STONINGTON - Award-winning playwright John Cariani, author of Almost, Maine as well as a Tony Award-nominated actor, will return to Opera House Arts in Stonington (OHA) to teach a second playwriting master class, "Five Days to Write Ten Minute Plays." The five day playwriting intensive is suitable for writers of all levels of experience, from beginners to experts, and is scheduled to accommodate both working local residents and those who may wish to come to Stonington for a week's creative stay: Saturday, Sunday, and Wednesday (Veterans? Day), November 7, 8, and 11 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.; and Monday and Tuesday, November 9-10, from 3 to 9 p.m. In addition, as part of its annual Winter Master Class Series, Opera House Arts will be offering "Scenic Design for Artists," taught by University of Southern Maine professor Shannon Zura, from November 7-December 19.
"`Play' is defined as `recreational activity, especially the spontaneous activity of children. For short-fun," Cariani wrote in introducing his playwriting course, developed in conjunction with OHA's master class series. "We define a playwright, then, as a maker of fun. And in this workshop we will make fun. Even if the fun you want to make is deep, dark, dramatic, polarizing, political, issue-driven and sad."
The playwriting workshop will focus on writing 10-minute plays, beginning with the art of dramatic storytelling. "We will learn that brevity is indeed the source of wit," Cariani said. "We will tell our stories-however small or large-economically. We will learn what happens when we write when we're confined by time (10 minutes) and space (10 pages). Limitation inspires imagination."
In this workshop, participants will learn how to make the surprising, unreal, impossible, illogical stories they want to tell make sense to an audience in 10 pages or less. Exercises will focus participants on draping existing story structures-fictional and non- fictional-with their own idiosyncratic voices. Other exercises will encourage participants to work with poems, paintings, and found objects; and explore making drama out of an essence, a picture, a feeling, or an idea. The workshop will include monologue and dialogue-writing exercises, and exercises to stimulate the writers' visual sensibilities: always with the intention of solving the riddle of "what happens next?" Participants will receive instruction on how to read and constructively critique others' work; and how to control and get the most out of a feedback session.
"Scenic Design for Artists: A crash course in set design for visual artists," taught by USM's Shannon Zura, will run from 11 a.m to 4 p.m. on three Saturdays, November 7, 21, and December 19. This workshop is designed to provide our area's large number of visual artists with a new way to employ their skills?for fun and also for pay! Participants will learn how the functions of scenic design and the role of the designer integrate with the rest of a stage production. All participants will read the playscript of Brilliant Traces by Cindy Lou Johnson, the play around which the workshop will be organized; and the first class will include analysis of the script as a preparation for determining visual styles and design approaches. Subsequent classes will include the construction of models and creation of elevations for the Technical Director. One participant in the workshop will be chosen, shortly after the December 19 session, as the paid set designer for the Opera House Arts' production of Brilliant Traces set in February, and will work closely with a technical director to realize the selected design.
John Cariani's first play, Almost, Maine, premiered at Portland Stage
Company in 2004, and opened Off Broadway in the winter of 2005. The play was named one of the ten best of the 2004/2005 regional theater season by the Wall Street Journal and is featured in Smith and Kraus' New Playwrights: Best Plays of 2006. John's short plays have been produced in New York by the Barrow Group; he was a contributing writer for Transport Group's Drama Desk-nominated The Audience; and his newest play is being developed by the Cape Cod Theatre Project. As an actor, John was most recently featured in the Los Angeles, CA premiere of "Minsky's," a Depression-era musical. He is an Outer Critics Circle Award recipient and a Tony Award nominee. He has appeared on and off Broadway, and in several films and television shows. Many know him as Beck, the very eager forensics technician on Law & Order. Originally from Presque Isle, Maine, John is a graduate of Amherst College. He currently lives in New York City.
Shannon Zura is an Associate Professor on the Design and Theater Tech faculty at the University of Southern Maine and was recently featured in Stage Directions Magazine as an outstanding woman in theater. She most recently designed lights for Opera House Arts' acclaimed production of Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" in July 2009. She has designed set, lights and sound for Philadelphia Shakespeare Company's The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged and sound for Romeo and Juliet and Taming of the Shrew. Shannon holds an MFA in Lighting Design from Temple University and is a designer for Maine State Music Theater in Brunswick each summer.
For more information:
Contact: Linda Nelson
Phone: 207/367-2788
email: lnelson@operahousearts.org
WWW: www.operahousearts.org
