And still Juggling…

playwriting, , ,

Well, I’m in NY… and it’s just as loud, as bustling, and as chaotic as it was the last time I was here… or maybe not.  Actually, the last time I was here, there was a freakin’ hurricane-a-coming, so things were pretty intense.

In any case, I’ve landed, taken a nap, and am safely resting in Brooklyn, trying to recover from the lack of sleep I got on the red-eye flight over.  I’m excited and nervous about tomorrow – there’s been a lot of anticipation and anxiety around this event for me for the past several months… mostly me fearing the unknown and also being afraid to trust in the awesomeness of the opportunity.  Now that I’m here, I’m like “Hey, whatever happens/doesn’t happen, I’m still a playwright who got to travel to NY to see her play performed!” and some of the anxiety it dissipating… some of it.

And I’m so thankful I have some good friends and loved ones attending the show tomorrow night with me.

Meanwhile, I’m also trying to get some emails written to the ladies contributing plays to my Female Playwright’s Fest, From the Mouths of Babes, this July.  It’s very exciting – 9 new plays written by female playwrights from AZ, CA, and MN will be performed in Prescott, AZ then read in LA (I’ll be sure to make sure the LAFPI posse gets VIP invitations!) and then also read/performed in Minneapolis.  As a playwright who yearns to have more control over her destiny than merely writing plays and sending them out into the ethers, it’s really satisfying to put on my producer hat and make things happen.

First thing I need to make happen though, are those dramaturgy emails to the playwrights 😛

So, even though I’m here in NY and on a lovely vacation of sorts, there’s still lots to be doing, to be juggling, and to keep me from chewing all my finger nails to the nub.

More to come…

~Tiffany

Progress Shoes

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So I hopped on the blog yesterday to talk about my producerly empowerment, and what do I wind up doing?  Complaining about the fight to find space in LA.  Tsk, tsk, tsk!

But the tallying/writing about it brought the truth to the surface of my frustrated mind… I’m still waiting.  On theatres. For space.  I hate waiting.  It makes me feel stuck.

And I hate being stuck.

Which is when it hit me:  Who said readings have to happen inside theatres?

And that little epiphany put me right back on track and in control… because if we stop limiting ourselves to the confines of the current patriarchal/inbred theatrical hierarchy (and I mean that in the most respectful way possible), aren’t we in the drivers seat?

(And totally/terrifyingly responsible for the outcome… but that’s a different problem :-P)

It seems then, that the frustrated female playwright need only some peers, some ingenuity, and some proverbial balls to get things up and running for herself… then she needs some running shoes and some long jump practice so she can bound around and over the flaming hurdles in her way.

I don’t know if I’m in marathon shape yet, but I’ve certainly got the shoes.

Which is one of the things I actually enjoy about producing – the creative problem solving it requires.  And maybe that’s what I like about playwriting too – stirring things up that require Big Answers… not knowing at the onset how I will tell the tale, only that I must tell it.

So, I don’t quite have all the answers for how I’m going to get my Female Playwrights ONSTAGE project the national wings I know it will someday flourish with, but I’m confident that if I keep fighting for it and running with it, I’ll find the festival evolving and developing those wings as we go…

Which is all to say, I figured out where the festival will be read in LA… and it feels perfect and exciting and surprisingly multi-dimensional for where its at in its development.

And that, my dears, is what I call progress.

 

The Battleground

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I have a secret – I’ve become a producer over here in Arizona – I’ve actually produced more shows/events this past year than I’ve written and I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop… because it’s hard out here for a Playwright.

It’s damn hard.

So I created Little Black Dress INK, an organization dedicated to promoting/creating production opportunities for female playwrights.  I invited some talented ladies to put pen to paper (or fingertips to keys) and draft up some plays for a festival last summer and it was a great success!   We didn’t know it would be a great success, we just went for it and crossed our fingers – because it’s better to do that than waste time hemming and hawing over a thing for so long that you forget what it is you’re even considering.

Which is why, when I decided to do it again, I decided to go reach even further… to get the fest to travel.  One hell of a lofty undertaking, to be sure… but so worth the work… isn’t it?

I ask, because I’m finding that while I may be tired of sitting around waiting for someone to produce my work, not everyone else has my same verve for  making-it-happen-ness.

(which may actually be more of a testament to their common sense than my tenacity)

In any regard – I am trying to get the plays some sort of reading in LA… it’s just a reading… no big expense, no set, no props… just a reading… And it’s been a hell of a lot more work than getting the thing fully produced here in AZ.

Which draws images to mind of the Los Angeles battleground I abandoned two years ago – so many theatres, so many artists, so many denizens of the “Industry” running their scrawny-underpaid butts off to get produced, be on stage, be seen, and knock some socks off…

I don’t miss the rat race of LA, but I am definitely feeling out of her frenetic loop.

But what else can I do than keep on keeping on?  I’m a playwright who’s fallen into producing as a means of feeling less impotent against the theatrical unknowables… no one ever said any of it would be easy, did they?  Nope.  Not even for a second.

Crazy Schemes Produced

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So, I’m a pretty active person, playwright, and dreamer… I like to keep busy and I like to feel productive.  I think it’s one of the reasons I was SO excited about the LAFPI starting up… I mean, a group of kick-ass playwrights all working towards gender parity in theater?  AND we get to have fun mixers and support each other and address important issues in theater?

Count me IN!

And over the past year (+) I’ve been super happy to see all the strides we’ve made – the very important LAFPI study helmed by the amazing Miss Ella Martin, the Women on the Fringe work that honored theatres who produce female playwrights, and the all encouraging and inspiring support that this site has offered for countless other female playwrights who want to get involved and join the revolution.

It’s been amazing.

But I’ve been watching a lot of it from AZ – where I’m now stationed – and I’ve been ants-in-my-pants-to-the-extreme for more ground-work than I can actually do from afar…

Until I realized that my new stomping grounds include an amazing community theatre and quite a few talented and accomplished female playwrights of its own…

And then I realized that I could support female playwrights by actually producing them.

So I started up Little Black Dress INK (www.LittleBlackDressINK.org), sent out invitations to some awesomely talented women, had a thrilling meeting with the head of the theatre here who said “YES!” to my crazy scheme, and got the ball rolling…

Now, a few months later, I find myself in the home stretch of a most passionate project:  Dirty Laundry, a ten minute play fest benefitting the Prescott Area Women’s Shelter and including plays from 9 awesome female playwrights!  There are also 7 female directors helming each of the plays, and a WAY talented team of actors bringing these plays to life.

So that ants in the pants feeling I was complaining about?  It’s settled down a little bit, appeased that I’m making something happen instead of waiting for it to come to me…

And isn’t that what the LAFPI is all about?

Becoming an “Instigator” is a call to arms!  All it takes is some daring, some passion, some wild-eyed-scheming, and a shared vision.

I might be one tired puppy at the end of this week, but I will be sleeping happy 🙂

~Tiffany