>My ten minute play A Page Turner has been commissioned by, and will be performed at, the 20/20 Conference in Birmingham in March. The director will be Gwenda Hughes. Conference details below…
20/20 conference: Playwriting/Pedagogy
- 20 years of the Birmingham Playwriting MA/MPhil(B)
- 20 new plays by graduate playwrights
- 20 papers on the pedagogy of playwriting
University of Birmingham, Selly Oak Campus
Saturday 13 March – Sunday 14 March 2010
2009/10 marks the twentieth anniversary of the foundation of what was then the MA in Playwriting in Birmingham, the first course of its kind in Britain. To mark this anniversary, 20/20 will reflect on the impact of the study of playwriting on dramatic writing within the theatre and beyond. The weekend will include the debut of 20 specially commissioned short plays by graduates of the Birmingham course. Panels of speakers will include some of the most active and influential playwrights, academics, and critics working in Britain, Europe, and the USA today.
The conference will attempt to define a lexicon of dramaturgical terms, survey the extent and validity of the playwriting literature, examine how playwriting is taught and nurtured at different levels of educational and artistic endeavour and through a comparative account of its place in the US, Britain and Germany, question what form plays for our times should actually take, ponder the old chestnut that theory and practice don’t mix, look at how playwriting is developed in theatres, on radio and in schools. It will be of interest to any playwright, playwriting teacher, dramaturg, educationalist, theatre practitioner and academic in this field.
20/20 plays by:
Clare Bayley, Craig Baxter, Helen Blakeman, Ben Brown, Stephanie Dale, Rod Dungate, George Gotts, Lucy Gough, Tony Green, Fraser Grace, Sara Grochala, Nancy Harris, Duncan Macmillan, Charles Mulekwa, Amy Rosenthal, Carolyn Scott Jeffs, Tim Stimpson, Anthony Weigh, Lance Woodman, Sarah Woods
Panellists include
Mark Bly is the Senior Dramaturg and Director of New Play Development at the Alley Theatre, Houston, TX.
David Edgar plays include Destiny, The Life and Times of Nicholas Nickleby, Testing the Echo founder of the MA in Playwriting whose book How Plays Work is published by Nick Hern
Dr Ken Cerniglia is a theatre scholar and dramaturg, who works for Disney Theatricals, and will offer the view from Broadway.
Maja Zade works as a Dramaturg at the Lehninerplatz Schaubühne, which has led Europe in establishing the collaboration of the playwright, the director, and the dramaturg in producing new work. Zade has also worked as a senior reader at the Royal Court Theatre.
Jack Bradley dramaturg and writer, former literary manager National Theatre.
Dan Rebellato Cathy Turner, Mary Luckhurst, Kara Reilly, Ian Brown, Karen Juers Munby, Liz Tomlin, Steve Waters, Anthony Weigh, Julie Wikinson, Peter Wild, Caroline Jester and others….
Fees: £130 full rate/ £75 concessionary.
Includes two lunches, dinner and drinks on Saturday night, all conference events and two performances of the 20/20 plays.
Supported by the British Theatre Conference
Lance Woodman 